First Week in Kindergarten

Wow! We have had an exciting week in our new Kindergarten classroom! This week we have been focusing really hard on learning new routines and following classroom expectations. We have learned that the word "expectation" means the things that we need to do to follow the rules and be safe. Everyday, we practice our expectations (that the students created) for carpet time.

Today we posed for some pictures, showing how well we can follow all of these expectations! Ms. Petersen is going to add the pictures to our chart to help us remember.

We are also becoming experts at our entry routines! Each day, we come into the Kindergarten room and hang up our backpacks in our cubbies. After that, we change our shoes and get our green or blue mail folder. We place the mail folder in the green bucket then go to the carpet to wait for Ms. Petersen.

To start our day, Ms. Petersen takes attendance. This is so we know who is here at school and who is at home. Ms. Petersen says "Good morning/afternoon, _________" and we say "Good morning/afternoon Ms. Petersen". 

After attendance, we start our meeting. The first thing we do is check our schedule. 

 

The schedule lets us know what we are going to do for the day! It also helps us to know when our favourite activities (such as gym, music, snack time or choice time) are going to happen. When an activity is finished, Ms. Petersen takes off the card.

After that, we look at our calendar. We are learning that it is the month of September. Then we all count together to figure out what date (number) it is. We are trying really, really hard to raise our hand with a quiet mouth when we think we know the answer. The calendar also shows us when important days are coming up, such as Picture Day or Meet the Teacher BBQ!

Then it is time to trace our name two times. We try really hard to stay on the black lines. We do our best and it is okay if we make a mistake. When we are finished, we put it in the blue bucket and get started on our stations. The stations help us develop our small hand muscles to help us print better!

One station we practice is the sticker station. We take off the circle stickers very carefully and try to place them directly on dotted paper.

In our classroom, we have a red timer that shows us how much time is left for an activity. When the red is all done, we wait to hear Ms. Petersen's instructions.

When the time is up, we clean up our stations, push in our chairs and sit in our special spots on the carpet. To end our meeting, we usually sing a song. We are learning so many new songs! We love singing about pirates, fishing, twinkling stars, moose and bubblegum! We can't wait to see what fun things we will do in Kindergarten next week!