End of the Reduce, Reuse and Recycle Unit

Dear Parents,

In an effort to communicate more about what we are doing in the classroom I will start sending out a weekly update of our learning goals and celebrations.

As some of you may know, we are learning about garbage and the three R’s (reduce, reuse and recycle). Over past weeks we have learned that garbage that is not recycled goes to the landfill and can cause problems for our communities.

Before our time away, we read a book called “The Adventures of Gary and Harry; A Tale of Two Sea Turtles” where a sea turtle swallowed a plastic bag, thinking it was a jellyfish, and was chocking until his friend saved him. Heavy stuff, I know, but the kids are now noticing every plastic bag that we encounter in a day and are real creative and curious about how to teach others to make a change. Next week we will continue by learning about how paper is sourced, used and recycled and ways we can all make some changes to keep paper from sitting in a landfill.

Academically, we are working on:

Claudine is working in small groups on Math skills such as:

• graphing
• shapes
• counting
• sorting
• patterns
• measurement

Skip is working with small groups on Literacy

• Letter recognition
• Lower case letter recognition
• Beginning letter sounds
• Middle and ending sounds
• Hand writing
• Pre-reading skills such as word for word tracking, CVC decoding and sight words

I am introducing students to reading who are showing an interest in learning and already have the pre-rec skills. This is not an ECE standard nor is it necessary for kindergarten readiness. I would never pressure a student to learn anything and recommend the same practice at home.

Please feel free to come to me with any questions about your student’s progress.

Next Week: Buildings!!!

*** March Conference sign up coming soon!