Welcome To Kindergarten!! I’ve been waiting all summer to meet you!!

Dear Parents,

Welcome to the wonderful world of Kindergarten!! My name is Becky Smith and I will be your son or daughter’s teacher this year. The whole kindergarten team has been working hard on developing lessons that will inspire and develop your child’s learning abilities. We also hope that they have a lot of fun while they are here as well.

This is my ninth year teaching here at Valley Oaks Elementary. I graduated from the University of Houston in May of 2005 with a degree in early childhood education.  I have a wonderful husband named Tom, and two adorable children. Tommy will be 3 in November, and Mackenzie just turned 1 in July!  Our other family members are our dog Yuna, and our very sweet cat named Buttons. When I have free time I enjoy cooking, biking, sewing and taking walks around our neighborhood.

I am so excited to be teaching your child this year. I have a real passion for leaning and I hope to pass that on to your child.  During the year I hope that we can work together to help your child reach their learning capabilities. 

I'm so excited that you were able to visit my class blog. My hope is that this will give you a snapshot into the fun things we are learning and doing, Please feel free to leave comments or ask questions.  I show the blog to students regularly, and post videos, pictures, and projects that we have been working on.  they are so excited to share their world with you!  

Once again, I want to express how excited I am to be teaching your child.  I can think of no other profession out there that I would rather be doing.  Please feel free to contact me through out the year with any questions or concerns that you may have.  My e-mail is

Becky.smith@springbranchisd.com

Here is to a wonderful fun filled year,

Mrs. Becky Smith 

Parts of a Seed

We have been learning recently a lot about the things that plants need such as food, water, sun, and air. This week we started looking to see what happens when a seed starts to grow. We soaked some lima beans in water overnight. After they had soaked we were able to easily open the seed and find the baby plant, and stored food. We had a lot of fun exploring our seeds.

Class Dojo

Hi all, 
Over the last few weeks we have been trying out a new behavior management system in my class. Class Dojo!!! http://www.classdojo.com/ It has been really working wonderfully in our class. Each students gets their own monster avatar, and they earn Dojo points throughout the day.  In the morning, I give them a goal to reach (usually 5 or 6)  if they reach the goal they get a reward.  Their points can go up and down as the day progresses based upon their behavior.  I usually let them see how many points they have a few times a day, which is really good way to keep them motivated about the goal for the day.  When I add or take away points it will make a sound on my computer which really gets their attention.  They want to know if they were the one who got the point. 
Another great feature that I haven't explored yet is the ability for parents to log on with a code so they can check their child's progress over the day or week.  I did however give the students a code so they could change their avatar. (Aren't they so cute!!!)  
 Mrs. Smith 

Field Trip and Rodeo Fun

This week was so busy and fun! First, we went on our field trip to the Edith Moore Nature Sanctuary and Terry Hershey Park. We had so much fun exploring in the park, watching the ducks, and playing with our friends.  At the Nature Sanctuary we learned  that a sanctuary was a special place for plants and animals to live. We toured a real log cabin and tried our best to fish with nets in the small pond.  We were so lucky that the rain left us early that morning so we could enjoy the beautiful day! Thanks to the parent volunteers that came along with us! 

On Friday we held or first ever Kindergarten Rodeo! It was a wonderful way to top off our learning about ranching and rodeo life.  We ate cattle drive food, had barrel and stick horse races. Practiced our aim as we through bean bags into cowboy boots and even panned for gold. 

A special thanks to all of the parents who came out to take pictures, set up, clean up and supervise during our rodeo! We couldn't have made it such a success without your help!! 

Boot throw

Covered Wagon Golf

Stick Horse Races

Information Station

Ready, Set,GO!!!!! 

A few of our awesome parent who helped us out!  

Adding With a Number Line

Today our class used a number line as a way to work on adding.  The focus of today was learning how to count up using dice, a number line,and manipulatives such as bears.
First I showed the class the number line 0-10. 

This is the basic number line that I used . 

Here is a picture of the two different types of dice that I used during this lesson. 

Four bears went for walk in the forest

  

One more bear joined them for a walk in the forest.  How many bears went for a walk in the forest?

We repeated this process several time so that students would have time to practice independently. Then I modeled the same problem as before except I moved the bear along the number line alone. 






In this problem there are four bears going for a walk, but the bear is the marker for the total amount of bears.  






Then a added one more bear joining in for the walk by moving the bear up one space on the number line. 

Again we repeated this process several times.  I even let a few students come up with their own story problems that the students tried to solve. 
You can do either of these methods when working at home in math with your child.  Teaching your child about how a number line works is a great skill for math later on.  

Mrs. Smith 

100 Day

I am so sad that it has taken this long to post our 100 Day celebrations. We really did have so much fun.  Our class traveled around to different teachers where we built with 100 items, made a 100 day snack, created a 100 day pop-up card, and even made a fun art project with 100 gumballs.  In the afternoon we shared our 100 day projects, and created a 100 day necklace.  Below are some pictures from our fantastic day!At the bottom of the page is a little video of all their 100 day projects. They did a fabulous job on them.

Try our video maker at Animoto.

A Few Fabulous Videos

Today I wanted to share with you a few fabulous videos that I found to practice counting. If your child has already mastered counting to 100 by ones I suggest practicing different ways such as by 10's, 5's, and even by 2's. These videos are a great way to practice.



Hope you enjoy these. 
Love, 
Mrs. Smith