Two Hoots and A Holler

Hoot #1
This hoot is all about PUMPKINS!  We have read about them, learned about them, explored them, carved them, and picked them!  
First we read this book, then we guessed how many seeds we thought would be in our pumpkin. Our pumpkin had 681 seeds!!   

We cut open our pumpkin and pulled out all of the pulp and seeds.

We dug through the pulp to pick out the seeds.  
Then we counted out 20 pumpkin seeds to take home.  

We completed a pumpkin brace map after we explored and carved our pumpkin.  

The Rockstars voted, and they decided that their jack-o-lantern was going to have a scary face.
  I think they were happy with the end result!  

The next day, we were able to take our pumpkin unit further by attending a field trip to the farm.  Every student got to ride on a hay ride out to the pumpkin patch to pick their very own pumpkin to take home!!   

Hoot #2

This year our kindergarten team decided to go all out on Halloween!  It was SO much fun, and the kids loved the entire day!  Students and teachers got to dress up in a costume for Halloween!!  There was only one catch though...it had to be a book character costume!

We also had students from the middle school come and read to our class in costumes!

After reading Room on the Broom, students got to make Witch's Brew for snack!  They got to help mix the snack in the cauldron and make spooky noises to make sure it mixed just right!  There was dry ice under the cauldron, but it had stopped smoking before the picture was taken.  The dry ice was so cool!! 

Then we got to do a "potion" and see whose jack-o-lantern would make the most elephant toothpaste.  The Jitterbugs won!  On the count of 3, we all shouted "HOCUS POCUS" and watched our jack-o-lanterns erupt!  The students all "oooohhh'd" and "aaaahhhhh'd"!  It was AWESOME!  

A Spook-tacular day was had by all!!
Even heard one student say, "this is the best day ever!"

This Week's Holler...
This week's holler goes out to all of our kinder team! We all work hard (that goes without saying), but we also work very well together as a team! This year we decided to dress up as letters from Chicka Chicka Boom Boom. The students absolutely loved seeing their teachers dressed up, and even though they may not admit it...the teachers had fun dressing up too!

 

Two Hoots And A Holler

Hoot #1

We continued celebrating and learning about all things fall this past week.  Ms. Jamie's class made Witch's Brew for snack one day.  The kids LOVED this activity so much that they shared it with Ms. Jodi's class!  Students have to listen and follow the directions carefully to make their Witch's Brew just right!  Then at the end they have to stir it all up and say "BOOOOOO!"  They took this task of stirring and saying BOO very seriously!  

Hoot #2

We wrapped up all of our October festivities and learning with a field trip to the pumpkin patch on Halloween Day!  The students had so much fun on our first field trip of the year!  They got to experience a corn maze, hay rides, pig races, petting zoo, and a pumpkin patch!  I heard some talking about it after we returned to school, and they said that this was the "best day ever!"  

 WE ARE CRAZY ABOUT OUR PARENT INVOLVEMENT!!!

This wonderful adventure wore us out!!!

This Week's Holler...

This week's holler goes out to Kristen at A Day in First Grade.  She has TONS of inquiry based, hands-on learning activities!  We love her science units in her TPT store, and so do our students!  Definitely hop on over to her blog and see for yourself how AWESOME this teacher is!  

Two Hoots and A Holler

Hoot #1

We learned all about pumpkins last week.  On Monday the students walked into the room to see a HUGE pumpkin in their classroom.  We carved a pumpkin on Friday after reading Pumpkin Jack,  Pumpkin, Pumpkin, and reading non fiction texts on pumpkins.  The students loved getting to use their 5 senses to explore their pumpkin.  We got to smell, touch, see our pumpkin.  We tapped on the pumpkin to see what it would sound like, and the class determined it sounded like a drum.  I had a few that were brave enough to taste the pumpkin.  They decided that pumpkin pie tastes a lot better! 

We dug through all the pulp to get all of the seeds.  Our pumpkin had over 550 seeds!  Each student took home 20 pumpkin seeds to plant at home, and the rest were planted at school.

 We voted on what kind of face our pumpkin would have.  It was a tie, so we carved a two faced pumpkin!  One side was happy, the other was scary. 

After carving and planting, we did pumpkin brace maps.  The students could easily label the parts of a pumpkin and recall the vocabulary used because of this wonderful hands-on experience! 
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Hoot #2

Over the past week, we have had a lot of visitors!  We had the librarian from our town's public library come read to us!  They love listening to stories! 

We also had Ned's Kindness Adventure come to our school! 

 The Kindness Adventure assembly shows that kindness is the key to making friends and respecting others.  It was very entertaining for students.  The students were engaged and interested the entire time!  It had a very good message.  It allowed students to see schools and children from a different culture, and learn to respect others' cultures. We are selling "Kindness Treasures" this week in our school's snack store to help students to remember to be kind and pay it forward. 

GO OUT AND SPREAD KINDNESS LIKE CONFETTI!!  

ALL IT TAKES IS A SMILE OR SOME KIND WORDS! 

 

This Week's Holler...
This week we have been really focusing on our writing.  Students have had a very hard time with writing this year.  After stumbling across a blog about writing from Abigail over at Kindergarten Chaos, we decided to take a few steps back and start over.  We have been working really hard on our "Drawing Journal" and focusing on how important illustrations are when writing.  We have seen so much improvement in our students writing!  We are moving on to labeling and lists next.  We loved her character cards used to help students understand the importance of a setting and adding details.  Check out these illustrations from some of our kinders using the character cards! 

We literally went from scribbling on paper to actual pictures!  Hop over to her blog to read all about it!  Thanks Abigail for sharing your ideas!  You Rock!