August 25, 2008

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Dear Parents,

If you are joining us for the first time, welcome to elementary school! If you are a returning family, welcome back to school! We will kick off our kindergarten year with a theme titled How to be a Star. This theme identifies, reinforces, and allows opportunities for the children to practice the rules, procedures, and behaviors that promote success in school. During How to be a Star we will focus on the following kindergarten concepts:

1. Children who come to school are called students.
2. There are rules to be followed in school.
3. Students always do their best in school.

Listed below is our integrated language arts (ILA) content:

		Beginning Skills
Week #1 August 25	Stories I Like Books	Rhyming, Phonemic awareness, and Listening activities
Week #2 September 2	A Day at School
Week #3 September 8	The More We Get Together
Week #4 September 15	Chicka Chicka Boom Boom
Week #5 September 22	I Can Read I Can Write

As we read our big books, we will focus on the following ILA outcomes:

• Books have both pictures (illustrations) and print (text)
  
• The print is what people read
  
• Storytellers use strategies to make their stories interesting
  

In math we will work on the following processes and skills:

• Number and Numeration
  • Count objects, sounds, and taps
  • Counts backward by ones
  • Recognize and understand zero as a number for “none”
  • Represents numbers with concrete objects
  • Use one-to-one correspondence to count objects
  • Recognize and represent numbers with groups of objects
  • Count numbers in sequence
  • Count up to 10
  • Represents numbers with claps or taps
  • Practice reading numerals through 10
  • Recognize numbers as “5 and some more”
• Data and Chance
  • Construct a bar graph and a moveable graph
  • Make comparisons and answer simple questions based on data from the graphs
  • Make a pictorial representation of class data
• Measurement and Reference Frames
  • Explore measurement by comparing lengths
  • Use measurement comparison words
  • Experiment with and compare volumes and develop awareness of relative size
  • Notice coin features and differences among coins
  • Compare heights of objects
• Geometry
  • Identify and describe shapes
• Patterns, Functions and Algebra
  • Explore pattern blocks
  • Find ways to sort objects using a variety of attributes
  • Identify attributes
  • Create and extend patterns with sounds and motions
  • Describe patterns
  • Sort coins according to various attributes

You can contribute to your child’s early school success by checking homework, reading theme-related books together, working on related projects and crafts at home, listening attentively as your child talks about school activities, and involving him or her in experiences that reinforce our How to be a Star lessons. You are invited to send photos of your child participating in theme-related activities for inclusion in the How to be a Star Photo Album.

Please check your child’s book bag and school folder every day.

Thank you in advance for your support. And we’re off . . .

Sincerely,