K002 – Week of 3/6/17

Last week was an exciting week in Kindergarten!
To continue exploring in our bread study, we actually made some bread as a class and baked it (with some help from the cafeteria). Students had the opportunity to measure ingredients, add them to the mixture, knead the dough and wait for it to rise before we could bake it. The next day, we also learned how to make butter together. While shaking the butter in the jar, we chanted the butter song!
“Butter! Butter! How do we make it?
We put in the cream and we shake it, shake it, shake it!”
At snack time, we shared the bread and butter that we made. Later we wrote about this experience in our bread study books. If you would like to try bread making at home with your child, here is the recipe we used: http://www.yourhomebasedmom.com/bread-bag/. Click here to see some pictures of our experience!
We began a writing unit focusing on procedural writing. Students are taking on the role of teacher as they write books that teach people how to do something. We call these “How-To” books. Kindergartners started by brainstorming things they knew how to do, make or play. For example, how to brush your teeth, make toast or play soccer. Then students began to write step by step directions. The focus is on making the directions easy for someone to follow and the illustrations clear and easy to read. We will continue writing “How-To” books this week. Talk to your child about what he/she is teaching people how to do.
We also began exploring non-fiction books in reading. Students are very excited to learn lots of different information from these books. This week we will learn how to sort non-fiction books into groups and categorize them by finding ways that they go together (i.e. sea animals, plants, communities, insects.) This week we will also begin to explore non-fiction features found in these books.