Christmas came early and so did SANTA!!

Today, during our Christmas party, we heard a loud knock on our door.  Guess who it was?!
SANTA!!!!
They were all SO excited their mouths literally almost hit the floor! He stayed for a while and every one of my friends got a chance to sit on his lap and talk to him.  Santa asked if they were naughty or nice, everyone yelled nice except my cute little Kendall.  She said "BOTH!!"  ...so stinkin' cute!  We are all a little naughty sometimes!!

Cayden was a little scared, but it worked out!

Giving Santa a big HO HO HO!

Our little elves working hard in Santa's workshop:

Mrs. Bassett and some elf friends at the gift wrapping center

Mrs. Engle, Mrs. Kueny, and friends at the cookie decorating center

Elves earning their ears with Mrs. Schlagle

Mrs. Marple at the ornament making center

Elves earning their bells

Chrismukkah

Merry Chrismukkah!

Over the past two weeks, we have spent a lot of time learning about different holidays.  

Kwanzaa

K is for Kwanzaa

My First Kwanzaa Book

Seven Candles for Kwanzaa

What we already knew about Kwanzaa:

-Kwanzaa is a holiday.

-You spend it with your family.

-There is a lot of love to go around.

 

What we learned about Kwanzaa:

-Kwanzaa is 7 days long.
-A kinara holds the Kwanzaa candles.

-Each day you light one candle.  

-The candles are different colors: black, red, and green.

-Each color means different things.

-Kwanzaa started on the continent of Africa.

When learning that Kwanzaa started on the continent of Africa, Mason shared with us that a LONG time ago, all of the continents were stuck together in on big piece.  What a teachable moment!!  I decided to pull up a picture of this, and we talked, and talked, and talked!  We learned that there was a special name for when all of the continents were stuck together.  It was called Pangea. 

Mason also shared that the plates in the Earth 'moved and shaked' like an earthquake and that is how the continents broke apart.  We made a self-connection to this summer when we experienced our first earthquake.  Pretty cool!

We also talked about the continent that we live on.  Kinders got to take guesses about which continent we live on.  

Here are their guesses:

Three friends got the correct continent! We learned that we live on the continent of North America.

Hanukkah 

Hanukkah Lights, Hanukkah Nights

The Hanukkah Guest

What we already knew about Hanukkah:

-Hanukkah is a holiday.

-You spend it with your family.

 

What we learned about Hanukkah:

-During Hanukkah, families make latkes.  

Latkes look like pancakes but they are really made from potatoes.

- Gelt is a coin shaped piece of chocolate.  

-Kids play the dreidel game with friends.

-There are 8 days in Hanukkah.

-A menorah holds the Hanukkah candles.

-Each day, you light a candle. 

Christmas

We read a really fun book called How Santa Lost His Job.  They next day, Jingle was missing from our room.   Santa needed his help at the North Pole.  Ever since the Deliverator incident, Santa hasn't had enough elves to help with all of his special assignments.  Since Jingle told him how great our class has been, he decided we would be the best class to fill out Elf Applications.

Sealed with our fingerprints!

We also made these cute elves to go with!

Jingle FINALLY came back from the North Pole.  We missed him so much.  He even brought us a special package.  All of my friends were so excited to open it.  

This is what we found inside:

Santa hired all of my kinder friends!  We are so excited to be Santa's elf helpers and even more excited that we don't have to go to the North Pole.  All of our special assignments can be done at Green-fields or at home :) We can't wait to see what our first assignment is!

Winter Wonderland!

This week, we have been practicing identifying different shapes and their characteristics.  During center time, we have been working on shape books with our parent helpers. THANK YOU Mrs. Williams, Mrs. Marple, Mrs. Thurston, Mrs. Ryer, Mr. Ryer, and Mrs. Engle for all of your help at the shape center.  After working with our shapes, I assessed students using shape snowflakes.  I gave clues to different shapes, and the kids had to find the shape, glue it on, then name it.  

We talked about how all snowflakes are different just like us.

Our patterned penguins are finished!  We had a fun time practicing the letter p and all of the different patterns we have learned while making our special craft.

Our winter bulletin board came out adorable!

Take a peek into our centers this week:

Writing center

We have been practicing making sentences, sounding out our words, and spelling our sight words.  Look at Joseph's awesome journal entry!  Great job :) 

Sort & Graph Center:

Kinders practiced sorting and graphing at the Winter Graphing center.

Gingerbread Counting:

At our gingerbread counting center, kinders arranged numbers in order from 1-20, practiced counting by 1's and 5's, and practiced forming their numnbers.

Gingerbread ABC's:

At our gingerbread ABC center, students practiced arranging, saying, and writing the alphabet.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Santa dropped by our classroom not once but TWICE this week!! We must be doing something right :)

Santa called in a special order of reindeer food from our class.  He told me that last year, all of the children left delicious cookies and ice cold milk for him, but they forgot about his reindeer.  His reindeer have been super hungry and feeling a little left out, so he dropped off all of the ingredients we would need to make reindeer food. We called on our 4th grade buddies to help us, and we had a great time!

Ingredients:

1 scoop of oats (Reindeer's FAVORITE food)

1 pinch of red glitter and 1 pinch of green glitter 

(It sparkles in the moonlight and catches the reindeer's attention)

1 handful of Hot Tamales (batteries for Rudolph's nose)

Since we have so many reindeer to feed, we split into two groups to make our batch of magic reindeer food.  

Ms. Lyon's and her friends working hard at the front rug.

Anna starting off our recipe.

A pinch of red glitter and a pinch of green!

Before adding the Hot Tamales, some of our brave students taste tested them.  I had to add this picture of Cayden's reaction....just priceless!!

4th graders packaging our Reindeer food

Kinders with Ms. Lyon's 4th graders

We love every second we get to spend with our buddies.  Hope to see you soon :)

We've been waiting for our elf and he has finally arrived.  Santa took a special trip to Green-fields school to drop off our special friend, Jingle!  We learned all about his special job as Santa's main man, and we have been on our best behavior all week.  We can't wait to see where Jingle pops up next!

When we first met him, he was a little shy--hiding behind one of our pipes!

Then he warmed up a little, and as you can see he is getting a little too comfy in our homework bin.

Look who we caught swinging from our snowflakes this morning...