Thanksgiving Newsletter

 November 21, 2020

Dear PreK Families, 

Last week, the whole school practiced doing a LOCKDOWN drill. We practice these throughout the school year with the Hartford Police Department to prepare for emergency situations. During a drill we shut and lock our classroom door, pull the window shades and turn off the lights and sit quietly in our classroom until the drill is over (usually less than 10  minutes). The students all did a great job practicing. Please let us know if you have any questions. 

Last month, the class enjoyed learning about pumpkins and Halloween. We did many art projects, and we learned the song Five Little Pumpkins. We read books such as: Pumpkin, Pumpkin by Jeanne Titherington, It’s Pumpkin Time by Zoe Hall, Spookly the Square Pumpkin by Joe Troiano, Go Away, Big, Green Monster by Ed Emberly, There was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat by Lucille Colandro, and Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson. The students really enjoy hearing stories and we usually discuss our favorite parts of the story. If you do not have copies of these stories, you can often find read alouds on well known children’s books on YouTube. 

Earlier this month, we learned about farms. We did art projects about several different farm animals, painted and made paper barns, and did a class project on Mrs. Whishy Washy based on the book Mrs. Whishy Washy's Farm by Joy Cowley.  We made a graph about our favorite farm animals and discussed that we get our food from farms.  The class had fun learning nursery rhymes about farms such as, BINGO, Baa Baa Black Sheep, and Old MacDonald Had a Farm. We also read many books about farms, including: Big Red Barn by Margaret Wise, Inside a Barn in the Country by Alyssa Satin Capucilli and Click, Clack Moo, Cows that Type by Doreen Cronin. 

Currently, we have been learning about the Thanksgiving holiday. We have read many books so far, such as I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie by Alison Jackson, This is the Turkey by Abby Levine, and Thank You, Thanksgiving by David Milgrim. Your child can retell the story of I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie with his or her story kit in a paper bag. This coming week is a special time at WRS, it’s the week of the Feast. In a normal year, the whole school has a Thanksgiving dinner together in the gym served family style. It is a memorable event for everyone at school. This year we will still have the Feast, but we will be eating in our classrooms instead. If you are able to, please contribute a jar of applesauce towards the Have Foodshelf.  

Thank you, 

Mrs. Zayas & Miss Taylor

IMPORTANT DATES

11/25-11/27 NO SCHOOL for Thanksgiving

12/18 NO PreK - ECP In-Service

12/22 PreK Pajama Day

12/23-1/3 NO SCHOOL Holiday Break

 November 1, 2020

We hope that you enjoyed a safe and fun Halloween this year. The children were all very excited about their costumes. We have been hearing about them all week at school. 

The class loved exploring our playground when we did our unit on fall and leaves. We did a nature walk around our playground and the students each found items for their nature collections. They examined their collections with magnifying glasses and created leaf collages after we read Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert. We also made leaf rubbings, created colorful leaves with watercolors, wrote in our journals, looked at leaf symmetry and matched like leaves. Our class loves to listen to stories and they enjoyed The Leaves Are Falling One by One by Steve Metzger, We’re Going on a Leaf Hunt by Steve Metzger, and There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed Some Leaves  by Lucille Colandro. 

We will meet for PTC on Monday and Tuesday 11/2 and 11/3. During the meeting we will discuss what our typical day is like and also review your child’s progress and development. In HSD, all of our PreK Programs use Teaching Strategies Gold (TS Gold) to track individual student development and progress in the following areas: social/emotional, physical, language, cognitive, literacy, mathematics, science and technology, social studies, and the arts. 

On Monday, I will send your child’s progress report on Social/Emotional Development from TS Gold (Teaching Strategies Gold) for you to review. We will discuss some of these points during our virtual meeting. You will receive a full report at the end of December. 

At school, we have been working to help students develop independence. Some age appropriate things that your child can do at home include all dressing tasks (including snow gear), putting items in their backpacks, zipping their backpacks, bringing dishes to the counter, putting garbage in the trash can, and opening snacks. We will be sending home a winter gear task strip that you can post near your door. 

Thank you, 

Mrs. Zayas & Miss Taylor