Week of May 12th

Mrs. Preskill
May 16
3 min read

Happy Friday Pandas!

General Updates:

We celebrated a panda birthday! Happy Birthday, Connor!
Please check out the specials classes update here!
If you weren’t able to sign up for Mystery Guest this year, there is still a chance to join us! I would love to work with you to find a day that fits your schedule before the school year ends.

If you're available for a quick visit between 1:20–1:35 PM or 2:25–2:40 PM on another day, please do not hesitate to reach out via email. I’d be happy to coordinate a time that works for you!

This week in literacy...

Phonics: We continued practicing all of the kindergarten heart words! We also began learning about VCe words—that’s Vowel-Consonant-e, where a silent e at the end makes the vowel say its name!
Examples:
- Cap → Cape
- Kit → Kite
- Hop → Hope
- Cub → Cube
We call it Magic E because it changes short vowel words into long vowel words—just like magic!

Sound Collection: /m/, /s/, /l/, /n/, /f/, /r/, /v/, /z/, /p/, /g/, /d/, /t/, /k/, /b/, /w/, /h/, /kw/, /j/, /y/, /ks/, /z/, /a/, /e/, /i/, /o/, /u/,

Letter Collection: m, t, p, a, s, c, h, i, d, f, r, o, g, l, n, u, b, k, v, e, j, w, z, q, x, y

Heart Word Collection: the, in, my, a, is, for, I, am, here, and, at, go, it, like, be, to, can, not, you, are, do, will, did, too, with, me, all, was, no, so, say, now, have, said,

down, come, they, that, this, ate, our, who, where, what, must, we, he, she, but, want, there, saw, own, please, make, good, new, out, one, two.

Reading: We read a new literature story, The Ugly Vegetables by Grace Lin! It’s a story about a girl who learns to appreciate the garden her mother grows—even if the vegetables look a little different than the gardens her neighbors are planting.
We used this book to practice retelling the story by thinking about what happened at the beginning, middle, and end. We also worked on picking out the most important details to help us remember the story.
Writing: The pandas worked on creating their own narrative stories! We started by picking the main event for the middle of the story—something exciting or important that happens. Then, we went back to plan the beginning, where we introduced the main character and the setting. Finally, we wrote the ending, where our characters shared how they felt after everything happened. The pandas are learning that good stories have a clear beginning, middle, and end—and that character feelings help make the story complete!

This week in math...

This week, our kindergarteners worked on composing and decomposing teen numbers using base ten blocks—a group of ten and some extra ones! We practiced showing numbers like 14 as 1 ten and 4 ones, helping us understand how teen numbers are built. The pandas did a great job showing what they know in math, and I’m so proud of their hard work and thinking!

Reminders

Please label your child's snack daily and pack this separately from the lunchbox.
Water bottles stay in the classroom. If you want your child to have a drink for lunch, please send a separate drink.
If you would like your child to buy a drink at lunch, please make sure there is money in the account for the lunch card.
Extra clothes and PE shoes should be labeled and stored in your child's cubby.
Please see Mrs. Smith's Principal's Message for further information about Willow Grove: principal's message