Turtle Talk

  

This week I introduced the idea of Turtle Talk - how turtles talk so slowly that they can only say one sound at a time.  We began playing games of oral blending (for phonemic awareness) like isolating the blending skill. For example, I say ' My turtle is so slow and tired, he can only say one sound at at time. Can you guess what he is trying to say /c/ /a/ /t/? Perhaps you can play this short game with your child in the car- only with 3 letter words (made from a consonant-vowel-consonant). Words like bat, cat, dog, fox, box, net, bag, fan, rat, van, hen, pig, bed, top, pot, can, jet, red, ten, tub, sub, mop wig.

Next, I will be asking the students to do the turtle talk and I will guess the words. These two games are done completely orally - an important skill for K students to understand before they begin matching sounds to letters.

 

I've also introduced the vowels (identifying the 5 letters) with an action song 'Vowel Limbo'. I taught the short vowel sounds slowly paired with actions to remember the sounds. For example, I ask the students 'What is the sound of the letter a?' and I make the action like I am grabbing an apple off of an apple tree and they respond /a/ - as in apple.

For letter e, I say that this sound reminds me of when I lose air in my stomach and the sound that comes out is /e/ - like in egg.

For letter i, I tell them to imagine that there is mud on their hands and they are shaking it off in disgust and the sound I make is /i/. 

For letter o, I say this sound is like when I see really cute babies (like Mr. Borkowski's twin daughters).../o/

For letter u, I say that when I was little my Mom caught me having a cookie before dinner and she said /u/-/u/-/u/ (with her finger signaling tsk-tsk-tsk!)

Tuesday - Show and Tell Theme for April....stories and/or pictures of animals or pets (past or present)

Wednesday - Hot Lunch

Healthy Eating & Healthy Bodies

From this  to this                     

Well, not exactly. The past two Tuesdays have been our days of trying new fruits and vegetables (carrots, strawberries, pears, cucumbers, oranges) and I believe that the students are learning so much from each other's preferences. It's amazing how one student may say 'I love cucumbers' as the tray is begin passed out and many of them have helped themselves to seconds! We have been discussing where different fruits and vegetables grow (garden, tree, bush, vine) and how important the nutrients that they contain are good their our growing bodies. There was a sheet in each student's homework folder to help record and track different fruits and vegetables they eat at school and at home. 

This week, students will be trying apples, sugar snap peas and broccoli. Also, a parent has volunteered to make kale chips as well - yummy! If you have never tried these yourself, you should (it tastes nothing like raw kale!) For the past 5 years, I've grown kale in my garden and each year my son and daughter (ages 8 & 7) can't wait to harvest it so I can make them kale chips!

PE clothes - just a reminder on gym days (Mon, Wed, Fri) students need to still wear their full uniform even if they are wearing their gym shirt underneath. I've noticed that a few students are not wearing their collared CCS shirts on those days but are simply wearing their gym shirts. If you have any questions about this, please email me at golaybal@ccsunited.ca