Oh Christmas Tree

Aloha family and friends!

What an exciting time we had during this final week of the semester! Tuesday we did our edible Christmas tree craft. Before we began we made a graph to show how much of each item we had.

Then it was time to get creative! The kids made adorable, edible trees!

                                  

Mahalo to everyone who contributed items to make this craft possible. And we would especially like to thank our class moms Sarah, Sunnie, Mililani and Maxine for helping us out in class. We couldn't have done it without you!

This week we continued out Christmas card bucket fillers by making Christmas cards for soldiers who have been injured. 

We had our final morning for the "The Million Miles Campaign" this week. Our goal was to get to 1,000 tickets during the 2nd quarter, and we made it! We collected 1,006 tickets!

On Thursday the kids made individual snow globes. They had so much fun painting the snow!

                                 

                          

I can't believe that the first semester has already come and gone! This has been such a fun year so far! Have a merry Christmas and I will see you all when school returns on January 7th.

Love,

Mrs. Kawai 

Winter Penguins

Aloha family and friends!

During the month of December we have been learning about the continent of Antarctica. For a fun project the kids each made their own wintery penguins!

 

This week we began something called "expert groups". Every table group has four kids and each student in a group will become an expert on something and then teach their team about it! We are focusing on different kinds of plants. Our four expert groups are: cactus, seaweed, sequoia, and plumeria. Everyone wrote down something that they know already, a wondering that they have, or something exciting about their plant. 

Every Thursday our class gets to have art with Ms. Gilbertson. This week this is what they made in her class...

For our "Bucket Filler Friday" we helped bucket fill someone other than our classmates. We made Christmas cards for a girl name Safyre. She is an 8 year old girl whose house burned down and was the only one in her family to survive. She was severely burned. She LOVES Christmas cards so we sent her a whole bunch of them!

Mahalo to everyone who signed up to donate items and/or their time for our Christmas tree craft next week. It will be Tuesday, December 15th. 

Have a great weekend!

Mrs. Kawai

Bucket Filler Fridays

Aloha Family and Friends!

This week we read the story of The Little Red Hen in a fun and exciting way. We did it with puppets! Everyone got a chance to be either the little red hen, the cat, the duck, or the pig. The kids did a great job helping to tell the story!

This week we learned all about the letter Hh. As a special surprise, Mrs. Santiago (another Kindergarten teacher) brought in something for each Kindergarten class that begins with the letter Hh...honey and a honeycomb! She got it from her own house! And the honey was delicious!

We are currently doing a unit on what living things need to grow. We learned all about the different parts of a plant and what it needs to grow, like sunlight, air and water. 

Each student was also given the opportunity to share what they know about plants as well as a question they have about plants. Here is some of our class wonderings...

"I wonder why flowers grow?"

"I wonder how plants sprout?"

"Is rosemary a plant?"

At school we talk a lot about being a "Bucket Filler". Everyone has an imaginary bucket and the things we do and say either fill someone's bucket or empties it. So, this week we started a new weekly activity called "Bucket Filler Friday". Everyone's names was written on a slip of paper. Then those papers were passed out so everyone in class got one. We all then had to write or draw something nice to the person whose name we received. Everyone was a bucket filler and everyone had their bucket filled! 

Thank you to everyone who signed up to donate towards and/or help out with our upcoming Christmas craft! It is going to be a great time! If you signed up I will be sending more information home next week.

Have a great weekend!
Mrs. Kawai

Who Works At Our School?

Aloha Family and Friends!

As we continued learning about different jobs and their tools we learned that there are all sorts of different jobs right at our school! Over the course of the week we had lots of visitors from around campus stop by our class and tell us about their job and what they use to do their job

Our first visitor was a principal Mrs. Matsukawa! She told us all about how her job is to make sure people are safe at school. She also said that her job was to make sure that kids are learning and enjoying it! She even helps kids in the health room when they get hurt. Some of the tools she uses for her job are a walkie and a computer. 

Ms. Pohai also stopped by to visit. She is our Parent Involvement Coordinator. She helps our community and families get plugged in to help at our school. 

Our ELL (English Language Learner) Coordinator, Ms. Lusk, also came by our class. She helps all the students and families at our school who speak a language other than English at home. She told us all about how she uses books and a globe to help her do her job. 

Our school counselor even made an appearance! Mrs. Q not only told us about what she uses to do her job at school, but also all about her previous career as an athletic trainer at the High School. She brought in pictures of her helping injured football and basketball players. 

Ms. Personius is the schools 4th and 5th grade counselor. For her job she uses lots things like games, books, and she even showed us her office key! Most importantly, she also uses her smile!

Ms. Josie even told the kids a bit about what she uses for her job as an A+ teacher. (I forgot to take a picture 😁). Throughout the week we created a chart of the different people who work at our school and what they use to do their job. 

In addition to our school visitors we had a special guest speaker from the community. Ms. Jill is a map maker. She showed us a map that she created. He even makes maps as big as our recess field! Afterwards the kids showed her the maps they have been working on in Social Studies. 

Towards the end of the week the kids were given the opportunity to think about all the different careers they had learned about and then chose what job they would want when they grow up. 

Scholastic Book orders went home this week. If you would like to order anything please return the order form with payment by Wednesday, November 25th. You can also order online using our special classroom code. 

Have a great weekend!

Mrs. Kawai

Y-O-U spells you!

Aloha Family and Friends!

Every Monday when we learn our new sight word for the week we do a fun activity called "Rainbow Writing". The kids have to use all of the colors in their box to write the sight word for the week. In the end they have a colorful sight word! This week our sight word for the week was "you".

On Tuesday we made Veteran's Day cards for the dad of one of our classmates. He appreciated them so much!

                      

                     

This week was "Custodian Appreciation Week". We made cards for our custodians to show them how much we appreciate all that they do for our school and our classroom. 

                     

                   

In math we have been learning about addition and using addition to show the different ways to make a number. For example, you can make 5 using 1+4, 2+3, etc. To help the kids with this concept we started playing a game called "How many am I hiding?" It is such an easy game that you can even play it at home! First I showed the kids five counters. Then I asked them to close their eyes while I hid some of them. When they opened their eyes they had to figure out how many I was hiding. They loved it! They caught on how to play so quickly that they then asked if they could play with each other. The students played in pairs and took turns being the "teacher". 

                

This week we started a two week study on different jobs and what people use to do their job. We read a story called "Whose Shoes" that showed pictures of different kinds of shoes people use for their job and then the kids had to guess who the shoes belonged to. 

                       

 After reading the story we charted some of the different jobs we saw in the book and then made a list of some of the things that they use to do their job. Later we used our chart to make descriptive sentences!

                 

Next week we will be learning about the letter Dd. Students are welcome to bring in items from home that begin with the letter "d". 

Also, our school received an anonymous $100 donation to host an a cappella competition. All grades may participate. Keiki talent is the focus, but adult participation is encouraged. More details will be coming. Friday, Jan 29, 2016 is the competition date.

Have a great weekend!

Mrs. Kawai