Kindergarten 2020/21: zones, names, and making choices to help

What zone are you in?

We used Jabari's story and the story of Little Crab to think about how our feelings can change throughout every moment, every day. We noticed how to tell what a character is feeling and when a character's feelings change. Using their own pictures of the zones, children showed when their feelings were changing at different times during the day.

We used the morning message as a tool for recording our feelings. We counted how many of us were in the blue, green, yellow and red zone. We talked about which zone had the most and which zone had the least. We can connect our literacy, emotional and math learning through our work during morning meeting!

My Book of Names

Our names are important words. Our names, like all of us, are a gift. The children opened their own book of Kindergarten names at school and at home today. They read the pictures, pointed to and found new and familiar names, and practiced reading the title. This patterned text provides children with the opportunity to learn the 19 faces and names of their peers.

Our names are labels and signs. We can write our name and read the names of our peers!

Following time reading and talking about their name books, the children used special black art pens and crayons to design a sign for their books and materials at school. Following our work, Roxy shared her sign. She talked about the details on her sign, like the turtle she colored with Earth colors. Roxy said she likes turtles, so she chose to draw the snapping Earth turtle beneath her name.

Integrating essential standards

As part of their daily transition cleaning up their tools, children are expected to count how many crayons (or colored pencils) they have in their glass jar. For our crayons, they should always have 8. They can use the label on their jar to check their counting. Even cleaning up can be connected to essential standards around counting and cardinality!