Kindergarten Specials
NFS Curriculum Update :: May & June 2016
ART
Kindergarten artists will spend the remainder of the year exploring the works of great Impressionist masters. By looking at masters like Monet, Seurat, Degas and Van Gogh students will explore mark making, color blending, pointillism, painting "en plein aire" and bring light, emotion and the feeling of a moment in time into their work. I know these creative young masters will absolutely love exploring Impressionism!
LIBRARY
In Kindergarten we will be reading several folktales including The Gingerbread Boy and Mrs. Chicken and the Hungry Crocodiles, focusing on the moral in each story. We will have a Harry the Dirty Dog marathon and finish the school year with a library skills game.
MUSIC
I have had such a wonderful time working with this class. We will end the year singing some fun songs, playing instruments, dancing to the beat and playing with the parachute. Thank you for sharing your child with me this year!
P.E.
The first part of May will focus mainly on Field Day activities that the students will be participating in at the big event. Students will be familiar with the activities prior to Field Day so they will be able to comfortably perform the required tasks. Following Field Day and weather permitting, PE class will move outside for game play on the fields. The rock wall will be used one final time. In the final week of the school year, the students will have the opportunity to choose a few of their favorite games and activities that were played during the school year and repeat these activities one final time before summer vacation.
SCIENCE
Kindergarteners continue to explore the use of force on motion or push and pull. We used magnets on other magnets and metal objects to explore how they move. We will use ramps to explore how height/angle affects the speed of an object going down an incline and learn about acceleration. Students will learn about friction and gravity and how it affects moving objects. We end the year using what we have learned to make an art piece. It should be an exhilarating experience.
SPANISH
A Kindergartener asked me if they could learn the alphabet in Spanish, so I squeezed in a few weeks of alphabet learning in the last two weeks of April. This delayed the start of our final unit, but I love when I can fulfill the interests of the kids and allow them to lead the direction of the curriculum. Our final unit will be “La Comunidad." In this unit we learn the names of places in our communities and also some natural locations (the beach, the mountains, etc.) Kindergartners will learn to recognize, respond to, and make inquiries with the question word: “¿Dónde está...?” (Where is...?). We will also work a bit with the verb “ir” (to go). Typically we spend the last few classes in June reviewing all the material we’ve learned over the course of the year with games, songs, and fun activities!