Kindergarten: Specials Spotlight
First Quarter 2017-2018
Exploratory Team
Music
I’m so excited to be teaching Music at Riverview! This is my 24th year in education, my 19th as a music teacher, and my 10th here as a Falcon! I graduated from Louisiana State University with a degree in Music Education, and I have Level 1 Certification for Orff-Schulwerk Music Education from Baker University. This year at RE, we also have a Music Student Teacher! During the Fall semester, Mr. Holthus is in our building several hours a week and is working with our K-2 grade students. In 4th Quarter he will be at Riverview every day working with all of our young musicians!
Kindergarten students have Music class twice a week for 30 minutes each time. The first quarter of Kindergarten Music class has been spent getting to know each other, exploring all that our voices can do, having fun with new instruments and moving to the beat! Students had experience playing rhythm sticks, lollipop drums, woodblocks, and triangles. We have been working on our close listening skills to find the differences in music, as well as discovering how much fun it can be to just move to the beat of a song. Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you have any questions!
Art
Greetings! I am your child(ren)'s Art Educator at Riverview, this is my first year and I couldn't be happier. Your students are welcoming and have made me feel a part of the family. I student taught at Forest View Elementary (A Stephen Covey, Lighthouse school aka a 7 Habits school). I learned and loved the opportunity to grow, which lead to the position here at Riverview! I grew up, went to school, and still reside in Olathe. I received my Bachelors of Art Education in May of 2017 from the University of Kansas, Rock Chalk! In my personal time I enjoy exploring downtown Lawrence and Kansas City as well as, Netflix bingeing, coffee, art-making (duh), and taking my dog, Sausage, to the dog park!
Kindergarten is so much fun! If you haven't heard your child sing about the COLORS song or maybe they've shown you our science experiment of mixing colors in art... we learned all about mixing Red, Yellow, and Blue(!!) to make all of the colors in the world. Then we moved onto our LINE unit. We can tell you all about different types of lines, I believe our personal favorite is loop de loop! We have painted, cut, collaged, and even made a line sculpture. (Which honestly, looks like a bunch of roller coasters, who doesn't love those?) We are learning that lines are all around us and lines are everywhere! I am so happy with all of our students’ progress with cutting, gluing, being gentle with Billy the Brush, and we haven't spilled water EVER!!!! You honestly have amazing children who make my job easy to love, their process is so exciting to be a part of.
PE
Hello! I am Kyndel Reeves, the Physical Education teacher, and this is my third year at Riverview! I absolutely LOVE getting to be the P.E. teacher to such amazing students. I grew up going to school in the DeSoto School District, so it is really an honor to be able to come back as a teacher. Growing up, my family was obsessed with KU, so of course that is where I went to college! Rock Chalk! In my free time, I love to be with my family and friends and do fun things together. I love doing things outdoors, going to the beach (when I am able to), going shopping, and going to my siblings' different events. I am looking forward to another wonderful school year with our wonderful community!
First quarter was filled with so many exciting “firsts” for the kindergarteners. I LOVE them! The students learned all the rules of the gym and P.E., and why we have P.E.! Their knowledge and understanding of the importance of physical fitness and health is so exciting. We were able to learn about our different warm-ups that we do right when we get into class; warm-ups such as Skunk Tag, Silly Bananas, Gladiators, and many more! We quickly got into learning about locomotor movements; movements that move us from one place to another, such as walking, galloping, skipping, jogging, sliding, leaping, jumping, and hopping. Learning these movements is very important because they are the movements we do all the time, and they are so helpful for all the other activities we will do throughout the year. We will continue practicing our locomotor movements throughout the year. We also began working on our rolling and throwing skills, with games such as Popcorn Machine, Catch me if you Can, Throw Up, and bowling. The students are doing such an awesome job, and I am really looking forward to the rest of the year with them!
Technology
I am Traci Seyb and I teach your children skills in technology. This is my 23rd year of teaching and my 16th year at Riverview. I've taught 4th grade and 5th grade in the regular classroom and was a Literacy Learning Coach in the Lawrence Public Schools. I received my Bachelor of Science in Education degree from Kansas State University--EMAW! I feel privileged to be a part of the Riverview community and count myself as a lucky individual that gets to work with the fabulous children who attend our school.
Students started this year in Kindergarten learning the basic operations of the laptops and laptop accessories, how to login and how to navigate to my site. Students played several games that included letter recognition, phonemic awareness, spatial reasoning skills and pattern building. Thank you to those who have donated your time to volunteer! It is greatly appreciated!!
Next quarter, we will continue educational games using the laptops and firming up logging into the system.
Library
I truly enjoy being the Library Media Specialist here at Riverview Elementary! We have an amazing school filled with eager-to-learn, wonderful students and dedicated, caring staff! It is so much fun getting to work with former students again and getting acquainted with all the fantastic kindergarten through fifth graders here at Riverview. I love getting kids excited about reading, introducing them to new books and authors they may not have read before, and researching with them! My goal is to develop lifelong readers!
This year is my 27th year of teaching. I taught second grade a total of 12 years, first grade for 2 years, and Tutorial Math Grades 3-6 for 1 year. I also was a substitute teacher for 5 years after taking time off to raise my own children. This is my twelfth year as the Library Media Specialist at Riverview.
In our library classes we talked about our five rules: Respect Books and Library Property, Use Quiet Voices, Respect Yourself and Others, Use Library Time Wisely, and Wait Quietly in Line. We read Mr. Wiggle’s Book by Paula Craig and Carol Thompson. We then talked about ways to take good care of our books that would make Mr. Wiggles happy, and things that could happen to books that would make him sad. Students were introduced to our new school-wide Award Winners reading program. Information about the program and a reading log can be found on my website at: http://riverviewlibrary.weebly.com/ We identified the book’s cover and spine and the purpose of each. We are practicing using shelf markers to hold the book’s place when we take it off the shelf and holding the book’s spine when replacing it on the shelf. We talked about the three ways to read a book – read the pictures, read the words, and retell the story. We practiced each of these together. We watched a preview of some of the books coming to our Scholastic Book Fair which will be in the library on October 26th and 27th.
Counselor
Hello and welcome back to a new school year! My name is Toni Munsey and I am your Riverview School Counselor! I’m pleased to start another year at Riverview. This is my eleventh year in the Desoto school district. My previous 18 years were spent in the Kansas City, Kansas school district. I received my Bachelor’s degree from Kansas State and my Masters in Counseling from Emporia State where I also completed K-12 building level Administrative certification. I’ve taught in the classroom for eight years before becoming a school counselor and am excited about my 21st. year as a school counselor. The counselors’ role is to help students be successful in academic achievement as well as social and emotional health. I will be teaching guidance lessons in the library this year as part of the special’s teacher rotation on a regular basis. I will also be available for small group and individual counseling. The counseling curriculum consists of Character Education, Bullying Prevention, Drug and Alcohol Prevention just to name a few. My goal is to find more time in my schedule for students who just need to drop by and talk out a problem. I am an advocate for all students and a resource for staff and parents. Please feel free to contact me anytime if there is anything I can help with. My phone number is 441-0808 ext. 4124 and my e-mail is tthurmanmunsey@usd232.org. I would also like to remind you the importance of community service and encourage you to join the Falcon Volunteers and track your community service hours throughout the year. I’m so excited about this school year and look forward to working with you and our wonderful Riverview students.
First quarter has been a blast! We have reviewed the role of the school counselor. We have also done several getting to know you and team building activities. We have learned Habit 1 “Be Proactive” from the book The 7habits of Happy Kids we are learning to be in charge of ourselves and think with a positive growth mindset.