Ms. Yamazaki’s Kindergarten News Issue3 November 7, 2008 There are five pages in this newsletter. Dear Parents, We are over half way to the 100th day of kindergarten! This school year is just whizzing by. I am constantly amazed at how much your children have matured and grown, both socially and academically. They demonstrated this during their student-led portfolio conferences in October. I’ve no doubt that you were as proud of them as I was. We will have another opportunity for them to lead their spring conferences in March. Our March portfolio conferences will be held Thursday and Friday, March 19th and 20th, so please mark your calendars. Thanksgiving is a time of reflection, and at school, we will be talking of the things for which we are thankful. I am blessed with a group of students who are eager to learn and parents who support their children in the best possible ways. I truly do thank all of you for this. It makes my job so much easier. We are fortunate to have a school so full of dedicated personnel, including our administrators, specialists, counselors, support staff, and our own Mrs. Liu. We are rich in resources that support our programs. How lucky we are! I hope you will join me, Mrs. Liu, and the class at our international pot luck luncheon on Tuesday, November 25th. Bring a favorite dish from your home country, or any favorite dish to share with our classroom community of parents and students. We’ll start setting up at 10:45. Younger siblings are welcome. Happy Thanksgiving, Mary We are Thankful!

Ms. Yamazaki’s Kindergarten News Page 2 Tricky Teens In math, we have been working on the tricky teens. It is important for young mathematicians to understand that a two-digit number is not merely two numbers side by side, but that the number in the ten’s place represents a group of ten(s). Together, a ten and another number (1-9) make a “tricky teen.” Thus, 14 is really “one ten and four.” To illustrate this further, we have been playing a dice game, The Teen Frame Game. The board looks like this-: To play, you roll the die and stamp that number (one stamp in each space) until you fill all the spaces to make a ten, and fill more spaces (at the bottom). If you fill the ten, and six more, you have the number Other math concepts we continue to practice are adding and subtracting with manipulatives, tallying, writing numbers to 30 and beyond, even and odd numbers, and counting by ones, fives, and tens.

Ms. Yamazaki’s Kindergarten News Page 3 Behavior, Books, and Bytes A Workshop by Ellen Foley, Mary Yamazaki, and Patty Sloan Thanks to those parents who attended our workshop on behavior, reading aloud, and computers. You can access the PowerPoint for our presentation on the first page of the kindergarten website. Some parents were interested in buying Jim Trelease’s Read Aloud Handbook, 6th edition. You can order it online at amazon.com Although it’s not technically a Halloween book, this is one of my favorites for this time of year. The rhythm and repetition in it make it ideal for having children “read along” with you during the read aloud. I think it is worthy of having in your home library as children ask for it again and again. Ms. Yamazaki The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything By Linda Williams Ms. Y’s Book Corner I think this book is a great resource for teachers and parents! ~Mary

Page 4 Ms. Yamazaki’s Kindergarten News Thank you, Halloween Decorating Committee! You can see more photos from Halloween in our November Photo Gallery and our ebook, Jack-0-lantern, Jack-o-lantern, What do you see?.

Page 5 Mark your PTA calendars: Monday,Nov. 10 is Day 7 Thursday, Nov. 13th is our last PE swimming day~Parents are invited! 12:50 p.m. Monday, Nov. 17 is Day 2 Monday, Nov. 24 is Day 7 Tuesday, Nov. 25 Class Pot Luck Thursday and Friday, Nov Thanksgiving Holiday Monday, Dec. 1 is Day 10 Monday, Dec. 8 is Day 5 Ms. Yamazaki’s Kindergarten News Pumpkin Math How many seeds in our pumpkin? Class International Friendship Pot Luck Tuesday, Nov. 25th 11:00 Set up at 10:45 We estimated. (our guesses ranged from ) We grouped by tens. Then we grouped by 100s. We counted seeds!