Some thoughts for my classroom parents….

I found this online and I thought it had some great ideas for at home reading!  We need to encourage reading and the love of books!  Parents you are a great resource and example to your child.  Let them see you read and then discuss the things you read with your child.

Units of Study for CVUSD

So I have been asked to help write the units of study for our district, and have been working on these since late January. I will be posting some resources that we are creating so that we can all access them next year when we all roll out COMMON CORE!

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Family Project (DUE NOVEMBER 8th)

Hello Parents-

We are finishing our theme called “We’re a Family! In this theme we discussed families and their relationships.  I am sending this note to tell you about an exciting project I have planned for your family!  This family project will be due this Friday (November 8th).  

Here is the outline of the family project:

You will be creating a family tree.  You may use whatever you want to create the tree (paper, video, poster, pictures, etc.)

• Your family tree must contain AT LEAST your immediate family, or members of your household.

• Your family tree must contain AT LEAST the names of family members (you can also include pictures, or drawings)

• Your child must be able to tell us about the people in the family tree (mom, dad, grandma, grandpa, great-grandma, etc.)

Please put your family members in an order that demonstrates each generation.  See below:

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask me.  

Common Core Standards:

Speaking and Listening- Presentation of Knowledge and Ideas

4- 

Describe familiar people, places, things, and events and, with prompting and support, provide additional detail.

5-

Add drawings or other visual displays to descriptions as desired to provide additional detail.

6-

Speak audibly and express thoughts, feelings, and ideas clearly.

 

I can't wait to see the projects!

Love, 

Mrs. Hinchen

Room 2 Happenings for October

So much has happened in the last couple of months that I haven't had a chance to update our little blog. We have learned so many new things that I will bullet point all of the awesome stuff we have done in the month of October.

• We have learned so many letter names and sounds!
• We have learned many ways to make numbers 1-10
• We had a successful fundraiser dinner!
• Ms. Vasquez was our awesome student teacher!  We learned so much from her and we are sad that she is done learning with our class.
• We learned about cultural events (Dia De Los Muertos, Halloween)
• The firemen came and taught us about their truck, the equipment they use and how to "Stop, Drop and Roll."

Learning and working together!

Dia De Los Muertos with Ms. Hassan

Halloween Nerds!

Fire Safety- We had the firemen come and visit and we learned about Stop, Drop and Roll

Ms. Vasquez was our awesome Student Teacher!

Our Spaghetti Dinner was a huge success!

Even though October is over, our learning is still going strong!  We have a lot of things to learn and do in the upcoming months!

Love,
Mrs. Hinchen

Welcome to Room 2!

Well it's here the official start of the 2013-2014 school year!  I am so anxious!!  I know it is going to be an amazing year!  We will be learning so many new things it will be incredible!  Here is a sneak peek at the classroom...

 My new Welcome banner... it will be next to the parent information board... so check it out!

 I re-organized the library so it will be more user friendly!

 I got this as a birthday gift... that's what happens when you have teacher friends... they give you stuff for your classroom!

 Our new common core writing wall... it's going to be awesome!

 I LOVE how our daily work folders turned out... so cute!

And my new sign for the door to the classroom... this has been years in the making and I FINALLY got around to making it!

So, these are just a few of the cute things that have been changed in room 2... I am excited to start a new year.  If you are new to room 2 this year, you can find information you need for student work/ projects, etc. on this blog. I hope it becomes a useful tool for you.

Here's to a great year!

I know I haven't posted in a while and we have done a lot of neat things in Room 2... I am still learning the art of blogging and making it a part of my teaching and communication. Please forgive me as I am trying to be better about it. I have just been so busy with life that my poor little blog has been neglected!!! Please read on....

This letter is going home on Monday along with the research packet. The idea for this project came from here:  

Cute little Animal Project

I saw this great little project and immediately wanted to do it with my class and instead of re-creating everything, I just purchased hers since it is absolutely perfect.  I'm sure my students will do an outstanding job on their projects as well.

Dear Room 2 Parents-

We will be starting our last theme of the year.  It is the Amazing World of Animals Theme.  I am excited because I have an exciting and rigorous project for you guys!  You will be helping your child do an Animal report.  Your student will be doing a Non-Fiction Report with the purpose to inform an audience of a topic using real information and facts.  This is a common core standard that kindergarteners should be able to do with support and guidance from adults.  You will get a packet that has pages for each part of the assignment to do with your child.  

Here is the timeline for you project:

May 20- Animal/ Type of Animal (mammal, fish, etc.)

May 21- Read and Understand the Fact Sheet

May 22- Find pictures of your animal (print them from the computer, find in magazines, books, etc.)

May 23- Diagram the parts of your animal

May 24- Habitat (where it lives)

May 28- Diet (what it eats)

May 29- Movement (how it moves)

May 30- Babies (information about its young)

May 31- Prey/ Predator Information (what it eats, what eats it)

June 3- Animal tree map (use the fact sheet to help you and any other information you have found)

June 4- 3 Interesting Facts

June 5- Favorite thing about the animal

June 6-7- Presentations in class

You can choose to do something each day, or you can choose to do it all at one time.  Your child will be getting points for this assignment, so make sure they have it ready to present by June 6, 2013.  Don’t worry, you do not have to create each page, I will provide a packet that all of the information needs to go into.  All you have to do is help your child research their animal by using the internet, the school or public library, rent videos, or visit a zoo or the Living Desert.  If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask me.

Reminders- Spring pictures and picture money is due!  Please get that into me as soon as possible.

June 10- K/1 Water day- more information to come

June 12- Room 2 Kinder promotion- more information to come

A lot of testing will also be going on in the next few weeks to make sure that each child is prepared for 1st grade.  I will send home some things that need to be worked on if there are areas they need to practice.  Thanks for all your help this year!

❤, Mrs. Hinchen

Family Project!

We are starting a new theme called “We’re a Family!”  I am very excited about our new theme as we will discuss, learn about and explore families and their relationships.  I am sending this note to tell you about an exciting project I have planned for your family!  This family project will be due in 2 weeks (November 5th).  Here is the outline of the family project:
You will be creating a family tree.  You may use whatever you want to create the tree (paper, video, poster, pictures, etc.)

• Your family tree must contain AT LEAST your immediate family, or members of your household.
• Your family tree must contain AT LEAST the names of family members (you can also include pictures, or drawings)
• Please put your family members in an order that demonstrates each generation. See below:

• What I want is for the kids to understand  that they are connected to people who came from other places and  lived in the past where life was somewhat different. 
• Students will be presenting their projects to the class (if you are not comfortable with that please let me know and I will just view it myself and give it a grade).
• I'm looking forward to seeing the creative projects that you will be doing!

New Theme in Room 2!

Hello!  I hope everyone is having a great weekend!  Well we are going to begin our new Theme called Colors All Around!  In this theme we will read stories that discuss colors and we will discuss COLORS all around!  We will be doing a very special homework activity where each day we will bring an item from home that is a specific color for that day and the students will share their items.  This will be a great way to talk about colors and have students talk about the things they decided to bring.  So parents here are the assignments:

On Monday, October 1, 2012- Red item
On Tuesday, October 2, 2012- Orange Item
On Wednesday, October 3, 2012- Yellow Item
On Thursday, October 4, 2012- Green Item
On Friday, October 5, 2012- Blue Item
On Monday , October 8, 2012- Purple Item
On Tuesday, October 9, 2012- Brown Item
On Wednesday, October 10, 2012- White Item
On Thursday, October 11, 2012- Pink Item
and Friday, October 12, 2012- Gray item
Monday, October 15, 2012 Mrs. Hinchen will do black, so you don't have to worry about that color.

Remember if it is assigned on Monday the child will bring the item the following day... they will share it on a Tuesday....  For each color day I send home a paper bag with a clue.  The kids find something from home, put it in the bag and write a few hints.  Here is an example:

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to call... this is going to be so much fun!

Thanks for your support!

P.S. We need snacks, plastic baggies and paper baggies!

Mrs. Hinchen

Apples, Apples Everywhere!

If you know me, you know that I LOVE apples!  I love eating them, smelling them, picking them and decorating with them.  So, every year I love September rolling around because we get to do fun apple activities!  So, this week we will be doing two apple projects, one of them is making and labeling an apple with it's parts (stem, leaf, core, seeds, etc.) and the other is a project based off of the story Ten Apples On Top... be watching for these cute ideas, and pictures to come!  Here is a sneak peek at one of the projects.  Also, this week we will really be focusing on rhyming!  Please work on rhyming with your child at home, in the car, at the park, or anywhere you can fit it in.

We are also starting counting to 5... so we start off really slow, but this is essential to the students' understanding of numbers and how they work.  

Also, be watching for the new math homework pages that will be sent home this week.... DON'T throw them away at the end of the week, the topic may run longer than 5 days, so leave the pages in the homework folder until the topic is completed!  If you have any questions, please ask.... we are going to have an AWESOME week!

Welcome Letter

Hello Room 2 Parents!  I would like to take this opportunity to introduce myself.  My name is Tara Hinchen and I am in my 10th year teaching at Valley View School!  Not only am I a teacher here, but I also went to this school as a little girl.  I am married to Curtis Hinchen and we have 3 beautiful dogs!   I am from Albuquerque, New Mexico but have lived here in the Coachella Valley most of my life.  I love this community and I love teaching Kindergarten!

You will notice that your child got a brand new folder (that contains this letter).  This folder will be our communication bridge all year.  I also am pleased to announce that we now have a class blog!  I will be communicating a lot on the blog as well.  Here is the blog address: http://mrshinchen.blogspot.com or if you have a smartphone you can scan this code to access the website:

I have set a few goals for us this year.  First, I want to provide your child with the best Kindergarten Learning Experience ever!  Second, I want to incorporate technology in our classroom as a means to communicate and learn effectively.  Lastly, I want to prepare my students to be ready for first grade by incorporating the new Common Core Standards as a course of study that will help students to become learners in real world situations.

Your child will be getting homework nightly.  I do not do a weekly packet as I want your child to get into the habit of doing homework and setting aside a nightly routine that helps make students responsible.  

I have provided all the supplies your child will need (as far as school supplies) so please have your child leave pencils, crayons, scissors, etc. at home.  Your child will need a backpack however so that they can take home finished work and their homework folder.  Also, please make sure your child does not sneak toys to school in their backpacks, they end up getting lost and playing with them at inappropriate times.

This letter is just a few of the important things that I think you should know.  You will be getting a lot more information however at our back to school night.  Please feel free to meet with me at anytime, we are in this together as a team for your child!  I look forward to getting to know each of your children as well as each of you parents! If you child requires a special diet, or religious accommodations, please let me know as soon as possible!  

Let’s have a great year

Love,

Mrs. Hinchen

I recently added a profile to edmodo.com  Please check it out... edmodo is an awesome tool to use in the classroom with students as well as with colleagues.  It is a secure social learning site... where teachers can create assignments, quizzes, as well as share things with colleagues.  I'm just learning how to use it, so bear with me while I figure it out!

Pinterest Addiction

I have been scouring Pinterest all summer for some great ideas for the upcoming year, I also already went to some teacher stores and bought some cute things to add to my classroom decor for this upcoming year.  I am nervous about the school year beginning, and can't wait at the same time.  I'm going to figure out how to add pictures of what I'm learning on Pinterest to add to my blogs... I'm excited to learn.

My goal for this year

I am making a goal this year of keeping a class blog and website.  Please keep up with our posts and information as it comes available!