Winnie Bear Newsletter – January 29, 2010

Dear Winnie Bear Families,

For the past two weeks, we have continued our unit on “My Family.”

Language: Vocabulary
Below is a list of theme specific vocabulary words that have been introduced:
1.Grandfather (Father’s Father) – 爷爷 （ye ye）
2.Grandmother (Father’s Mother) – 奶奶 （nai nai）
3.Grandfather (Mother’s Father) – 外公 （wai gong）
4.Grandmother (Mother’s Mother) – 外婆 （wai po）
5.Family Tree – 家庭树 （jia ting shu）
6.Feelings – 情感 （qing gan）
7.Happy- 开心 （kai xin）
8.Sad- 悲伤 （bei shang）
9.Mad- 生气 （sheng qi）

Reading: Stories
We continued to read many books by Todd Parr, involving families and family members. We discussed our extended family members.

Mathematics: Skip Counting
We have been counting the days in school since September. As of today, we have been in school for 86 days. As we count the days in school, we have been practicing counting and skip counting by 10s. The 100th day of school will land sometime in the middle of February. We will be having a day focused on 100 when it arrives.

Music: 恭喜恭喜 and Rhythm Clapping
We learned a new song called “恭喜恭喜.”
每条大街小巷，
每个人的嘴里，
见面第一句话，
就是恭喜恭喜，
恭喜恭喜恭喜你，
恭喜恭喜恭喜你。
We have also been doing some clapping by following a rhythm.

Body Movement:
We have continued to do body movements such as morning stretches and exercises.

Art: “My Family” Book and Family Tree
We finished making our family book and also made a family tree of our immediate family members.

Fine Motor:
Besides coloring, we have started doing more fine-motor skill development activities. We have been doing some pasting, cutting, and tracing of horizontal, vertical, and diagonal lines.

Social/Emotional:
We spent some time discussing feelings. The three feelings introduced were happy, mad, and sad. We talked about how our faces look when we are feeling happy, mad, or sad. We also played a game of Charades to guess which feeling was being portrayed.

Next week, we will share our family posters and begin talking about the Lunar New Year.

Thanks,
Katherine
1/29/10