Parade

We had a great character parade this year. One of my personal favorites is the book Bee-Wigged by Cece Bell. So I put on my best wig and borrowed my daughters stuffed bee and I was Jerry the bee. We had lots of fun and creative book characters. if you haven't already check out the book  Bee-Wigged by Cece Bell it is a lot of fun to read to kids.

Our Amelia island field trip was a blast. We found shells and several sharks teeth on the beach. We had lunch under the canopy of oak trees and learned about and got to touch turtles rabbits and a king snake. The Omni resort was a breath taking backdrop and made this our most upscale field trip by far. Thank you to all the chaperones that helped to make this trip a success.
Mr. Blakeman

100 Days Smarter

We had a great 100th day of school. We made our 100 days hat and our 100 days glasses and we showed off our collections of 100 things. We also wrote about what we would buy if we had 100 dollars.
Mr. Blakeman

               

We had a wonderful time on our field trip to Diamond D Ranch. Thank you to all the parent chaperones that helped to keep things running smoothly.

Mr. Blakeman

Check out the picture collage of our literacy stations. Stations is a time for students to work independently and get some hands on practice with phonics, letters, writing, sight words, rhyming words and more.   

If you want to do some of the fun things we do in class at home, please check out the between the lions site at

http://pbskids.org/lions/

It is full of free fun phonics games and videos. Some of our favorites are the Quiet Machine, Dub Cubs and The Blending Bowl. Also check out the fun videos section.

All the best

Mr. Blakeman  

More Practice with letters and sounds

We have had a great first week. The students are getting used to the rituals and routines of the school day. The first hurdle that a new reader must master is recognizing the letters of the alphabet (upper and lower case) and knowing the sounds each letter makes.   We are just focusing on the short sound for now, long vowels come later. One website that every kindergartener parent should be familiar with is

http://www.starfall.com/

It is a free interactive phonics website that we use in class and it is a great tool to reinforce phonics skills at home.  A song we listen to often in class is who let the letters out by Dr. Jean. I found it free on you tube at this address

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iblK6O0XhLsit

Our class has also been watching the Letter Factory DVD by Leap Frog. It is a fun way to give your students extra phonics reinforcement at home.

All the best 

Mr. Blakeman

Welcome

I am excited to meet my 2013-2014 kindergarten class. I have been hard at work getting our room prepared for a fun and exciting year. I am happy to report that New Berlin is once again an A school. I look forward to meeting my students and families at our orientation this Thursday August 15th from 6:00 - 7:30.

I can always be contacted via email at

blakemanj@duvalschools.org

To receive text updates and reminders about our class on your mobile phone.

text @mrblakem

to (904) 647-2084

Also check out the helpful information and parent resources on our kindergarten web page at

http://teacherweb.com/FL/NewBerlinElementary/Kindergarten/apt1.aspx