(bright music) - Hello, little learners.

Welcome back to our pre-K and TK classroom.

My name is Mrs Lara.

Hello.

Today is the last day that we're learning all about kindergarten.

Kindergarten is the grade that you go to in school after to preschool or TK.

And it's still a lot of fun like those two grade levels.

So I'm gonna add another magnet to my board 'cause it's day five.

Let's see.

Two on the top and three on the bottom.

And two and three together make five.

All right.

So let me tell you about our day, lots of fun things planned.

We're going to learn some new words right behind this door, read a new book, right in that box, do some writing.

So if you have your journal out, get it ready.

You can also use a pencil, paper marker whatever you have or just air write the letters with me.

After we do our writing we're gonna end our week with some alphabet soup, yummy.

You've never had it?

It's delicious.

Oh, it's my specialty.

So I can't wait to try that with you.

But we always start our day off with a song and this song for this week involves a rhythm, pat and clap and pat and clap, it's a pattern too.

So get your patterns and rhythms ready.

Here we go.

♪ Bread and butter ♪ ♪ Marmalade and jam ♪ ♪ Let's say hello as quiet as we can ♪ Hello.

♪ Bread and butter ♪ ♪ Marmalade and jam ♪ ♪ Let's see hello as loud as we can ♪ Hello!

♪ Bread and butter ♪ ♪ Marmalade and jam ♪ ♪ Let's say hello as slow as we can ♪ Hello!

♪ Bread and butter ♪ ♪ Marmalade and jam ♪ ♪ Let's say hello as fast as we can ♪ Ninja fast, ready?

Hello.

That was super fast.

I'm really good.

Patting myself on the back.

♪ Bread and butter ♪ ♪ Marmalade and jam ♪ ♪ Let's say hello as high as we can ♪ Hello.

Last one is low, get your voices ready.

♪ Bread and butter ♪ ♪ Marmalade and jam ♪ ♪ Let's say hello as low as we can ♪ Hello.

That's really good.

I love singing with you.

Now let's learn some new words, another thing I love to do with you.

Behind the door, vocabulary words from our book.

"School is Wherever I Am".

Now I love the message in this book because it talks about school just not being a place but being a learning, wherever learning happens.

So it can be in a park or a zoo.

Well, you'll see.

Here are the words that I pulled from that book that we might need to know.

The first one is stumble.

Special letter S, stumble.

Have you ever tripped on something?

Like if the sidewalk is higher and you are walking and then you trip, that's a stumble.

It's to trip or even to make a mistake.

The second word is familiar.

Now you might notice it looks a lot and sounds a lot like the word family and familiar just like family is know something really, really well.

It's not strange to you or different.

You understand it, it's familiar.

The last word that I pulled out of our story is mansion.

I wish I lived in a mansion.

It's a really big, fancy house.

A large, beautiful house, that's a mansion.

So let's keep those three vocabulary words in mind when we read our text inside of our box.

"School is Wherever I Am".

And this book is by Ellie Petersen.

And you see right here, although the pictures are not realistic.

They are actually, this book is actually a true book.

That means it doesn't have anything in here that's not real.

Nonfiction.

Here we go.

My school is a brick building with big doors and rectangle windows.

So let's see the rectangle windows.

They're right here.

Do you see.

Does your school look like that?

My classroom has smooth desks, colorful posters a teacher and lots of students.

So there's the desk and it even has their name right on it.

I'm guessing that's the teacher because she has one of these things called a lanyard.

Sometimes people with lanyards are teacher, sometimes they're principals or janitors, and those are all the students.

We also call them friends.

School is where I laugh and where I write.

It's where I create, where I solve and where I sometimes stumble.

Remember the stumble means to trip or make a mistake.

So right here he is saying seven minus two is six.

Which if you know math, that's not the correct answer.

It's where I wonder things like...

There he is in his desk wondering.

Is school only one place?

Are there other classrooms?

Different teachers?

New things to learn?

Where else is school?

That's a very good question.

Where else is school?

Can school be found among hoots and howls at the zoo?

Can school be at a zoo?

Or in the shimmering scales of bubbly aquariums?

Maybe school is in the shadow of strangely familiar faces at the museum.

So remember familiar means, you know it well.

So maybe it looks like him a little bit, huh?

They have glasses.

Can school be at the pumpkin farm where my arms are bigger than my eyes?

There he is getting a big pumpkin and all the students are too.

This student even has a wheelbarrow.

And is it always filled with kids?

Does school have to have kids?

That's a good question.

Can school happen when I'm learning things all by myself?

Like, look, he's in the bathtub and right here these signs say sink and float.

So he's learning what things sink to the bottom and what things float.

Is that school?

I think sometimes school is on my screen served with a side of brownies.

So just like you're watching me, I'm your teacher here on your screen, aren't I?

And that's a teacher on the screen.

Look, he's getting delicious brownies.

Or is school in my sketchbook where my train looks more like a caterpillar?

There's his train.

Oh, it kind of does like a caterpillar, but a cool train caterpillar.

My classroom could be Nana's kitchen where I over stuff the potstickers.

And my desk might be Papa's work bench where we build a bird mansion.

Another one of our words.

Beautiful, big fancy house for bird, I bet that is pretty fancy.

I think school can be on the shelf of my library.

Can a book be part of school?

Of course.

But can school be just a book?

Who knows.

Or back home in my favorite chair?

Do you have a favorite chair maybe a pet that you like to cuddle with while you read?

It can be the things I've broken.

And things I've built back up.

Fixed, all done.

It can be in, I'm sorry and thank you.

That can be a form of school too.

It's in the hikes with mom or on bikes with dad.

Are you learning when you do those things?

Maybe when you're going on a hike with mom you're talking about all the nature, all the animals around and what they like to eat maybe the different kinds of trees.

And when you're on your bike with dad you could be talking about simple machines.

What makes the wheel move?

Why do we have pedals?

That's a form of school, isn't it?

It can be high in trees and under stones.

Around a campfire.

Yes, you can learn to sing all kinds of new songs and why fire is dangerous, and the things that fire can cook for us like smores.

Or up in the stars.

Where is school?

Well, school is wherever I am of course.

So see you're the learner.

School is wherever you are.

And I hope that you take that message to heart.

So we learned this week about a lot of different creatures that went to school, a pigeon, different animals and all of their experience.

We even learned about a little boy who wanted to build a school that had a zoo in it.

So I want you to think about school as not just a place, but the learning that happens.

So school is wherever you are.

Right now we're gonna go over to our writing place, we're gonna do some shared writing.

I'm gonna write about the things that I know about kindergarten.

So let's walk over there.

So in order to do this writing, I'm gonna need a pen.

So I'm gonna use my black pen today.

Take the cap off put it in the back, don't let it dry out.

And we're gonna write some words that remind me of kindergarten.

So the first word I think of is the word safe.

Now, when we're doing writing, we write all in uppercase letters.

We're learning to write uppercase much easier.

So we're gonna write together, get your writing tools.

Let's write the word safe here.

Safe, /s/.

S that's right.

Letter S is like this.

/a/, A.

/f/.

What letter makes the /f/ sound?

F. That's right.

And then I know that because I've been writing a long time that safe has a tricky ear, silent E at the end.

Safe Kindergarten is a safe place for you.

What else is it?

It's fun.

That's right.

Let's write the word fun right here.

Can you help me sound it out?

/f/.

F, that's right.

It's big line down, little line and little line.

The middle sound is, /u/.

It's a U.

And the ending sound is /n/, N. It's big line down, big line that slides and another big line, safe and fun.

Kindergarten is also a place where you learn.

You learn lots of new things.

You learn new friends names, you learn a routine, you learn when to share and when to stay quiet.

To keep your body calm.

Lots of things to learn.

So let's write the word, learn, /l/, L. Learn.

I know that has an E. Next is an a, so let's write that.

And the last two sounds are /r/.

It's a R big line, little curve, little line.

And last sound is an /n/, N. Learn.

We learn.

It's a safe, fun, a place to learn.

And who's there at your school?

One last word.

Someone like me, a teacher, that's right.

Let's write teacher right down here with a little heart by it 'cause we love our teachers.

First beginning sound is /t/, T. Correct.

Big line down, little line across T E. It's an E. Remember if I'm going to fast for you, just hit pause and just pick up right where you left off.

EA.

And the /ch/ are two letters that go together, like a pair that make the /ch/ sound.

C and H. And the ending sound is also two letters, E and R make /er/.

So E down here and R and a little heart as promised because we love our teachers.

So let's take a look at some of the words that we wrote that remind us of kindergarten.

Safe, fun, a place to learn, and of course, place with the teacher who loves and cares about you and wants you to learn everything that the grade level has to offer.

Right.

Right now we're gonna go over to the project plays.

Wonder how many steps it's gonna take me?

Oh, probably, can I do it in three?

Let's try.

One.

Two.

I can do it, I do it.

Three.

Oh, I know I could.

We're gonna be making alphabets stew, my way.

Like I said it's one of my favorite things to make because I put insects in my stew and noodles in my stew and dinosaurs in my stew.

And then I try to pull and save all the letters and put them on my board.

So here are the materials that you'll need to make this activity.

You're going to need a pot of some kind.

Hopefully you have one in your kitchen.

I like to use these they're called tongs because it lets me pull things out one by one and match 'em.

Now what I did that's extra that you don't have to do is I wrote all the letters on a tin.

Got this tin at the place where everything use a dollar, but you can use an old one or not use one at all.

So you can use that.

And then whatever materials you have and of course some letters.

I have some magnet letters because I knew that I needed to use my tin so I can stick on there.

All right, first thing we need to add to the stew, alphabet stew is eggs.

Of course we need golden eggs.

So we're gonna crack a few eggs in there.

Egg.

Two eggs in the stew.

In you go.

Or maybe give it a quick stir with my spoon.

Ooh, I like it.

Next we need noodles.

Of course, noodles.

Here are my noodles.

Oh, give it another stir.

Noodles and eggs yum for stew.

There it is inside.

We can't see it very well.

Next, I'm gonna need frogs, lots of frogs.

Let's do you 10 frogs in my stew because it's not alphabet stew without 10 frogs.

Let's count them, ready?

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, and 10.

10 frogs in my stew.

Give it a stew.

Bubbling hot.

Next, we're gonna need insects.

Of course.

Delicious, delicious insects.

Let's put in six of my favorite insects that I collected this morning.

One, two, three.

How many more do I need?

I have three, I need six.

Three more, I think, yep.

Four, five, six.

Six in there.

Then spiders of course, arachnids.

I need some spiders.

Let's do three spiders.

One, two, three.

Ooh, extra crunchy.

Give it a stir before we add our last two ingredients.

We need some dinosaurs.

Dinosaurs.

Let's do eight dinosaurs right in the stew.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and eight dinosaurs in my stew.

And of course our letters all in there.

This is what my alphabet stew is looking like, look at that.

Does it look delicious, deductible, scrumptious, fabulous, good enough to eat?

Now that we've made our alphabets stew, it's time to save our letters.

We need to put 'em right here on my tin so we can eat them all up.

Now I want you to help me find this letter right here I'm gonna write it.

We're gonna go in our alphabets stew and we're gonna to find the letter.

Let's see.

Big line down, little curve and little curve.

What letter is that?

The letter B, that's right.

Let's go in there and find the B. Ooh, there's my stew.

Do you see the B anywhere?

Get it out, is that a B?

Let's see.

Does this letter match that one?

No.

Back in the stew.

How about this one?

No, that's an A.

In the stew you go.

This one and I, no.

Look.

Oh, I see it.

Noodles, get back in there.

Oh, here it, the letter I'm looking for, the letter B.

See how they match.

I'm gonna put my B right down here.

Now what I like to do when I was a teacher doing independent exploration is just kind of leave these out and it's more fun when you do it with the fruit and each one has their own special ingredient to add to the alphabets stew, I really love that.

Of course, you can do this with water as well.

And I would have them take out each letter and identify a letter sound right when they're pulling it.

So a K says /k/ and we'll add it here to the K, letter matching as well.

And then let's pick out some more letters.

Some noodles too.

What letter is this one?

Z.

That's right.

/z/ that's the sound it makes.

/z/ right there.

More letters you say.

Okay.

What's this one?

Out of my alphabets stew came on X.

/x/, X. X, X, where's the xray, here match.

Let's see how many we can do.

Then we have the letter, do you recognize this one?

P, /p/.

I'll put it right down here.

Let's do a few more.

(indistinct) I pulled out an egg, it's smells a little rotten.

I put it back in.

A butterfly and some noodles.

No, not letters at all.

Ooh, here's a letter and a spider.

It's the letter T. What sound does the T make /t/.

Let's put it down.

Do I have your special letter yet?

Let's see.

I'll put out a few more.

How about the letter W?

/w/.

Here we go, putting it back on the W. And a dinosaur noodle, no fun.

I know the letter.

What's this one?

H, /h/, like it's hot.

One more.

Let's go in there.

A dragon fly, no, no, no.

Unless you wanna pretend you're pulling out beginning sound matching game like that.

The D for the dragon fly, that can be a lot of fun too, just not what we're doing today.

I know.

This one, it's a D, /d/.

Move over dragon fly.

And all right, we'll do one more, 'cause I wanna try to get everybody's special letter.

What's this one?

R, /r/.

There it is.

All right, let's put our ingredients back.

Give it one final stir and say, I'll eat you another time, alphabets stew.

I wanted to share another stir.

Like you can also do this activity with the foam letters and some water.

You can use a ladle and have the student scoop out or have your child scoop out each of the letters.

Maybe you can call out a letter or write a letter, like I did.

Lots of fun ways that you can adapt this.

Since it's the end of our week, I'm going to take a little time to tell you about the summer and the importance of learning during the summer.

In education we call the learning that ends up going away, the summer slide.

You slide backwards up to two grade levels for some students.

So next week, our last week together, I'm gonna be teaching you all about the summer things that you can do to keep the learning going, so your child or student goes into the next grade of kindergarten ready to learn and loving school and learning.

Hey, let's put this away and we'll sing our alphabet song, and I'll give you a preview of the activity we're going to do next week.

All right, here we go.

Are you ready?

♪ A is for amazing, that's what you are ♪ ♪ B is for brave, that'll carry you far ♪ ♪ C is for caring and community ♪ ♪ And D is for determine to be the best you can be ♪ ♪ E is for empathy, caring for all ♪ ♪ F is for friends that'll catch you when you fall ♪ ♪ G is for grateful for everything around ♪ ♪ And H is for hopeful, there is more good to be found ♪ ♪ I is for imagine all the fun things we could do ♪ ♪ J is for joyful, how I feel when I'm with you ♪ ♪ K is for kind to people and animals too ♪ ♪ And L is for love, put it in all that you do ♪ ♪ M is for mindful, be present every day ♪ ♪ N is for nice words and everything you say ♪ ♪ O is for original, always be you ♪ ♪ And P is for persevere until you make it through ♪ ♪ Q is for quiet, those bad thoughts ♪ ♪ R is for remember all the greatness that you've got ♪ ♪ S is for strong body and mind ♪ ♪ And T is for talent, why not make yours be kind ♪ ♪ U is for unique, special and loved ♪ ♪ V is for victorious, always rise above ♪ ♪ W is for worthy and wonderful too ♪ ♪ X don't X out those mistakes they're what make you, you ♪ ♪ Y, yes we're at the end of this rhyme ♪ ♪ And that's the alphabet ♪ ♪ I'll Z you next time.

♪ Okay, no preview, but I'll see you next time.

(bright music)