Today Kelcy and I did some review with ABC/Sight Word Ninja, read a couple chapters in our Junie B. read aloud, and played a rhyming word game to practice rhyming words from our lesson.

We ended the session with a couple new Arctic animal books and began our online research about that region. He loved watching the video that let us HEAR what each animal sounded like. We will continue with an Arctic/Ice research unit until February when he heads up north!

Since this was the first session after a period of some absence due to holidays and illness, the bulk of the lesson revolved around reviewing previously learned letters and sounds (Nn, Ss, Pp, Aa, Tt, Ff, and Cc, specifically). He was first tasked with writing his name on construction paper using multi-colored chalk and did this well, although he hesitated and required a prompt before writing the letter 'o' in his last name. Nicholas performed well when recalling other letters he previously learned, but gave the 'n' sound for the letter 'p,' and struggled a bit recalling the sound of the letter 'f.' Nicholas was also tasked with writing the letters and sounds on paper and performed well doing this. The letters and sounds that Kk and Mm make was introduced, with Nicholas correctly repeating the sound and words after they were initially modelled for him. 'The Song of Kookaburra' was viewed on YouTube to stimulate interest and reinforce the 'k sound. Though off to a slower start when he first arrived at school, Nicholas grew more animated as activities and varied modalities engaged his attention, sustaining concentration and attention and responding favorably to the varied methods and teaching techniques employed (song/chalk/visual and auditory modalities) to assist in skill acquisition. For example, he greatly enjoyed first singing 'The Muffin Man' song, and then performed very well circling all the 'M' letters he saw in the written lyrics, achieving 15/16, or 94% accuracy in this visual discrimination task. Nicholas freely demonstrated his affection to this tutor, hugging her a few times sporadically throughout the session. He is spontaneous and genuine in his display of affection as well as candor, which is quite refreshing. We concluded the session with Nicolas requesting me to draw a picture of him after I commented on his nice smile and bright-eyed expression. I took a few minutes to pencil sketch him and he helped cut out his name that he had written at the introduction of the session and attached it to the sketch, asking me to hold it in order to show his mom the next time he came to school. All told, it was a productive session and Nicholas demonstrated a good ability to follow multi-step directives and recall skills of learning acquired in prior sessions.

Today was a great session!!! Kelcy was so excited about everything we were doing!

We continued working on word families and adding to our lists. We started a new Junie B. Jones book, A Little Monkey Business. He wrote in his journal (without complaint) and was incredibly persistent!

Finally we brainstormed a new science/soc. studies unit about the Arctic. He explained to me everything he knew about the animals and climate of the Arctic and we made a think web about it with sticky notes on his wall. We will continue to research and learn throughout next week about this topic.

Today Kelcy practiced new and old sight words using his App as a warm up! He told me how excited he was to play it at home too! :)

We worked on a phonics lesson today with the "-at" family in his journal. He got to use stamps to make each word and picked up the new concept of word families/rhyming words quickly.

We finished our Junie B. Jones read aloud chapter book as well, and read and responded to some poetry from Where The Sidewalk Ends! Great work today, Kelc!

Today Kelcy practiced sight words and letter names/sounds with ABC Ninja and Sight Word Ninja Apps again! We journaled, read through some new books for his book baggie, and went outside to read a couple chapters in Junie B. Jones - which we should finish tomorrow. We decided to do a little word art with water colors. He also made a name sign for Penny which turned out lovely :) . Great day!

Today we got some new apps on the iPad for Kelcy to practice letter sounds and sight words! He loved the competition and was so excited to play them! If you'd like to utilize at home, they are called ABC Ninja, Phonics Ninja, and Sight Word Ninja :) In the settings I was able to customize and personalize the game to what he is working on/already knows.

We also were able to read a couple brand new read alouds before our short session was finished today! Kelcy said he'd like to learn how to make Roman numerals after seeing them on Ms. Judie's watch, I'll show him on Tuesday :)

Today Kelcy spent time with a new book "The Man, the Pan, and the Egg" which had tons of sight words he knew and a few words he was able to figure out from sounds and from picture clues. I sent this book home with him to practice! I also introduced the last of the sight words given to us from St. Catharine's that they are learning this month in his Pre-K class.

We read a couple more chapters in "Junie B. Jones and the Stupid, Smelly, Bus" which he seems to be enjoying! When he is not sure of what a word means, etc - he will ALWAYS ask to make sure he understands what is happening in the story!

Today I began reading aloud a small, funny chapter book to Kelcy (Junie B. Jones). He followed the story well and was looking forward to continuing where we left off tomorrow. We also read some Shel Silverstein poetry and responded with pictures and sentences in his wonder journal!

We reviewed sight words, letter sounds, and letter names. We also spent time looking through new books and changing them out in his book baggie!

Kelcy was absent today.

Today, Kelcy and I spent lots of time talking about his winter break and journaling to catch up! His growth in his sight words has been awesome, knowing all of the first 25 high frequency words for kindergarten. We practiced writing sentences using many new words and finished the session rereading a few of our favorite stories!