November News from Computer Science with Miss Samantha

Dear Parents,

Happy Halloween and happy autumn! What a great time we have had this past month celebrating the season and preparing for Halloween!  

As a special treat for Halloween, the children created wonderful funny pumpkins using the online program ABCYA.com.  The 2 and 3 year-olds were able to create the silly pumpkins with drag and drop functionality on the SMART Board, but the older kids definitely rocked their mouse-clicking skills creating their pumpkins on the computers!  I am so proud of them and love the way my classroom looks with all of the pictures hanging on the walls!

Tying Halloween in with Park Shore’s Kindness Program, I presented the online version of the book “Room on the Broom” by Julia Donaldson.  I bought this book for my own children several years ago and we all enjoyed it so much that I wanted to share it with my classes!  The video version of this amazing book is available on YouTube, but it is such a great story that I encourage you to check it out and ask your children to tell you about it!

The children continue to develop their skills through the use of our programs on both the computers and iPads.  I’ve loaded several fun Halloween-themed learning games on the iPads such as Halloween Puzzles, Paint by Number Halloween, and for the little ones Halloween Dress-up (Sago Mini).  Our 3 and 4 year-olds are well into the alphabet and have covered through the letter D.  I reinforce the classroom curriculum by using iPad tracing applications such as Writing Wizard and ABC Tracing, as well as with alphabet learning videos that we watch on the SMART Board.  Our Kindergarteners continue to work on their letter sound recognition skills and have begun beginning word sounds and sight words.  We are also working with a great online game and app through ABCYA.com called Alphabet Order, which helps the children to both identify the letters and place them in the appropriate order in the alphabet.  This game is also available for numbers and is called Numeric Order on ABCYA.com.

I look forward to working with your children in the weeks ahead as we approach Thanksgiving and continue to learn, laugh and enjoy the remainder of the fall season!  Please feel free to reach out to me with any questions or suggestions that you may have.

A list of the websites and apps that we use in the classroom is detailed below, and are grouped by the average age for usability and reference.  I gladly welcome any suggestions or recommendations that you may have based on applications your children have used and enjoy at home.  

 

Sincerely,

Miss Samantha

Park Shore Computer Science Specialist

Toddlers

Shapes, Colors, Classifications & Concepts (These games are appropriate for ages 2 through 5+)

Interactive Learning / Classroom Reinforcement

Creative / Puzzles/ Just for Fun