Our kindergarten service project and more!



A.M. Class helping with the sorting



This past Friday we delivered our donations to the Good Samaritan NICU. The nurses were very excited to receive our donations.  I can't thank you all enough for your generosity. We really collected a ton of baby t-shirts, blankets and beanie hats that will be put to good use.  We didn't get to see any of the babies because only parents are allowed in, but some of the nurses came out and spoke to us about how our donations are helping the babies.  I wish we could have had all the students there, but space didn't allow. I do thank those parents who took time out of their busy schedules to bring their children there.



P.M Class after we put our donations in the bucket














The nurses of the NICU

 

Looking forward, I sent home a note outlining what our May will look like.  Please check that schedule often. We are going to be busy.  Keep your fingers crossed for good weather for our field trip to the zoo and our field days.  Over the next few remaining weeks we will continue working on our independent writing, which is truly impressive and we will be using our smartboard for many end of the year activities as we wind down.  We will continue to take our timed math tests until May 18th.  The week following that  we will be busy with our field days and our VIP program so we will not take a timed test that week and the following week we only have 2 days of school.. Can you believe it.  A note about about Graduation will come home shorty.  Our ceremony is held in the evening and all are welcome, (grandparents, siblings, cousins, aunts uncles etc.) I must admit this year has flown by so fast.



As usual thank you for checking our kindergarten blog!

St. Patricks Day, oviparous and our Service project.

I feel like such a slacker, I have not updated my blog in weeks. Between being sick and all the other things I let take over my life I have failed to keep up with the blog. I truly apologize. Over the past few weeks we have been exploring many new things. We learned what oviparous means. We created a cute riddle bulletin board about oviparous animals. Please stop by and read the riddles. The students have been writing in their journals. Their independent writing is coming along so nice. We also planted some marigold flowers and we are watching them grow. We had our first sprouts today! We have been studying plants and what they need to grow. We have also been talking about the parts of a plant and their importance to the plant. We also covered the different seasons and how a tree or plant looks during the different seasons.

Last week we started our Social and Emotional Service Project. We had a nurse come in from the Good Sam NICU. She talked to the students about what goes in unit and how their donations are used. I can't believe how responsive the students were. They really made some personal connections to the information that was presented to them.

Thank you to everyone who has donated to our service project, if you haven't had a chance yet remember I do need all donations by Monday. We will be sorting and getting our donation ready for delivery. I really appreciate all your help with this project. Our goal is to have them make a connection to the community and how the little things we can do make a huge difference to others who are less fortunate then ourselves.

Science day- physical and chemical change

I hope you all enjoyed your spring break! I am finally getting some of our pictures posted. For our last science day we made Ice cream, we watched milk, vanilla, sugar, salt and ice turn into a tasty treat! Each year we try to improve on the recipe and I must say this year was the best. We also blew up balloons, volcano's and watch M's float off our M & M's . It was very exciting to see what happens when you add baking soda to vinegar. So many ways to have fun with house hold items. I think the kids favorite was when the balloons blew up after the baking soda mixed with he vinegar. I really appreciate all the help you parents offered up for our science days. We couldn't do it without you . Plus the kids love to have you in the class.

Other information:

I am going to be sending home information on our field trip to the zoo, field days, VIP and Graduation. Also next week a note will come home about our social and emotional service project we are participating in. Thanks for stopping by. I will be posting pictures from St. Patrick's day soon.

St. Baldrick's

In preparation for this event, I charged my camera and when we got to DGS I took a few pictures. When the time came for Sam to have her head shaved, my camera card was full. (GO figure, just my luck) Luckily my daughter Cory had her camera and handed it to me so I could get the 10 thousand pictures I take at every event. SO all worked out and thanks to Cory saving the day here are the after pictures of both my girls. The St. Baldrick's event at Downers Grove South was very exciting. They raised over $65,000.00 dollars. Plus they had a special guest speaker Mikayla Sweeny, she is a SJS student who has battled cancer and won. When Mikayla came to kindergarten her hair had just started growing back. Friday she told a special story of a preschool friend who defended her when the other children made fun of her for being bald. She also spoke of how Nate shaves his head every year to support her and all the other children going through cancer. Although I had a schedule of events for that afternoon, I didn't make the connection when I read her name on the list. I was pleasantly surprised to find out it was her. I understand she spoke at last years event as well. Let me tell you what a great job she did speaking in front of that many students, family and faculty. (it was packed)

I am so proud of both my girls for their support with this foundation and Mikayla for her bravery to tell her story. This was a wonderful experience for everyone who attended.

Thanks for letting me share a little bit of Cherney news, I will be posting pictures of our Science day and St. Patrick's Day activities. (Probably tomorrow) So check back soon!

The Cherney Family

This past week I was exceptionally busy with my family, that is why I didn't get the blog updated and for that I apologize. I am dedicating this weeks blog to my two daughters. Last year they decided they were going to join St. Baldrick's and raise money to help fight childhood cancer. My oldest daughter Cory (who is a NICU nurse at Good Sam) joined the St. Baldrick's team sponsored by Midwest University here in Downers Grove. Their venue was held at Ballydoyles last Monday and as of that night they raised over $20,000 dollars. It was an exciting evening. Cory and so many others shaved their heads in support of those who lose their hair to cancer. Cory was the top fundraiser for the event and was the first up to shave her head. Sam, my youngest daughter (a Freshman at Downers Grove South )is shaving her head this Friday during a pep assembly. The DGS venue has raise over $33,000.00 dollars. My girls together raised over $2600.00 dollars for the foundation. Our family knows first hand how devastating Cancer is and I am so proud of them for taking part in this fundraising event.

We shared in Cory's head shaving last week and we anxiously await Sam's turn on Friday. I am posting a before picture of the two of them, but will post an after picture when Sam has her head shaved. Thank you for letting me share a little bit of Cherney news with you all. I have such a wonderful family and I know you will all agree how blessed we are to have such happy, healthy children.

Dr. Seuss

Last week we celebrated Dr. Seuss's birthday! We had so much fun reading his books and watching some movies based on his books. We also compared and contrasted the books to the movies. We watched "The Lorax" and "The Cat in the Hat" and "Green Eggs and Ham" , after we read the books we retold the story by answering questions and writing about the movies. We also made a Cat in the hat "at" word hat! So much fun. I must say they looked adorable in their "Cat in the hat" we made. This week we will be reading stories about Leprechauns and making a treasure box just in case a leprechaun visits our classroom and leaves us some of his gold.

Tuesday we will have hands on Science day. We will be exploring chemical and physical change, it is a yummy science day!

Thanks for stopping by!

Science Day- exploring our five senses

At our hands-on science day we explored our five senses- by tasting, feeling ,smelling, listening, and looking. The kids tasted many different items, lemons, sugar, pickles, pretzels, sweet tarts and chocolate. We talked about the different taste buds that we have and how each section of our tongue is used for different tastes. The look on their faces when they tasted the lemons was priceless. We also used our noses to determine what smells we were smelling. I think my room smelled like vinegar for a couple of hours afterwards. I am so grateful to all you parents who come in to help with these experiments, as you can tell they really enjoy science day! So thank you so much for your commitment to our class.

This week coming up in class we will talk about Dental health. February is dental health month and I have some activities planned that are centered around our teeth. We will also start our unit on Dr. Seuss. His birthday is March 2, We've got some Seuss activities planned for the end of the week and into the following week. We will be watching the movie "The Lorax" (the old version of course, but I can't wait to see the new version at the theater) which has a wonderful lesson on appreciating and respecting the world God created for us , as well as how important trees are to our lives.

Well thanks for checking in.... Send me a note and mention the next movie I will be seeing at the theater and your child will receive a sweet treat!