March News

Hi, Everyone - I hope your vacation was fantastic.  OK, the weather could have been better, but there was/is plenty of snow for outside fun.  Did your first grader practice tying his/her shoes?  Beginning this week we will be posting names of expert shoe tie - ers  (sp?) to a class honor roll.  If you can, it would be great if you can help your first graders master this tricky but important skill.  The boys and girls will be surprised on Monday when they see their new seats!   Last time we changed seats the kids got to pick who they thought they would work well with.  This time I decided to shake things up and give everyone a new perspective.  Nothing is set in stone, and everyone will be moving a couple of more times before the end of the year.  Speaking of set in stone - I am hoping to replace this blog soon with one done on i-web.  One advantage of the new blog is:  The snowman movie plays on it!  So watch for it this week. 
Reminder - PTA Book Fair this week.  Watch for more info in the homework folders.
Have a great March week!

Sunday Update

Hi, Everyone!  Last week before vacation - and it will be busy as usual.  We are resuming our Reading Street lessons, so watch for new spelling words coming home on Monday.  Monday is also 100 day - so if your child has made a project, he/she should bring it in to share.  We will have Show and Tell on Friday this week - I'm sure your child will remind you.  You may have noticed that the snowman video was on this blog - it did not work, so I took it down.  We did get to watch the video Friday at school, and I am still working on getting it up and running correctly on the blog.  The animal reports did get finished - hopefully you saw your child's - they are now in our class room library for everyone to enjoy and learn from.  We also finished up our first math journal last week.  ( I do not correct every item in the math journal, but do check to be sure the children are grasping the concepts, and have them fix major or frequent errors.)The children took the Unit 5 test, and did very well.  So on Friday we began the second half of the math program.  On Tuesday, the PTA approved the first grade request for funds to visit Charmingfare Farm in June.  We asked for $300.00, and they gave us $400.00!  Thank you PTA!  Still, the admission fee and bus cost is substantial - and we will be sending home information this week so you can plan ahead for this fun and educational trip.
Have a great week!

Sunday update

Quite a snowstorm!  I hope every one got outside to enjoy all that snow!  Please send in boots, mittens, ski pants etc. so the kids can enjoy the snow at school as well.  Due to the snow day, our spelling test will be Monday.  Also, we have gotten ahead of ourselves in Reading Streets, so this week will be a review week.  There will be no new spelling words.  We will be spending time improving our writing - reading like a writer to figure out how to write really well-crafted stories.  As I told the kids, now that they can write sentences with pretty good (or better) handwriting and spelling, it is time to move on to writing stories that include dialogue, "spicy" words, and details that will paint a picture in their reader's mind.  Don't forget:  Valentines due on Thursday, and 100 day is now Monday February 18th

Student Council Collections

I forgot to mention in my newsletter that the student council is collecting donations of people and/or pet food to help out those in need. If you can, please send in an item for this worthy cause. Happy Groundhog Day!

February Newsletter

End of January

As the picture below shows, the kids have really had a lot of fun during indoor recess this week. The lack of fresh air and running around time is tough, so I am hoping we can get out this week. Animal reports are nearly finished - the children worked very hard on them. I am going to type them, and on Thursday we will visit the computer lab to make covers for the reports on Print Shop. Speaking of computers, our technology integrator Haley Loiseau will be helping the students prepare a snowman video using KidPix. The completed video will be posted on the blog. Now that February is almost here, watch for information on Valentine's Day and Hundreds day - which are coming up fast.

indoor recess

January Freeze

OK, I wanted winter to return - but just a little bit warmer so we can go out and enjoy that new snow! We will be busy this four day week - writing animal reports and finishing up Reading Streets unit 2 and taking the reading assessment for that unit. We will be having spelling - watch for the words in the homework folders tomorrow.

January Thaw

Oh dear,what a dreary weekend! I hate to see the snow go, the kids had such fun at recess sliding down the snowbanks. I hope winter returns soon. As I mentioned last week, in science we are studying animals. We have learned six classes of animals, and characteristics of each. This week the kids will be choosing an animal to read and write about. Once the reports are done, we will be sure to share them with you. Our Reading Streets story was about triceratops this past week, hence the triceratops art project that you should be seeing come home this week. Show and Tell for January will be this Friday, January 18th. Have a good week!

January 6, 2013

Hi, Everyone, It looks like it is going to be a warmer week - so we will be going outside. Boots are really essential, and ski pants if your child wants to go on the playground or snow banks. We do not wear ski pants at the snack recess which is short, but we do wear boots. If you want to send in slippers or sneakers to keep at school for the winter, that might be helpful. It is a full week - so we will be having a spelling pretest on Monday, and the final test on Friday. Some students may get 5 extra words instead of 10 if they do well on the pretest. I notice that 10 is too challenging for some, even though they get all the pretest words correct. The pretest words tend to be easy because they follow a pattern. This week we are beginning a study of non-fiction animal books. After a few days of reading about animals in the books, and in the science book, each child will choose an animal to research and write about. Happy January!

Happy New Year

Back to school tomorrow! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday. The snow was fun - I'm sure the kids enjoyed it. The cold weather will allow us to use some of the wonderful games, art supplies and play doh you contributed to our classroom. Thank you! I posted a slideshow of the Three Billy Goats Gruff. We had to reenact the play for the camera - but I did want to give credit to our actors. Due to the short week - there will be no spelling test this week. We will review the words, but there will be no end of week test. Math homework does resume however. Happy New Year!

Three Billy Goats Gruff

Free digital slideshow customized with Smilebox