Week of November 12, 2012

Dear Parents:

What a  fabulous day Poetry in the Park was on Thursday! The weather was perfect! Such a beautiful day to be outside! I was so proud of the children. Even though we had a little glitch, they continued on and finished with a bang! True performers! The show must go on! If anyone has any pictures to share, please send them to me or post them on our shutterfly site! Here are a few from my camera.

On Wednesday, we will be going to the SPCA for a tour and to take our bins full of donated items for the animals. The children are so excited and so are the teachers! There are also farm animals so the children are allowed to bring carrots and apples to feed them if they like. We will eat lunch at the SPCA. Sage will provide a sack lunch for the children who returned the green form marked that they needed a lunch. Those bringing lunch from home need to bring a COMPLETELY DISPOSABLE lunch. No lunchboxes, please. We would love to have parents join us, but you will need to either meet us at the SPCA or follow the bus from school. We will leave school promptly at 10:45.

I am so thankful for my wonderful class this year AND you wonderful parents! That is my "thankful thought" for this season. Now, it is your child's turn to come up with a "thankful thought" to bring to our Thanksgiving celebration on Thursday afternoon. We will begin our celebration at 1:45 on Thursday. A letter went home last week asking your child to bring in a specific ingredient to add to our cornucopia snack mix. Please be sure to send it in by tomorrow. At the party, each child will tell us their thankful thought when they add their ingredient to our snack mix. You may have your child write the thought down if it will help in remembering what he/she wants to say. It is so sweet to hear what the children are thankful for. As always, everyone is welcome to join us for our Thanksgiving celebration. We will also be making a fun and useful Thanksgiving decoration so parent helpers are especially appreciated!

Now, for what is going on in our class this week:

Reading Workshop/Word Work: This week we are reviewing all of the short vowels and all of the word families that we have covered so far this year. Please continue to review these with your child at home.  We'll practice blends and the digraph sounds ch, th, sh, and wh. We will also do some work with compound words. We'll continue to practice reading fluency. When you read with your child at home, model appropriate voice inflection and fluency. Read a page and have your child echo back the way you read. Engage in conversation with your child about the books they are reading at home. Talk about the sequence or order of events in the story, the setting, and the characters. Ask your child about his/her favorite parts of the story and why. The children know that my favorite word is because. That is my favorite word because I love for them to tell me the "why" of things. Encourage "thinking" in response to  your child's reading to help deepen comprehension. This will help the children learn the power of talking and thinking in response to the stories they read.

Using iPads during word work is fun!

Writing Workshop: We will finish up our poetry unit and work on several birthday books for our classmates!

Math: We are working on nonstandard and standard units of measure. The children will be having fun measuring with different parts of their bodies, rulers, tape measures, and even candy corn! M-m-m-m!

Ben and Phoebe measure the length of the classroom using a non-standard unit of measure...
arm-spans.

Sydney and Natalie work together to measure the length of the classroom using arm-spans, too.

Please send in an empty paper towel tube and an empty, CLEAN Pringles can (large - not snack size). Please send them in this WEEK if possible. If you have any extras, we would appreciate them, too! We will begin using them in a special on-going math activity right after Thanksgiving break.

Kaja and Leni work together to record their findings while measuring many different things in and outside of  the classroom using various non-standard units of measure.

Science: We are working on our Human Body voice thread this week. I hope to have it posted for you soon! The human body "pocket books" containing the work of your children during our human body unit came home today. Please go through it with your child and celebrate all of their hard work and learning! We will begin a new unit on the solar system when we return from Thanksgiving break. I know the children will enjoy it, too!

Things to remember:

• Word card rings are due every Thursday! This is considered part of the homework responsibility for your child.
• Thanksgiving celebration will be at 1:45 Thursday. All are welcome to join us!
• Thanksgiving break next week - November 19 - 23.
• Holiday Gift Drive begins December 3 and ends December 14. Information regarding the family our class will be providing gifts for will come home soon. A container will be placed in our classroom by December 3rd to collect the gifts for the family. On Friday, December 14, the children will carry the gifts to the gym to be sorted. Then, they will be taken to the family so they may enjoy a happy holiday! 

Volunteers this week:

• Wednesday - Library Check-out - 2:10- David Nguyen and 
• Thursday - Math Game - 10:30 - Kim Gross
• Friday - Art - 9:15 - Lorraine Thorpe
• Friday - Parent Reader - 2:15 - Twila Davis

I hope you all have a very HAPPY THANKSGIVING with your loved ones!
Susan

Week of November 5, 2012

Dear Parents:

The parade and fall festival on Wednesday were so much fun! What a beautiful day! Enjoy the pictures! I will post more soon on our class shutterfly site! 

Poetry in the Park is this Thursday beginning at 8:30. Please keep practicing our poem with your child, encouraging both facial and voice expression! Bring your chairs or blankets and get ready for a wonderful morning of both funny and lyrical poetry! It is truly one of the best days of the year at Shorecrest!

We also have the Book Fair this week in the Student Activity Center. This is the only fundraiser for the library. We will be browsing as a class at 9:00 on Tuesday morning. You are welcome to join us if you would like. If you would like to take your child shopping with you, please try to do so either before or after school, if possible. Otherwise, during recess would be best so that they don’t miss any class time. Recess is from 1:00 – 1:30. For your shopping convenience, the Book Fair’s hours for the week are as follows:

Monday 8 – 3:30

Tuesday 7:45 – 5:00

Wednesday and Thursday 7:45 – 3:30

First Grade Service-Learning Project:

Our service-learning project for the SPCA is in full swing. PLEASE help your child experience “giving” for such a wonderful cause. Below are some of the suggested items needed by the SPCA. The collection bins are in the hallways and need filling! We will take all the collections with us when we visit the SPCA on November 14^th.  Parents are welcome to join us, but will need to drive, as there is not enough room on the bus. Thank you so much to those who have donated so far! When we go on the field trip, we’ll also be visiting the farm animals at the SPCA. Last year, they LOVED the carrots and apples we brought for them and used good animal manners in taking them! :) Please go to the "Animals Wish List" at the following link to see what they need.

http://www.spcafl.org/

Donate a Dog or Cat Bed

Although we have another shortened week due to Poetry in the Park on Thursday morning and the Professional Development Day Friday, we are jam-packed with learning! This week our spelling and word work will focus on all the short vowels with words ending in ck, such as shock, track, chick, and wreck. The word cards that came home at the end of last week in the rubber band do not come back to school. The children are responsible for being able to apply the correct spelling of those words in their writing. I recommend that you get an index card file box and have your child file the words alphabetically in it. This will give them excellent practice in alphabetic order. The file will become a great resource to use for spelling when writing. New words will come home today on the word ring. PLEASE remember to practice reading AND spelling the words with your child. Please also help your child remember to return the ring every THURSDAY. This is part of the weekly homework responsibility. THANK YOU for your help!

During reading workshop, we are practicing voice inflection and working on gaining fluency while reading both poetry and our just right books.

During writing workshop, we continue writing poetry. The children are working on a poem in the style of Margaret Wise Brown’s The Important Book. We’ll also work on acrostic poems. Some of their work will be displayed in the breezeway and outside our classroom for Poetry in the Park. Be sure to check it out!

In math, we are using dominoes to practice addition facts. We will take our unit 3 assessment. Look for it to come home this week. Also, the Unit 4 family letter will be coming home. Please look for it in your child’s folder. It will explain the concepts that will be covered in that unit and give you suggestions for activities and games to play with your child with at home.

In science, we are finishing up our human body unit by working on a voice thread project. I will post the voice thread in next week’s blog for your enjoyment! The children have worked hard during this unit and learned much. Look for your child’s “My Body” pocket book to come home this week. Celebrate your child’s learning and hard work!

Kate & Matthew (see him down by the cubbies)  hold a string to show how long the small intestine would be if stretched out!

Other Important Dates: 

This Friday, November 9th, is a Professional Development Day for teachers. There will be no school for students. Faculty will be attending a diversity workshop with guest lecturer, Rosetta Lee.

I encourage you to attend a very special evening for parents on Thursday, November 8, at 6:30 pm in the Janet Root Theater. Rosetta Lee will be talking with parents about inclusivity and identity development. It will be a wonderful opportunity to learn and discuss issues that impact our students. More information is included at the end of this blog.

Field trip to the SPCA will be Wednesday, November 14. Parents are welcome to join us. You may follow the bus or meet us at the SPCA.

Also, please remember that our class will be celebrating Thanksgiving on Thursday, November 15 at 1:45. The other classes will celebrate on Friday, but because we have two birthdays to celebrate on Friday, I have moved our Thanksgiving celebration to Thursday. We do not have a “feast” but will be making and enjoying a cornucopia snack mix. A letter will be coming home this week to let you know the ingredient that your child needs to provide for our mix. All parents are welcome to join us on Thursday at 1:45!

The Holiday Gift Drive takes place December 3 – 14. Information regarding the family our class will be providing gifts for will come home soon. A container will be placed in our classroom by December 3^rd to collect the gifts for the family. On Friday, December 14, the students will carry the gifts to the gym to be sorted. Then, they will be taken to the family so they may enjoy a happy holiday!

Volunteers this week:

• Wednesday - Library Check-out – 2:10 – 2:50 – Kristen Danielson and Lorraine Thorpe

See you Thursday, if not before...

Susan

Week of October 29, 2012

Dear Parents: 

It has been a difficult couple of weeks, especially last week. I appreciate so much your caring, understanding, and prayers for Mrs. Weinman and her family. It is so hard and incredibly sad to lose a friend and colleague, someone you see every day. She definitely touched many lives in so many ways. Thank you for understanding the need to close school on Monday so that her friends and colleagues are able to be together to say good-bye. 

One of Mrs. Weinman's favorite days was the Halloween Parade and Fall Festival which will take place Wednesday. The parade begins at 8:30. Please send your child to school in his or her costume. The children may wear play clothes to the festival so please send some for your child to change into after the parade. Don't forget shoes and underwear! If you are accompanying your child to the festival, please be at the classroom no later than 9:45 to pick up your child. There will be a sign-out sheet at our classroom. Please be sure to sign your child out. You will not have to do so at the office. If someone else will be picking your child up, please send a note or email to let me know. Otherwise, they will be dismissed to the festival at 9:45.

Math: This week I hope to finish unit 3. We'll be counting and exchanging dimes, nickels, and pennies and learning to write money amounts using dollar and cents notation. We'll explore domino-dot patterns and practice all of the basic addition facts through domino addition. The plan is to take the unit 3 assessment next Monday.

Science: We will finish up our study of the human body this week. We'll learn about the largest organ of our body - our skin. We'll also spend some time reviewing all that we have learned about the amazing human body. Their "pocket" books will be coming home either the end of this week or early next week. Please celebrate with your child all that we have learned and all of their hard work! It has been such a fun unit!

Reading Workshop: We are noticing how quotation marks capture talk and help us to know who is talking. We are learning to change our voice when we see different types of punctuation, such as questions, exclamations, ellipses, etc. Paying attention to punctuation helps us to make meaning of what we are reading and to read books and poems as the author intended.

Word Work: We continue working on words with short vowel /e/. This week we are focusing on the word families _eg, _est, and _ell. We’ll continue to work with 2 and 3 letter initial blends and digraphs.

Writing Workshop: We will continue with our poetry unit. Look for a sampling of your child's poetry to be displayed in the breezeway at Poetry in the Park.

Don't forget that we are collecting needed items for the animals at the SPCA for our first grade service-learning project. We will take all of the donations to the SPCA on Wednesday, November 14. We'll leave school at 10:45 and should return by 2:00. We will be eating a picnic lunch at the SPCA so please be sure to send a completely disposable lunch with your child that day. If you have purchased a school lunch for that day, Sage will provide a bag lunch for your child. Parents are welcome to accompany us to the SPCA but will need to drive separately. We will not have room on the bus.


Also, please remember that our class will be celebrating Thanksgiving on Thursday, November 15 at 1:45. The other classes will celebrate on Friday, but because we have two birthdays to celebrate on Friday, I have moved our Thanksgiving celebration to Thursday.

Other Things to Remember:

• The Book Fair will take place next week! Our class will be browsing on Tuesday morning at 10:05. If you would like to come shop with your child, you can do so before or after school, before 8:25, or during recess (1:00 - 1:30) each day.
• Poetry in the Park will be on Thursday, November 8^th at 8:30 a.m. Our class will recite the poem, "The Creature in the Classroom" by Jack Prelutsky. Please keep working with your child on this poem at home using lots of expression in both voice and face! 
• Next Friday, November 9th, is a Professional Development Day for teachers. There will be no school for students. 
• Field trip to the SPCA will be Wednesday, November 14.
• The Holiday Gift Drive begins December 3^rd and ends December 14^th.

Volunteers this week:

• Wednesday - No check-out this week
• Thursday - Math Game (10:30) - Deborah Shipley
• Friday - Art  (9:15) - Mary Hind
• Friday - Parent Reader - (2:15) - Charlene Hosseini

Take care - 
Susan

Week of October 22, 2012

Dear Parents:

Thank you so much for coming to our writing celebration on Friday! The children were so excited to read their stories to you over and over and over! You wrote such heart-felt and inspiring compliments to the children. Thank you for celebrating them as the authors they are! Oh, and I can't forget to thank you for the delicious treats many of you provided  - what a feast! Such wonderful children deserve wonderful parents and I appreciate you ALL! I have lots of pictures from the celebration but am unable to post any in the blog right now as there is still an issue with my computer involving iphoto. I hope it will be resolved this week and I will be able to download photos to our class shutterfly site. I promise pictures will also be coming of the cow eye dissection last week and the homecoming pep rally.

Your child's individual first grade pictures came home at the end of last week. I thought they were all fabulous! However, picture retakes are tomorrow. If you would like your child's picture retaken, please send in the picture package with your child tomorrow. 

Last week, Sharon Hauser from the SPCA brought her dog, Rusty, to meet our first graders and kick off our first grade service-learning project. This morning, she brought Rusty to Town Meeting to help us tell the rest of the lower school about our service-learning project to help the SPCA. Mrs. Hauser adopted Rusty from the SPCA about 10 years ago. Check out the Service Learning link on e-bytes to see pictures of Rusty and the childen from last week. You will see why we fell in love with him! This week some of the children will be visiting the other classes of the lower school to tell them about our service project and to encourage them to donate items on the wish list for the animals at the SPCA. Thank you to Charlene Hosseini for bringing in the bins for collecting the needed items. The bins, located in the hallways and breezeways, need filling! Blankets, towels, treats, food, chew toys are just a few of the items you might consider sending in. Check out the SPCA website for a complete list of things they need.

http://www.spcatampabay.org/page.aspx?pid-396

Reading Workshop: Readers listen to the "song" of a text by reading with fluency, phrasing, and the sounds of stories and poems. Over the next few weeks, we'll work on reading in a voice that sounds like talking by reading in phrases and, of course, rereading when necessary.  We'll also continue to pay attention to punctuation as we read and to use a storyteller voice that expresses the mood of the text. We’ll not only be reading books during this workshop time, but we'll be reading lots of poetry as well. We’ll look at how poets “see” things, listen for the “music” and the “voice” of poetry, and learn to appreciate all types of poetry. While we have learned many strategies for figuring out tricky words, we want to learn how to use the most efficient strategy. We’ll practice all the strategies we have learned including using chunks and analogies (word families) and to help read new or tricky words in the poems we read. Poetry in the Park will be our culminating celebration for this unit. You’ll enjoy a wonderful morning of poetry as you hear our poem as well as many others. You’ll also get to see some of our own poetry displayed!

Word Work: We are working on words with short vowel /e/ and the word families _ed, _en, _et, and _ent. We’ll continue to work with 2 and 3 letter initial blends and digraphs as in fled or shred. We will also learn about nouns.

Writing Workshop: We are beginning our poetry unit of study in writing as well.  We’ll use our hearts, minds, and imaginations to take in the details of our lives in new ways. This week, we’ll spend some time observing the objects the children brought today. We’ll use all our senses as we describe them. We’ll look at these ordinary everyday things with a poet’s eyes. Then, we’ll practice changing our observations into poems by experimenting with line breaks (format).

Math: This week I am introducing a new routine called Frames and Arrows. You may refer back to the Unit 3 Family Letter for an explanation of it. You will also find a basic explanation in this week's homework calendar. We will also practice counting with a calculator and work with dimes.

Science: This week we are learning about our muscles, the lungs and respiratory system, and the digestive system. We will finish up this fantastic study of the human body next week. The children have loved it and so have I!

Just a heads-up! Our class will be celebrating two birthdays on Friday, November 16, which will be our last day of school before Thanksgiving break.  Therefore, our class will have our Thanksgiving  party at school on Thursday afternoon, November 15^th at 1:45. More information will come home about it later.

Things to remember:

• The Halloween Parade and Fall Festival take place next Wednesday, October 31. The parade begins at 8:30. Please send your child to school in his or her costume. They will change after the parade into play clothes. If you are accompanying your child to the festival, please be at the classroom no later than 9:45 to pick up your child. Otherwise, they will be dismissed to the festival at 9:45.
• The Book Fair will take place the week of November 5^th in the Janet Root Theater Lobby and the Student Center. Our class will be browsing on Tuesday morning at 10:05. If you would like to come shop with your child, you can do so before and after school, before 8:25, and during recess (1:00 – 1:30) each day.
• Poetry in the Park will be on Thursday, November 8^th at 8:30 a.m. Our class voted to recite the poem, "The Creature in the Classroom" by Jack Prelutsky. The poem was sent home last week. Please keep working with your child on memorizing this poem at home.
• The Holiday Gift Drive begins December 3^rd and ends December 14^th.

Volunteers this week:

• Wednesday - Library Checkout (2:10) – Amber Ferrol and Kristen Danielson
• Thursday - Math Game (10:30) – David Richardson
• Friday - Art – (9:15) Kim Gross

Take care and love each other…

Susan

Week of October 15, 2012

Dear Parents: 

Thank you for all the good wishes for my new grandson. I loved being with Owen and Chase and being able to witness the birth of Chase. It was hard to leave them, but, I also missed my children here at school so that made it easier to leave them and come home. Mr. Schiaparelli and Mrs. Rauman did a fantastic job while I was gone! Mr. S kept me updated and worked flawlessly from my plans. He took pictures while I was gone and posted them on our class Shutterfly site. Thank you Mr. S!

I've been having a lot of trouble both with my laptop and with my internet at home so I was not able to get a blog done this past week. I am so sorry. My laptop is still "in the shop" so I am working on a desktop in the classroom to get this done. Unfortunately, many of the pictures that I want to post are on my laptop so I will get those posted when I get it back. I might even post a picture of Chase and Owen if you don't mind indulging me!

Today, we kicked off our first grade service learning project at school! Sharon Hauser of the SPCA brought her dog Rusty to meet us! She adopted Rusty from the SPCA a few years ago. She talked to us about how to take care of pets and what we can do to help the animals at the SPCA. She and Rusty will also be at Town Meeting next Monday to help first grade introduce our service learning project with the whole lower school. We will be collecting items that the SPCA needs during the next several weeks. Then first grade will go to the SPCA and take all of our donations. We began this project last year and the overwhelming support was amazing! There will be a bin in each hallway (K - 4th) to collect donations from anyone that is willing to help us. You can go on the SPCA website www.spcafl.org to find out the items they need now to help our furry friends. Some examples are Hill's/Science Diet dog and cat food, dog biscuits, cat treats, brooms, dust pans, mops, paper towels, blankets, towels, tennis balls, and latex gloves. There are many more items on the website. Check it out with your child!

Paws for Reading!

To go along with our service learning project, our class has also joined with kids across the country to pledge to read every day to help donate 250,000 books to kids in need! Each child joined a team - either the cats or the dogs - and pledged to read at least 20 minutes at home every day! Today each child brought home his/her own screen name and password to use to log their minutes read at the Paws for Reading website (www.scholastic/com/paws). Their pledge cards and more information came home on Thursday. A paper reading log is also attached to the homework calendar for your child to turn in at school. The contest ends December 15.

During science last week, we learned about the heart. Some of the really fun activities were having Mrs. Peck come and teach us about the heart while dissecting a real cow's heart! We learned about the 4 chambers and how the heart pumps the blood through the body. Also, on Thursday Mai Nguyen (a former parent of mine) brought an ultrasound machine and each child was able to see their heart beating on the screen as well as seeing blood vessels. So cool! Cyrus's mom, Charlene Hosseini, was also here and worked with the children taking blood pressure, using stethoscopes to listen to their hearts, and various other medical tools to check reflexes and hearing. The kids loved it!  This week, we will be learning about the muscular system of our body and about our eyes. Mrs. Peck will be visiting us one more time on Tuesday to teach us about the eye using real cow eyes! I have pictures and will post them on our shutterfly site as soon as I am able.

In Math this week, we are learning about number grid patterns; counting, adding, and subtracting on the number line; and practicing telling time to the half hour.  

In Reader's Workshop this week, we have begun exploring the patterns in books. Many of the just right books we read have patterns that we can use as a tool for improving accuracy, fluency, and comprehension. We noticed today that patterns are also often found in poetry. We will spend the next several weeks reading and enjoying poetry. We also chose a poem for our class to recite at our upcoming Poetry in the Park! I read five different poems to the children, they voted on their favorite, and the winner was "The Creature in the Classroom" by Jack Prelutsky. The poem came home today along with a note. Please practice at home every day with your child!

This week our word work will focus again on words with short u and the phonograms _ug, _um, up, and _ump. We're also working on beginning blends so please practice these with your child at home. Remember that our spelling tests are application focused. If you can spell bug, you can spell shrug!

In Writer's Workshop, we chose a piece from our personal narrative (small moment) unit for publishing. We began working with our partners as "editors" today to help us fix up our pieces. We will be celebrating on Friday at 12:15. Please join us if you can. Next week, we will begin writing pattern books and poetry.

In handwriting, we continue to work on lowercase letters.

Dates to Remember:

Picture Retake Day -Tuesday, October 23rd

Fall Festival - Wednesday, October 31st. The costume parade will begin at 8:30. The children will be dismissed to the Festival at 9:45.

Poetry in the Park - Thursday, November 8th - Mark your calendars now!

Volunteers this week:

Wednesday - Library Check-out - 2:10 - David Nguyen and Sharon Cannella

Thursday - Math Game - 10:30 - Donna Main

Friday - Art - 9:15 - Heidi Joswig or David Richardson

Friday - Parent Reader - Kim Gross (Kim, this will need to be rescheduled as we have a Pep Rally that afternoon for Homecoming.)

Have a great week! 
Susan

Weeks of September 24 and October 1, 2012

Dear Parents:

This blog will cover this week and next. As you know, I will be in Texas Wednesday as my new little grandson, Chase Ellison, is due to be born at any minute! The children will be in excellent hands with John Schiaparelli substituting. He knows first grade and is a great teacher.

At a special Town Meeting Friday, we enjoyed a beautiful morning celebrating International Peace Day. We listened to several of our lower school students read their own interpretations of what peace means to them, sang together and, along with the whole lower school, added rocks we had painted to a peace symbol in the center courtyard. It really was a very nice and peaceful morning. In class we read the book What Does Peace Feel Like? by Vladimir Radinsky, which went along well with our study of the senses during our human body science unit. We used our five senses to think about what peace "feels" like, "sounds" like, "smells" like, "tastes" like, and "looks" like. Check out our "peace people" in the windows of the first grade hall to "see" our thoughts. If the rest of the world could think like our children, the world would certainly be a better place.

During science this week, we will be learning all about the framework of our body, the skeleton. This Tuesday, upper school anatomy teacher, Mrs. Lisa Peck will be visiting with us to help us learn about our skeletons. She just might be bringing a "friend" with her! The following week we'll begin learning about that most important organ, the brain. We'll have a second visit with Mrs. Peck on that Friday and she will be bringing sheep brains to dissect with us! What a cool way to learn about the most important organ of our bodies!

In Math, we'll be counting combinations of pennies and nickels, and practice exchanging pennies for nickels. We'll learn a new math game called the "Penny Plate Game" to give us both concrete and mental math practice for complements of 10. The following week we'll work with both addition and subtraction number models and number stories.

In Reader's Workshop, we will continue to talk about and practice strategies for figuring out "tricky" words. We have formed partnerships and the children will be working with their partners to figure out tricky words by "coaching" them to use all they know rather than just telling them the word. We will also talk about and practice reading with a smooth storyteller voice by implementing the strategies of going back and rereading and reading with a voice that isn't too s-l-o-w or too fast. We'll also learn that noticing and using punctuation helps us read more smoothly. Reading with a smooth storyteller voice will help us to better understand what we read.

This week our word work will focus on words with short i and the phonograms _id, _ig, and _in. Next week we will focus on the phonograms _ip, _it, and _ill.

In Writer's Workshop, as we continue our personal narrative writing on the small moments of our lives, we will establish partnerships for writing. We'll focus more on "sketching" rather than drawing with a lot of detail so that we can get to the important work of getting the words down. We'll work on planning details for our stories, learning how to tell our story across our hands. We'll read a book written by some of our very own Shorecrest student authors, Jack and Hannah S. What a great mentor text for my young writers to hear the "small moments" of  Jack and Hannah's lives written and published! Also, as we have been learning to stretch words for reading, we will practice stretching words to help us write them. The children are seeing that the strategies we use to help us as readers, we can also use to help us as writers.

In handwriting, we will continue to work on lowercase letters.


Dates to Remember:

No school for students on Thursday, October 4.

Professional Development Day - Friday, October 12th - No school for students

Picture Retake Day -Tuesday, October 23rd

Fall Festival - Wednesday, October 31st. The costume parade will begin at 8:30. The children will be dismissed to the Festival at 9:45.

Poetry in the Park - Thursday, November 8th - Mark your calendars now!

Volunteers this week:

Wednesday - Library Check-out - 2:10 - David Nguyen and Kristen Danielson
Thursday - Math Game - 10:30 - David Richardson
Friday - Art - 9:15 - Charlene Hosseini
Friday - Parent Reader - 2:20 - Lorraine Thorpe

Volunteers week of 10/1:

Wednesday - Library Check-out - 2:10 - Kim Gross and Chris Dubroff
Friday - Art - 9:15 - Kristen Danielson
Friday - Parent Reader - 2:20 - Sharon Cannella

Take care. I will post pictures soon of my sweet little Chase!
Susan

Week of September 17, 2012

Celebrate, Celebrate!

First of all, I want to thank you all for my wonderful birthday celebration on Thursday. I so appreciated everything! You made me feel so very special.

On Friday, we had our first writing celebration! During the week, each child selected a piece from their writing notebooks and worked to "fix it up" for publishing. On Friday, they shared their published stories with the class and their classmates gave each writer specific compliments on their work! Look for their published pieces in the hallway outside our classroom. We are writers! Today in Writing Workshop, we began our new unit of study - Small Moments: Personal Narrative Writing. The children will learn that they can create stories out of the details of their own experiences. The opportunities that children have to take the moments of their lives and spin them into stories play an important role in their literacy development.

Today during Reading Workshop, we celebrated all that we have learned so far as readers! The children received their very own book bins, whisper readers, and shopped for “just right books”. This week we began learning new strategies to help us figure out “tricky” words. During the next several weeks, we will also be focusing on the importance of making meaning of our reading. As children work to become proficient decoders, they sometimes forget that the words they read are making a story or lose their understanding of the story as they work hard to figure out “tricky” words. We will focus on using three sources of information (meaning, syntax, and graphophonics—although we don’t use those words!) to figure out the words in books.

In Word Work this week, we are focusing on words with short vowel /o/ as in the words frog, stop, and not. We will practice making many words with the phonograms _og, _op, and _ot. Words from these phonograms, or word families, will be on the Friday spelling test along with this week's sight words (word card words). This week's sight words are be, as, by, will, all, ball, and too. Please don't forget that the word card ring with these sight words came home today and should be worked on (reading and spelling) daily at home and returned to school on Thursday.

In handwriting, we continue to work on lowercase letter formations. When your child is doing homework, please encourage neatness and proper letter formation.

In math today we began talking about complements of 10. We learned a game called “Two-fisted Penny Addition” which is great practice for math facts. Also in math this week, the children will learn about the routine of Math Boxes to give reinforced practice of math concepts that we cover throughout the year. We’ll also be introduced to the calculator and its functions and talk about analog clocks as we begin to review telling time to the hour.

In Science this week we will begin our new unit on the Human Body!  To kick off the unit, tomorrow we will read the book Parts by Ted Arnold. If you haven’t read it, it is hysterical! This unit will last through the month of October as we study the heart, brain, skeleton, muscles, skin, and so much more! This will no doubt prove to be a favorite unit of the children. On Tuesday, I will be telling them about some of the things we will be doing during the unit and they are sure to be as excited as I am! One of Shorecrest’s wonderful upper school science teachers, Lisa Peck, will be bringing sheep brains, cow hearts, eyes, and kidneys to dissect with the children to help them learn about these parts of our bodies. I’m also looking for any parents in the health or medical field who would like to come in and share with us. In the past, we have had heart doctors, eye doctors, bone doctors, nurses, etc. come visit. Please let me know as soon as possible, if you would like to come in and share your knowledge and expertise with the children, what you would like to share, and dates/times you could be available.

Today we read a book titled What Does Peace Feel Like? which called upon us to think about peace using our five senses. Each child decorated a die-cut image of themselves and wrote a speech bubble answering one of these questions: What does peace feel like? Look like? Smell like? Sound like? or Taste like? These will be up in in our window for International Peace Day which will be celebrated this Friday. That morning will begin with a special Town Meeting gathering. The children may wear "peace-themed" t-shirts if they have them and uniform bottoms. They will be joining in with the rest of the lower school in making a rock garden. Each child painted a rock in class today to add to the rock garden. You are welcome to join us at the Town Meeting gathering if you can.

Things to remember:

Spanish word of the week: paz which means “peace”

Although I will not be at Conference Day on October 4, there will be no school for students that day. I will be sending home a reminder of your conference date and time.

Library books should be returned by Wednesday of each week.

Don't forget to check out our class Shutterfly site. I am adding a lot of pictures to it!

Volunteers this Week:

• ·      Wednesday- Library Check-out – Lorraine Thorpe and Heidi Joswig or David Richardson (2:10)
• ·      Thursday - Math Game –Donna Main (10:30)
• ·      Friday - Art – Sharon Cannella (9:15)
• ·      Friday - Parent Reader – Heidi Joswig or David Richardson (2:20)

Wishing you a peaceful week - 
Susan