Week Six

* As you all have noticed, reading bags started coming home with real books this week! I was able to start reading groups on Monday and have had so much fun beginning to teach your children how to read! We are learning new sight words and reading strategies daily; it's so neat to see how they are starting to remember and apply the strategies on their own. Please let me know if you have any questions about the bookmark and reading log. Also, I am going to start sending home the paper books on the weekends for more practice. We don't have a lot of time during the week to color the pages, so this is a great time for them to do this. Make sure to return all three paper books in their bag on Monday. 

* Our first field trip to Moelker's Apple Orchard is this upcoming Tuesday, October 14th. We will be leaving at 8:30 and returning before lunch. Parent drivers can come right to our classroom around 8:20. I will have groups assigned for the cars. Please make sure to send your child's booster seat in the morning. 

* Our Halloween party is approaching quickly and I'm sure you all have similar questions about the logistics of everything. So here we go... Since we have specials on Friday afternoons, we are going to have our party in the morning from 10:30-11:20. My room parents and Halloween helpers are putting some fun plans together for the party. If you'd like to stop by, you are more than welcome! (You must be an approved volunteer and will need to sign-in at the office first) Please keep in mind that we don't have that much time for the party and I would still like your child to be able to wear their costume. So I encourage you to keep the costumes simple and easy to get on and off. Remember- no masks or weapons. We will be putting the costumes back on at 2:15 for our parade at 2:30. Again, you are welcome to attend the parade as well. After the parade, everyone will take their costumes off and head back to specials. If you have any questions about all of this, please feel free to email me. 

What we focused on this week...

* Literacy: A lot of our focus is still on letter/sound identification. We also started working in our handwriting books and have learned how to properly write the uppercase letters E,F,D,P,B. We are learning that these are frog hopping letters that start with a big line down. Please encourage your child to practice these letters the correct way at home (always starting their letters at the top)

* Math: We have just finished Chapter 1. You will receive a packet of journal pages next Friday. Please note- as I mentioned at our parent info night, there are A LOT of journal pages for each chapter...we will not be completing EVERY page in school, so if you see blank pages, you can save those for a rainy day at home. They are a great review of what we are learning about in school. 

* Writing: We are just finishing up our first "fix and fancy" writing piece. This means we are taking a piece we have already written and made revisions to and turning it into our final draft. At the end of the unit, I will send home the rest of their writing pieces so you can see the progress they have made thus far. 

* Science: This week we did an investigation using different size balls, ramps, and other supplies around the room. Their goal was to figure out if the size, shape and mass of two different balls effect how fast/far they move. Stay tuned for some great pictures I got of this experience!