December 21st Newsletter

Important Dates

December

          21 – Classroom Holiday Party

          24 – Winter Break Begins

January

          7 - Classes Resume

December Reading Logs

     Your child can return his/her December reading log on January 7^th when we return from the holiday break.  I am sending home January’s log on December 21st so you can begin recording the books they read in January starting January 1^st. 

Cookie Exchange

     Thank you to everyone who took the time to bake cookies and send in food for the cookie exchange.  It was all very delicious.  My children were thrilled with the cookies (and so was I)!

We won’t be having any homework this week due to the holidays.  Enjoy the break!

Please return your child’s green reading book if you haven’t done so already.  Thanks!

Reading

      We will be reading The Kite and How to Make a Kite.

Comprehension Strategies

          The children will be working on reading directions, cause/effect, and monitoring/clarifying.

Vocabulary Words

          The vocabulary words will be weather words and:

 anywhere, beautiful, convinced, easy, news, perfect, raining, weather.

Phonics Skills

          Our phonics lessons will be centered around blending long i words.  We will also review the soft sound of “g” /j/ and “c” /s/.

Grammar Skills

          We will practice using pronouns in sentences.

Spelling Words

The spelling words are:

six, pad, smell, bike, time, smile, prize, like, have, bridesmaid

Have a wonderful holiday 

& a Happy New Year!

December 14th Newsletter

            

 Important Dates

December

          14 – Slipper Day

     21 – Classroom Holiday Party

          24 – Winter Break Begins

January

          7 - Classes Resume

December Reading Logs

Your child can return his/her December reading log on January 7^th when we return from the holiday break.  I am sending home January’s log on December 21st so you can begin  recording the books they read in January starting January 1^st. 

Barnes & Noble Fundraiser

     It sounds like the Barnes & Noble fundraiser was a big success.  I wish I could have been there.  Thank you to everyone that attended or helped out in any way.  Our school district is very fortunate to have such supportive and giving parents.

In math, we have been working on reading graphs – bar, picture, & concrete graphs.  We also played some games in the computer lab to go along with this concept.

Reading

          We will be reading The Kite and How to Make a Kite.

Comprehension Strategies

          The children will be working on reading directions, cause/effect, and monitoring/clarifying.

Vocabulary Words

          The vocabulary words will be weather words and:

 anywhere, beautiful, convinced, easy, news, perfect, raining, weather.

Phonics Skills

          Our phonics lessons will be centered on blending long a words using the VCe (vowel consonant e) pattern.  We will also review the soft sound of “g” /j/ and “c” /s/.

Grammar Skills

          We will practice using and identifying verbs in a sentence.

Spelling Words

Our spelling words for next week are: ran, hat, scar, came, grape, name, cake, only, old

     We won’t be having a student of the week next week since we will be having our holiday party on Friday.

December 7th Newsletter

 Important Dates

December

            21 – Classroom Holiday Party

            24 – Winter Break Begins

January

            7 - Classes Resume

Reading Books

We completed our second reading book this week.  I will be sending it home soon.  Please listen to your child read the stories and help him/her with any unknown words. Practicing reading is very important at this age. Please return the book by Friday, December 21st.  Thanks.

        Author of the Month

  We explored the Chris VanAllsburg website and played some of the games on it. The children enjoyed the memory game and the puzzles. If you would like your child to play some of these games at home, you may go to www.chrisvanallsburg.com 

Math

     Last week during library time, the students were shown a video explaining the Math-a-thon program.  This program is a fund raiser for St. Jude's Hospital in Chicago.  If you would like your child to participate in it, return the form (filled out) to school.  The librarian will send home either a booklet or a CD depending on which one you requested.  Thank you for supporting local charities.

Reading

      We will be reading the following stories: Moving Day and Hermit Crabs.

Comprehension Strategies

     We will be working on comparing and contrasting.

Vocabulary Words

     Our words will be: grow, light, long, more, other, right, small, room, and these

Phonics Skills

The children will be working on digraphs:

 sh, th, ch, wh, tch

We will also be reviewing short vowel sounds.

Grammar Lesson

We will review the use of exclamations and alphabetical order.

Spelling Words

The spelling words are:

sad, let, trip, blue, orange, gray, black, one, by, color

       Our student of the week for the week of December 10-14 will be Maeve.