Thank you!

A big Thank you to all the parents who took time out of their busy schedules to meet with me this last week! I enjoyed speaking with you about your child's accomplishments and successes.

A big Thank you to our room mothers, Elizabeth Ward, Amber Eyre and Andrea Rasband, for the fun Valentine's Day party. The students really enjoyed their day!

A big Thank you to our classroom volunteers, Carrie Larsen and Elizabeth Ward! They have made a wonderful difference to the reading successes of so many of your children!

100 days in school!

Can you believe we have been in school for 100 days?! Time flies when we are having fun! Friday, February 3, we celebrated 100 days by bringing 100 items to school for our guessing game, making a 100 froot loop necklace, and other fun activities.

We have a few celebrations ahead in February to look forward to. First, the students have earned a Popcorn day that we will have on Friday, February 10. Students will be asked to bring something to share with the other students that have the words "pop" or "corn" or "popcorn" in them. Mrs. C will provide popcorn for the kids to enjoy this day.

February 14 we will have our Valentine's Party and we can hardly wait to see what our room mothers have planned for our celebration!

Thank you for working with your students on reading and the weekly homework. We are currently at mid-term and I would encourage you to look on Skyward to see how your child is doing at school.

Busy, busy, busy as bees!

We have been back from Winter break for two weeks! As the second term comes to the end, the students have been tested and then tested again on their reading and math skills. They are progressing and learning. I hope you can see the same developments that I am seeing in the classroom.

This week we will continue our science studies on the weather. We also conclude our travels as we end in China for the New Year celebrations.

Please continue to work with your child on the homework assignments. These are meant to supplement what we are learning in the classroom.

Thank you to the parents who have been reporting their child's reading minutes on the homework forms. I have changed the homework form this week and hope it will make it easier for all parents to report the reading minutes. I can't stress enough how important it is that your child read for a minimum of 20 minutes a day! Everything we do in the class and in life is related to reading and practice is what they need at this time!

The holiday travels continue...

This last week we traveled to France and England. The children learned about the tradition of the yule log, both the one that is burned and the delicious cake. They made yule log ornaments to hang on their trees. The children were especially delighted to learn about the traditions of Mrs. C. Her mother is from England and Mrs. C. lived there when she was a student so they learned all about her childhood traditions. They learned about Father Christmas and how he is a tall, skinny man (not at all like our Santa). They also now know that children in England leave Father Christmas a serving of Christmas pudding (not really a pudding at all) instead of cookies. The best part for the children was to learn about the crackers Mrs. C. had next to her plate during her Christmas Eve dinner.

This is our last week before our winter break and we will be busy. On Monday and Tuesday, we will learn about Hanukkah. On Wednesday, we will study Winter Solstice. We have much more writing and math to do but we also have some fun assemblies all week. Friday will be our short but fun day. We will have a school sing-a-long, where the students will be performing the songs we have been practicing. We will, then, have a Polar Express Pajama party. Be sure to have the children wear their pajamas!!

We have been a travelin'...

If your students have shared with you already, we have been traveling the world! We are on a whirlwind tour of different states and countries to see how the holiday season is celebrated around the world. On Nov 29, we flew to New York City to see the lighting of the largest Christmas tree and ice skating at Rockefeller Center. On Nov. 30, we zoomed to Santa Fe, New Mexico to see the lighting of the farolitos or luminarias in the city center and learn about the Las Posadas (The Inns) that occurs from December 16 through December 24. From there we visited Sao Paulo, Brazil, where we learned that the summer weather made the holiday season very different from the one we know. From December 5-7, we spent our time on the African continent. First in South Africa, then onto Botswana and finally, Nigeria. The children learned that barbeques on the beach are another way to celebrate. Mrs. C liked the thought of the holidays occurring in the summertime! At the end of last week we ended in Madrid, Spain. We learned that the children in Spain actually look forward to January 6, Three Kings Day, since they receive presents that day from the Kings. Ask your child to share with you some of our adventures as we continue our travels through January 10.


We have also been writing so much more. We have learned the proper way to write a sentence and how to make it so much more interesting with our use of words. Math is zooming quickly as well. We have been learning geometry, addition and subtraction. We've had great fun as we learn so much!

Thank you!

I had a wonderful time meeting with each of you and discussing your child’s success over the last 10 weeks. We have so much more to do and I know that we can work together to have another successful term.

Thanksgiving is fast approaching! We have begun studying the origins of the holiday and will continue this week as we learn more about the holiday and family traditions. On Friday, November 18, we will be having a Thanksgiving dinner in our classroom during lunchtime. The school lunch program has a traditional turkey dinner with all the trimmings and I encourage you to purchase this lunch for our dinner. We will get our lunches and return to our classroom for our dinner.

We are starting our geometry studies in mathematics and I encourage you to ask your children to share their new knowledge of shapes and the difference between plane and solid shapes.

A New Beginning!

We have successfully completed our first term of first grade! We have been so busy that it has flown by!

Now that we are in the full swing of first grade, there will be a few changes to assist the children to continue to progress. The biggest change will be the addition of weekly homework packets. On Monday, I will send home a packet of math worksheets, a fluency practice sheet, and a spelling word practice sheet. At the beginning of the month, the packet will include a monthly project calendar. They are pretty self-explanatory but please let me know if your child is having difficulties with them.

I didn’t have very many students report their nightly reading to me for the first term. The students do receive a grade on their report card for this at home reading so please be sure to complete the form I provide in their take home folder. Reading is the basis for all learning and the more they read the better they will become at all subjects.

I look forward to meeting with you all this week at Parent-Teacher Conferences. If you have not made an appointment already, please contact me so I can get you on the schedule.

Thank you to Amber Eyre, Robin Alvey and Daniel Whitney for their help with the field trip!

Thank you to Amber Eyre, Elizabeth Ward and Andrea Rasband for our FANTASTIC Halloween Party!