Hello Families,
Thank you for your patience in seeing this post. It was so very wonderful to see you and talk about your children. We learned so much and it is such a rewarding part of our job to share their progress with you in person.
We know you do not see their copybooks regularly so we really wanted you to see those. We are always open to meeting with you about anything. Just send us an email. And, we are always there on Wednesday afternoon from 3-4 pm to meet with you in person with or without your child. If you can not come in person then, we can always have a phone conference then. Thank you all signing
up and coming and sharing!
A few housekeeping reminders:
1.
Wednesday is park day. On Wednesday afternoon,
no matter what the weather (rain, snow or sun) we go walking to the park and
play there. Most of the time the students have been prepared for this, but not
all. Please check the weather on Wed am and place various layers / boots etc in
their backpacks so they can be prepared. We do have a rule that when it is 20 degrees or colder, all students need a hat and gloves.
2- Bringing in items: Please, please discourage
your child from bringing in jewelry, money, extra “stuff” from home. Students
are exchanging items on the playground or in the hallway and we do not want to
encourage sneaky behavior.
3- We are going to generate a wish list and volunteer
opportunities we can see about the best way to see if you can help us with
these items. Be on the lookout for an electronic sign up.
4- Readers are coming home more frequently. Please hold
on to these books for a week or so and then return them in the Thursday folder
or in the back pack. We are counting on you to return them to us! We do not log
the exact book(s) that go home with the student but we do make sure it is a book that
helps them practice the phonograms there are learning.
5- Thursday folders: we were gifted a set of extra
folders for times when a student has forgotten the folder. If you get a folder that
has no name, it is likely a loaner folder. Please return it as well as your regular
folder.
6- We are generating a classroom bin of extra
mittens, hats, coats, boots etc for days when a student doesn’t have what they
need to be warm outside. We have already received a donation of a coat and a
pair of snow overhauls. Others are welcome.
7- We have started our job chart. Each child has a
chore for a week. They are responsible for doing it any time in the morning or
afternoon as well as for the general class clean up and straightening which happen
twice a day.
Our time seems to be just racing by! The students
are well into their routines of work, choosing from some required work such as
reading and math facts and some free choice.
The students continue to develop their social
skills by using and learning conflict resolution skills, by practicing lessons
we give them and by sharing their affirmations and acknowledgements with each
other. We are pleased with all of their growth; in just this short time we can
already see many developments.
We have given them the “yielding lesson”
but we need your help with showing them the concrete example from the car. We
have taught them that sometimes it is better for everyone to just “yield.”
Examples of this are: let a person ahead of you in line, let a friend pass in front of you for snack, when two students want the same work, let another have it
first. If you are in the car with your children, try to point out a time when
you yield and let another in front of you because it’s just a polite thing to
do, and it can avoid an accident/conflict. Learning to not invest in a conflict
is another side effect of the “yielding lesson” which we will teach them over
time.
Thanksgiving
lunch: we will be making vegetable soup on the Wednesday morning before Thanksgiving.
We will eat our soup for lunch and we will have some bread too. If you want to
pack a lunch that day, we completely understand this, in case they do not “like”
the soup! However, in my experience, the invest so much in its production that
they usually eat it. J
We will be assigning vegetables to each
student and some other items such as cream (so we can make butter), chicken
broth and alphabet pasta. We will send the list in a separate email very soon.
We need the items by Wednesday morning at
the latest. Feel free to send items already on Monday so we can talk about root
vegetables.
Wish
list: Also coming separately will be a wish list that will contain a
variety of items that our classroom could use. Our first focus will be on
procuring items to create works that develop fine motor skills, from which many
students will benefit. Other items will be listed there as well. If you can provide
the item, we will be extremely grateful!
Several of you asked for this again: The French
song about peace we have learned is:
Enfant
de paix https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SiinCxpJxSU
The words are on this version on you tube.
A few notes on the pictures:
We took a walking field trip recently to
the 6th grade classroom and watched a play about the Second Great
Lesson. The students LOVED it and did wonderfully. Alas, we do not have photos
of that. However, we also had some 7th-8th graders from
the Spanish class come and visit us and read us stories they wrote. You will
see those photos. We also did go visit the Upper Elementary class on Halloween morning for their historical figures presentations, some were in costume. Again, they were a super respectful audience. We did make applesauce on Halloween morning and we
have included those photos as well. Finally, we have included pictures from our Handwork class with Karen on Tuesday afternoons (it alternates weekly with Art). As we are sure you have seen at home, they have learned to finger knit!
Lesson
update:
Math:
Clock work
Bead Frame lessons (multiple digit addition
with carrying)
Stamp game (a manipulative for doing
operations concretely
Data and measurement: graphing the
temperature and drawing conclusions from the data
Learning to write number words (i.e. twenty-three)
Fraction equivalencies: 2/6 = 1/3; 2/4 = ½ (with
the fraction material)
Math facts: sums and differences to 10
Math vocabulary: addend, sum, multiplicand;
multiplier, product etc.
Geometry lessons on drawing a cube
Nomenclature of a solids: vertex; surface,
line.
Types of triangles: right angle; isosceles,
scalene
Shapes made from various triangles:
rhombus; trapezoid; hexagon, equilateral triangles
Language:
Vocabulary lessons: presenting new words that
we hear in our read aloud
Dictionary introduction lessons
More Phonograms: (long e) ee/ea; (long a) ai/ay/eigh/
Magic e lessons
Words by heart (these are sight words that
they need to learn “by heart.”) There is no expectation at this point that they
spell them, but rather that they recognize and read them.
Memorizing a poem by Robert Louis Stevenson:
Autumn Fires
Cursive and more cursive (capitals and
where on the line certain letters sit)
Cosmic
Education: ( Geography, History and the Sciences)
Research and drawing the evolution of an
animal or plant using the timeline of life
Recording data in science sketch book
Learning more characteristics of the three geological
eras: the Paleozoic (Age of Insects and Crustaceans), the Mesozoic (Age of Reptiles)
and the Cenozoic (Age of Mammals)
Beginning discussions of continent
formation
Land and water forms: cape/ bay
Examining and drawing specimens of: sea
urchin, shark’s teeth and star fish
Our read aloud is: Magic by the Lake
As always, no one child has had all
of these lesson but all of the children have had some of these lessons.
Until the next post J
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