Christmas is coming soon!

Our first week of the Christmas theme is complete. We have made a few more Christmas presents for friends and family and we learned about the letter Ii. We have also been working hard at zipping our coats independently. Please encourage your student to get dressed completely on their own at home especially for snow pants, boots, jacket, hat, and mittens/gloves. Today we had a Families Being Involved event! The cookies turned out great, thank you all for coming. :-) 

Reminders:

Our program will be Monday the 22nd and Tuesday the 23rd at 9:30. We will have drinks and refreshments after and be sure to stop by the classroom to pick up the gifts we have been making for you! You may park in the front of the school, busing area, by the high school, or by the Simek center if needed. Just remember all vehicles need to be moved by 3:00 if they are parked on the east side (busing area). 

Bedding will be sent home for the holiday break and the spare set of clothing will be sent home to be sure that they still fit and are for warmer weather. Please be sure to send these back after the holiday (labeled too please!). 

More students have been bringing in gifts for our gift exchange. A gift must be brought to receive one. Remember it is a $5 limit. Boys buy for boys and girls buy for girls. Please address them as: To a boy (or girl) from (your student's name). If this will be a hardship for your family this year please let me know so we can be sure that your child may still participate. 

We will be sending home the next family project this week to be completed over the holiday break as well as a workbook that your student can work on during the break as well. 

There will be no school Wed. December 24th through Friday, January 2nd. Classes will resume Monday, January 5th. 

Year in Review...so far :-)

We are almost in to the new year. Here is a review of what we have done so far!

September

The themes covered were: Bus Safety, Shapes and Colors, Apples, 5 Senses, Leaves and Fall
We reviewed the letters: Aa, Yy, and Ll

We used our senses on a nature walk. 

We made applesauce from scratch.

October

The themes covered were: Leaves and Fall, Fire Safety, Hibernation and Migration, Halloween

We reviewed the letters: Ll, Ff, Mm, Jj
We began our focus on numbers with:1

We had a visit from the fire department! We were able to see all of their gear, climb in the fire truck, and hear the siren. 

We had a Halloween party/dress up day. We trick-or-treated in the classroom and went on a costume parade. 

Our first Families Being Involved activity was pumpkin carving. 

November
The themes covered were: Night Time, Scarecrows, Thanksgiving
We reviewed the letters: Kk, Hh, Tt
We reviewed the numbers: 2, 3, 4

We had a pajama day with popcorn for our night time activity. We had our first snow/ice day of the school year. Had a pumpkin bar treat for Thanksgiving and began practicing our Christmas songs for our program in December.

Our Families Being involved event this month was bowling!

December
This month we will be focusing on the themes: cookies and Christmas trees, and Christmas
We will focus on on the letters Cc, Ii and the number 5

We decorated gingerbread houses and have been working hard on making special Christmas gifts for our families.We are also working on trying to zip our coats independently so we can be part of the zipper club. We are doing really well on our songs for our programs!

Pets, Spring, and Easter!!!

We finished up March by talking all about flowers and seeds. We learned about the letter Uu and reviewed the numbers 5 & 6. We made some really neat water color flowers made with milk filters and some finger painted flowers. With spring comes rain, so we were able to make a fun umbrella project to help us with the Uu sound.

Last week had an awesome field trip to the Medford Veterinary Clinic. We were able to see where the doctors do surgery on pets and X-rays of broken bones and babies still in the mom's belly. We also were able to see a few pets that were at the clinic for check-ups. To go with out pet theme we made Clifford the Big Red Dog, paper plate snakes, and a book about what a pet needs. We talked about the letter Xx and the numbers 7 & 8.

This week has been full of fun activities for Week of the Young Child. We had a pizza snack donated to us from Nestle Tombstone Pizza. We had a puppet show put on by Hairy and Company. We also received a book donated to us by the Literacy Council. Each day has had a fun dress up theme. Monday was sports, Tuesday was Pajamas, today was Crazy Day, and tomorrow will be Beach Day. Remember we will be having the potluck dinner and dance from 5-6 on Thursday night at the MAES commons area. If you are looking for something fun to do this weekend. Broadway Theatre is hosting a special on Saturday the 12th for an 11:00 movie with half off popcorn and soda!! 

This week is the first of two weeks that we are talking about Easter and spring. So far we have made windsock chicks, a bunny story, and hatching eggs. We have been talking about the letter Bb and the numbers 9 & 10. Next week we will be making a project with pussy willows, making special Easter baskets, and reviewing all of our numbers using Easter eggs. We will also be learning about the letter Ee.

REMINDERS:
--There is an early release on Thursday the 17th. Students will be released at 1:52.
--There is no school for all grades Friday the 18th and Monday the 21st. 
--Spring pictures will be on Wednesday the 23rd.
--We still need to wear boots and snow pants for recess until all of the snow is melted and puddles are dried up. Students will be sent to the office during recess if they do not have these and repeat occurrences will result in a phone call from Mr. Miller. 

St. Patrick's

Last week we talked a lot about tricky leprechauns and rainbows with pots of gold. We made some pretty neat projects and the students have been showing a lot of progress in their cutting and gluing skills. We have been reviewing our numbers 1 and 2 and the letter Qq.

This week we will be talking about all things zoo related. We will be making all sorts of animal crafts. We will also be working on the letter Zz and reviewing the numbers 3 and 4.

Just a reminder: Even when we have nicer temperatures to play outside in, we still need the students to have snow pants, gloves, boots, jacket, and hat until the snow is no longer on the playground.

Dr. Seuss

The first week of March we read several of Dr. Seuss' books and made art projects to match the theme. Mr. Miller read us the story Cat in the Hat, we had two other special readers (Mr. Rappe our gym teacher and Ms. Barb our school nurse) come to our class to share a story with us. I hope you enjoyed our One Fish, Two Fish pages that were sent home and the Cat in the Hat faces. The students loved wearing their Cat in the Hat hats all day! We had fun making Thing 1 and Thing 2 hand print characters too. We continued to work on rhyming and focused on the letter Rr.

Look at all the wonderful rhyming posters we have hanging in our room!

February

This month has been filled with lots of fun things. We started the month with our final week of dinosaurs and took our first field trip of the year! The kids had a lot of fun watching Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs at the Broadway Theatre. The following week we had our Valentine's Day fun. Lots of heart themed projects and games and of course our party with cards and treats. :-) The last half of this month we have been focusing on rhyming, this will continue into next week when we explore Dr. Seuss stories. Please encourage your children to rhyme even if it is nonsense words. Help them distinguish between words that rhyme and those that don't.

In recognition of the Olympics happening this winter, our school worked hard to represent a country in each classroom. We represented the USA! The Pre-K classes were able to watch the opening ceremony parade that the K-4th graders marched in. We also had fun at our very own Olympic/Beach Day celebration. We had scooter relay races, bean bag toss, Frisbee toss, kickbowl, and parachute fun!

We have seen a lot of improvement in the way our students are able to write! Please have your child practice writing their name with a capital letter followed by all lowercase letters. Encourage them to write their name on all of their homework pages.

January

We have been having very cold days and so we missed a few school days earlier this month and now we are having a few more days off this week. Please be sure to send your child to school in warm clothing (the chill chaser gloves are too thin for keeping their hands warm at recess). In order for your student to play at recess they need to have a jacket, hat, snow pants, boots, gloves/mittens. Please be sure to label all pieces of clothing with their name as many students have similar winter clothes.   

We have been very busy with winter projects and reviewing letters, numbers, shapes, and colors. I hope you have enjoyed seeing the snowmen and mitten projects coming home. This past week we focused on games. The students practiced taking turns, being good sports, sharing spinners and game pieces, and having fun! We had high school buddies helping us out one day and 4th grade buddies helping us out the next day learning how to play all sorts of new games. 

The next two weeks we will be talking about dinosaurs and having our first field trip of the year. We will be going to the Broadway Theatre on Feb. 5th and 6th to see Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs. Please be sure to send $3 with your child, this pays for their popcorn and drink. 

Ice Skating

Our last Families Being Involved event was a lot of fun! The Simek Center was open for us to go ice skating. It was the first time a lot of our students were on the ice in skates and they did a great job! Thank you to all of the families who attended. :-)