Good Morning Everyone,

Well, I thought I would send this out first thing so you would not be anxiously awaiting my weekly newsletter. First of all I would like to thank all of you for the wonderful gifts I received. They were all very thoughtful. We had a wonderful last two weeks at school, working on monsters and snowmen. This last week we worked on some holiday cards and gifts, watched the Polar Express, ate popcorn and drank (along with spilling) hot chocolate and eating candy canes. Of Course, we did work of reading, math and writing as well. Gifts Galore was a huge success as always. The children had a great time shopping for their families.... and themselves.
Craft day was amazing. You would think it would be crazy, but as I wondered the halls and walked through the classrooms, I saw multi-age children sitting, talking and working together. It was awesome.

I want to thank all of you for giving me the opportunity to work with your children. Each and everyone of them has something wonderful to contribute to our school family. Each has grown so much over the past few months. I feel extremely lucky to have the group of children I have this year. I know I will be missing them by the end of the break!


Oh, I almost forgot....
I sent home a math pack. It is not mandatory that your kiddos do the work, but it would be great to work review some of the pages. Also, I would really encourage reading over the break. So, please create another reading log for your kiddos and have them fill it out. (I just had to get some school work in over the break)

Have a wonderful, relaxing break,

Becky

Newsletter December 19

Good Morning Everyone,

Well, I thought I would send this out first thing so you would not be anxiously awaiting my weekly newsletter. First of all I would like to thank all of you for the wonderful gifts I received. They were all very thoughtful. We had a wonderful last two weeks at school, working on monsters and snowmen. This last week we worked on some holiday cards and gifts, watched the Polar Express, ate popcorn and drank (along with spilling) hot chocolate along with eating candy canes. Of Course, we did work of reading, math and writing as well. Gifts Galore was a huge success as always. The children had a great time shopping for their families.... and themselves.

Craft day was amazing. You would think it would be crazy, but as I wondered the halls and walked through the classrooms, I saw multi-age children sitting, talking and working together. It was awesome.

I want to thank all of you for giving me the opportunity to work with your children. Each and everyone of them has something wonderful to contribute to our school family. Each has grown so much over the past few months. I feel extremely lucky to have the group of children I have this year. I know I wil be missing them by the end of the break!

Oh, I almost forgot....

I sent home a math pack. It is not mandatory that your kiddos do the work, but it would be great to work review some of the pages. Also, I would really encourage reading over the break. So, please create another reading log for your kiddos and have them fill it out. (I just had to get some school work in over the break)

Have a wonderful, relaxing break,

Becky

Newsletter, December 13

----- Original Message -----

Last Week:

Last Week we finished our Wild Things projects. We read Snowman at Night and competed a "tear" snowman art activity and the children wrote lovely acrostic poems. They will all be coming home at the end of the week, but you should come and check them out! Personally, I think they are amazing. The children worked really hard on them.

THIS WEEK IS GOING TO BE VERY BUSY!

Monday - Reports cards will be sent home with the children. Also, Mrs. Neumann will be subbing for me on Monday. The first grade teachers have a Professional Planning Day.

Wednesday - Holiday Party with Mrs. Doyles 2/3 class from 12:30 to 1:30

• items needed

- rolling pins

- cookie cutters for an art project

- one or two more volunteers for the craft room (I think it is
going to be very busy, but really cool)

Thursday - Gifts Galore

• The money raised from this event is for Hunter our school Sparrow. The Sparrow Club members will be coming to our classroom on Wednesday, Dec. 17 so the children can buy tickets. Each ticket cost .25 cents.
• Items sell for 25 cents up to 1 dollar
• Please have your child bring his or her money in a plastic bag with their name written on it.
• Items needed:

- more stuff to sell!

- tape

- gift wrapping paper

Friday - All School Craft Day

• Friday morning the children will rotate through two craft projects. There will be some projects that do not focus on Christmas. If you would prefer your child be placed in one or two of those rooms, please let me know.
• All week we will be watching The Polar Express and on Friday afternoon we will finish the movie while enjoying popcorn and drinking hot chocolate with marshmallows!
  

ALL WEEK

Hat, Mittens, Coats Drive: There are boxes by the front office to place all of your gently used items. These items will be donated to a local clothing bank.

Canned Food Drive: We are trying to "deck the halls" with food! Please consider donating cans or boxes of food to help line the halls! All food will be donated to a local food bank.

Pennies for Peace: We are raising money for schools in third world countries. If you would like to donate pennies to the cause, we have a collection container in our room.

I hope you have all had a nice weekend and see you at school!

Becky

Newsletter, December 5, 2009

This Week:

This week we completed some art activities, word work, and comprehension work using the book titled Where the Wild Things Are. This has been a really fun mini unit for the kids and me! Completed work will be sent home when we have wrapped it up.

Needed Items:

I would like to borrow as many copies of The Mitten by Jan Brett as possible. If you have a copy the class we can use, please put your name on the inside cover and send it to school. Thank you!

Giving Campaign: Thank you to all who donated to the Giving Campaign! Your donations mean a great deal to the teachers. We are able to do so much with our curriculum and provide your children with wonderful learning opportunities due to your generous contributions.

MARK YOUR CALANDERS!

Teacher Work Day: On Friday, Dec. 11 the teachers have a work day to prepare report cards, so it is day off from school for the kiddos.

Gifts Galore: Wednesday, Dec. 16 in the morning.

This is a great fund raiser for our Sparrow Hunter. It is like a huge garage sale with prices $1 or less! Children bring $5 or less to school and go shopping for Christmas gifts for their families. All the money raised will go to Hunter and his family through the Sparrow Foundation. If you have items to donate to Gifts Galore bring them to school. Please do not bring clothing or any large items! All gifts are wrapped at the event, so if you would like to donate tape and or wrapping paper that would be awesome! You can go to the Dollar Store for those items! If you would like to volunteer with this event let me know and I will be happy to set you up!

Hat, Mittens, Coats Drive: There are boxes by the front office to place all of your gently used items. These items will be donated to a local clothing bank.

Canned Food Drive: We are trying to line the halls with food! Please consider donating cans or boxes of food to help line the halls! All food will be donated to a local food bank. So far we have 6 cans in front of our room!

Pennies for Peace:We are once again raising money for school in third world countries. If you would like to donate pennies to the cause, we have a collection container in our room.

Holiday Party: We will once again we will have a mellow, calm holiday party with Ms. Doyle's 2/3 class. We will be decorationg a snowman cookie and completing a holiday craft. On Monday, I will have a sign up list of items needed and volunteers.

Pajama Day and Craft Day: On Friday, December 18 everyone in the school gets to get up in the morning and come to school in their pajamas! We also get to make fun crafts. If you are interested in helping let me know!

This week in Math we worked on:

Addition and Subtraction

Time - review the the hour

Introduced the term "half past"

Worked on Number Stories (word problems)

3 minute timed math test (Wow! This was this an exciting day for the kiddos!)

Frames and Arrows: With these activities the children are either following a given rule or finding the rule.

Vocabulary:

Number Model Sentence- a fancy word for a basic addition or subtraction problem Ex. 3+4=7

Addition: Change to more

Subtraction: Change to less

Homefun:

First off,just a few friendly teacher reminders:

PLEASE:

• Help your children stay organized. Go through their home folders each night with them. Take out old materials. Many children are not turning in their homework. The excuses I am hearing from the children are: We were too busy over the weekend. My mom wouldn't let me do it. My dad has it. I forgot. The children not turning in their work are developing habits that will affect their education in the future. Please help them develop positive habits now.
• Help your children with the math homework. This includes making sure they are writing their numbers the write way and answering the questions correctly! We do not want our children to practice doing things the WRONG way. If they do.... they will learn to do it WRONG. We want our children to practice doing things the RIGHT way so they will learn to apply the concepts correctly.
• Make sure your children write their names on their homework. They often do not recognize their own work so they can't figure out which work is theirs. If I can't figure it out and they can't figure it out, they get to do it again!
  

Actual Homefun activities!

~ Correct and complete timed math test (this is optional. Students who do this receive a Positive Piper slip)

~ Studying sight words - please work on spelling as well!!! remember each time your child practices their words, sent in a note and they get a Positive Piper Slip!

~ Math homelinks - going above and beyond the work given will earn your child a Positive Piper Slip!

~ Reading (week long project) please return Take Home Book Envelopes on Monday.

~ NO poem folder went home this week.

Have a great weekend.

Becky

Saturday, December 5

This Week

Giving Campaign

Hi Parents,

I just forwarded a  letter from the PTO concerning the fundrasing campaign.  I wanted to thank all of you who have donated to this event, even though I don't know who you are!   Currenlty 62% of our class has donated to the Giving Campaign.  It would be an amazing effort from our class if we got all 21 families to contribute!!!  

Thank you,

Becky

Letter from PTO

Thanks for sending this to teachers (Barbry)

And to parents via full email (Deb)
Thx!

Chels

----- Original Message -----

Please see attached for the PTO giving campaign update letter that is going out to families today.

Barbry

----- Original Message -----

Thanks for sending this to teachers (Barbry)

And to parents via full email (Deb)

Thx!

Chels