Weekly Note
Week of January 12th-16th
Welcome!
Hello Parents!
I just wanted to let everyone know that rather than sending my Weekly Note in an attachment through email, I will now be sending out our Weekly Note in a SMORE Newsletter! Thank you so much for viewing my "Welcome Back" newsletter! I saw that everyone was easily able to view it, so we are going to transition into using this method throughout the new year! Please take a look at the topics below to view all of the exciting things the students were working on this week!
I just wanted to let everyone know that rather than sending my Weekly Note in an attachment through email, I will now be sending out our Weekly Note in a SMORE Newsletter! Thank you so much for viewing my "Welcome Back" newsletter! I saw that everyone was easily able to view it, so we are going to transition into using this method throughout the new year! Please take a look at the topics below to view all of the exciting things the students were working on this week!
WHAT'S HAPPENING IN LANGUAGE ARTS AND MATH?!
This week in Language Arts, students learned about the short and long sounds that the letter "E" makes! We read the story "The Best Nest" and then made a list of short /e/ words! We then read the story "Queen Bee's Scream" and made a list of long /e/ words. Throughout the rest of the week, students worked on short /e/ and long /e/ work in literacy centers! Students also learned ways to answer the reading question of the week "What new things can you do as you get older?" We read the concept book "Growing Up" and students drew four pictures of things that kids can do as they get older. Students then wrote four sentences identifying what they illustrated on their graphic organizer. Our graphic organizers and our writing our hanging up in the classroom! Be sure to check them out! We then read the story "Little Quack" and learned about what ducks need to do as they get older! Ducks must leave their nests and jump into a pond in order to learn how to swim and paddle! After reading this story, we learned about the comprehension skill of plot! The plot of the story is what happens in the beginning, middle, and end of a story! Together, we identified the plot of "Little Quack!" As we read in our reading groups, we identified what happened in the beginning, middle, and ending of our stories in order to identify the plot! Next week, we will be writing about the plot of several Kevin Henkes stories including Chrysanthemum, Wemberly Worried, and Lily's Big Day! We will be completing an Author Study of Kevin Henkes!
In Math this week, we completed our chapter on Addition Stories! We did a phenomenal job on this chapter and I have never seen such interest in a math topic before! The students LOVED adding! We will continue to add as we move on to our next chapter! However, next week, we will not be working from our math books! We will be learning about the concept of time to the hour! Students will be working as a whole group and in centers to learn how to identify time to the hour on analog and digital clocks!
In Math this week, we completed our chapter on Addition Stories! We did a phenomenal job on this chapter and I have never seen such interest in a math topic before! The students LOVED adding! We will continue to add as we move on to our next chapter! However, next week, we will not be working from our math books! We will be learning about the concept of time to the hour! Students will be working as a whole group and in centers to learn how to identify time to the hour on analog and digital clocks!
STAR SAILOR MARIA
This week our STAR SAILOR was Maria! Maria shared her ALL ABOUT ME poster with us and we learned that she wants to be a Scientist when she grows up! We also learned that her favorite book is THE CHRISTMAS STORY! We danced the end of the day away on Wednesday with her favorite song, LET IT GO from Frozen! On Thursday, Maria shared her favorite snack with us, the chocolate bar called JET! Finally on Friday, we all created a book for Maria to celebrate her week as a STAR SAILOR!
KINDERGARTEN CAN BE CARING BY...
Last week, we read the story "Somebody Loves You Mr. Hatch!" and we created an anchor chart sharing different ways that we can be caring to our family, friends, and school! This week, students wrote about one way that they can be caring and illustrated their writing! Be sure to check out all of our writings hanging in our classroom!
CELEBRATING DIVERSITY!
This week in Social Studies, we celebrated the concept of diversity! We learned that it's okay to be different and unique!
On Monday, we read the story "Leo the Late Bloomer" and we learned that everyone learns at different times and paces. We also learned that each of us have different strengths and are often very good at specific things. In our journals, we wrote about something that we are very good at.
On Tuesday, we watched two stories online. The first story was "The Crayon Box that Talked." In this story, the crayons are all very upset because they don't like how they are a specific color, they don't like how close they are in the box, etc. Towards the end of the story, they realize that altogether, they can create a beautiful picture that would not be complete without each other. They presented the message that no matter who you are and the qualities that you have, together as a group of children, you can accomplish anything when working together! We also watched the story, "A Bad Case of the Stripes." In this story, the main character Camilla Cream, is always worrying about what others are thinking and she breaks out into stripes! Her pattern on her body changes to whatever anyone says! With a little help, she learns to stop listening to what others have to say about her and just be herself! She does this and learns to be happy with who she really is! After reading this, the students were given a photo of themselves and they had to draw stripes on their face! Afterwards, we noticed that not one students' stripes were the same! Students then glued their photo on a poster and drew objects around their photo that represented who they were and what they liked.
On Wednesday, the students listened to two stories "No two Alike" and "I'm Gonna Like Me!" They then wrote about what makes them unique and different! We attached this writing to our posters we created yesterday and they are now hanging in our classroom!
On Friday, we watched "Finding Nemo" and learned that Nemo had a "lucky fin", which was smaller than the rest of his fins and caused him to swim a little slower. His dad constantly reminded him how he was different and couldn't do what the rest of the fish did even though he wanted to. Nemo wanting to prove his father wrong went out in the open sea and got taken. Throughout the rest of the movie, Nemo spent his time fighting to get back to the ocean to his father and never once stopped himself because of his "lucky fin." He proved to his father that he can do whatever he wanted to do even though he was different from other fish! Students will be writing a response to this movie on Tuesday for morning work in their journals!
On Friday evening, we hosted Barnes and Noble Night in Exton! We started the evening with Mr. Alaxson reading "A Book with no Pictures" by BJ Novak. Mr. Rodia then shared the teachers version of the book "It's Okay to be Different." The teachers changed the book and put their own spin on the pages! We then ended the night with the Diversity Day Video "Shake it Off" that Ms. Moser and Mrs. Roupe created! It was a great night filled with reading, listening, shopping, and slurping "Chester's Vanilla Bean Dream!" We had such a great night!
On Monday, we read the story "Leo the Late Bloomer" and we learned that everyone learns at different times and paces. We also learned that each of us have different strengths and are often very good at specific things. In our journals, we wrote about something that we are very good at.
On Tuesday, we watched two stories online. The first story was "The Crayon Box that Talked." In this story, the crayons are all very upset because they don't like how they are a specific color, they don't like how close they are in the box, etc. Towards the end of the story, they realize that altogether, they can create a beautiful picture that would not be complete without each other. They presented the message that no matter who you are and the qualities that you have, together as a group of children, you can accomplish anything when working together! We also watched the story, "A Bad Case of the Stripes." In this story, the main character Camilla Cream, is always worrying about what others are thinking and she breaks out into stripes! Her pattern on her body changes to whatever anyone says! With a little help, she learns to stop listening to what others have to say about her and just be herself! She does this and learns to be happy with who she really is! After reading this, the students were given a photo of themselves and they had to draw stripes on their face! Afterwards, we noticed that not one students' stripes were the same! Students then glued their photo on a poster and drew objects around their photo that represented who they were and what they liked.
On Wednesday, the students listened to two stories "No two Alike" and "I'm Gonna Like Me!" They then wrote about what makes them unique and different! We attached this writing to our posters we created yesterday and they are now hanging in our classroom!
On Friday, we watched "Finding Nemo" and learned that Nemo had a "lucky fin", which was smaller than the rest of his fins and caused him to swim a little slower. His dad constantly reminded him how he was different and couldn't do what the rest of the fish did even though he wanted to. Nemo wanting to prove his father wrong went out in the open sea and got taken. Throughout the rest of the movie, Nemo spent his time fighting to get back to the ocean to his father and never once stopped himself because of his "lucky fin." He proved to his father that he can do whatever he wanted to do even though he was different from other fish! Students will be writing a response to this movie on Tuesday for morning work in their journals!
On Friday evening, we hosted Barnes and Noble Night in Exton! We started the evening with Mr. Alaxson reading "A Book with no Pictures" by BJ Novak. Mr. Rodia then shared the teachers version of the book "It's Okay to be Different." The teachers changed the book and put their own spin on the pages! We then ended the night with the Diversity Day Video "Shake it Off" that Ms. Moser and Mrs. Roupe created! It was a great night filled with reading, listening, shopping, and slurping "Chester's Vanilla Bean Dream!" We had such a great night!
WHAT EVENTS ARE HAPPENING AROUND THE SCHOOL???
- No School on Monday, January 19th! Happy MLK Jr. Day!
- On Tuesday and Wednesday of next week (January 20th and 21st), our Kindergarten will be hosting visits from our preschools in West Chester and Exton showing our preschool friends what it is like to be a Kindergartener in our school!
- Thursday, January 22nd, our school will be hosting an OPEN HOUSE for prospective families! ALL students will be wearing their FORMAL UNIFORMS! No gym uniforms today!
- Friday, January 23rd, 5th Grader Lizzy Carr will be Principal for a Day! Students are allowed to wear their PJs to school on Friday! After PRIDE time in the morning, girls will have a dance party with Lizzy in the gym and boys will get a morning recess! After lunch everyone will gather in the gym to watch BIG HERO 6!
- Saturday, January 24th is our Winter Open House! It is also our ART SHOW! All students in Pre-K and Kindergarten are asked to visit the Art show from 1-230! 1st-5th grade students are asked to visit from 230-4pm. Specific times are allotted in order to avoid large rushes and crowding in the hallways, which would make viewing the artworks very hard to see! We hope to see you there!!
- Wednesday, January 28th is Look Ahead Night for 1st Grade! Mrs. Garritt looks forward to meeting all of you!!
- Friday, January 30th is DRESS DOWN IN YOUR FAVORITE FOOTBALL ATTIRE DAY! Mrs. Roupe will also be kicking off her SOUPER BOWL project this entire week! (January 26th-31st)