Lincoln's January Newsletter
Leading the Pack In Kingsport
New Year's Resolutions
- Being prepared for school the night before to promote an on time arrival to school the next day. Have those back packs packed and by the door and ready to go before going to bed. End the daily struggle of finding items for school while racing out the door.
- Set aside 20-30 minutes daily to either read with your child or for your child to read independently. Daily reading or exposure to books is a great way to improve students reading ability.
- Make a routine either at the dinner table or at bed time to talk to your child about their day. Ask questions about what happened in math or reading that day. Find out what was the best part of their day or what was a part of their day they wish they could do over again--but better. Showing interest and excitement about your child's school day tells your child that you value what they do at school and their learning.
- Set a reasonable bed time for students and an evening routine to promote quality sleep for your child. Quality sleep allows your child to recharge their brain, transfer knowledge learned during the day from short term to long term memory, and for our younger students, brain development. Take out TVs, video games. and other electronics from bedrooms to promote healthy sleep.
We are excited for the start of 2019 and all the possibilities that a new year can bring.
Speaking of Sleep
Attendance Reminders
- At the beginning of each semester all children receive three excused absence days that can be used during the semester.
- If a child is absent the parent must write a note regarding the absence. If the reason for the absence is illness, and the child does NOT go to the doctor and has a doctor's excuse, one (or more excused days depending on how long the child is out) will be used to cover that absence. Once the three excused days are used because the parent sent in a note, they are gone and all other absences will be unexcused unless a doctor's note is provided.
- If a child is absent and the parent does not provide a note, Katy Clark, our secretary who enters attendance data, must use one of the excused days to cover the absence each time the child is absent and there is no note. For example, if the child is out of school on three separate occasions and the parent does not write a note regarding the absence, the school will use the three days of excused to cover the first three absences and any further absences are unexcused regardless if the parent does write a note for a 4th, 5th or 6th day of absence from school. The first three days out will use up the excused absences days for the semester.
- If a child uses up the three excused absence days and becomes sick, missing several more days of school, it would be recommended that the parent get a doctors note regarding the additional sick days as it is approved by the doctor. The school will code those days as medical, not unexcused. No doctors note, the days are automatically unexcused.
- If you go to the doctor and haven't used your three days, turn in your doctor's note. The absence will be coded as medical and your excused absences will not be used.
- Should a child use up all three excused absence days and the family unfortunately experiences a death in the family, we encourage a call to the office for further instruction regarding next steps.
Please remember that students are counted as tardy if they are not IN THEIR CLASSROOMS at 8:15. Please make sure that you are getting your child to school in enough time to get from your car to the classroom or to breakfast and then to the classroom by 8:15. We had a significant up-tic of tardy students before break. New year, new habits! On time, EVERY DAY!
Talking Points With Your Child About Our Behavior Expectations
- How did you demonstrate being responsible/respectful/trustworthy/safe today?
- Did you see a friend being responsible/respectful/trustworthy/safe today? How did that make you feel? Did it make you want to be better in that area too?
- Why is it important to be responsible/respectful/trustworthy/safe in school/out of school?
- What is an area of the four expectations that you want to improve in? What is your plan to make these improvements? When do you want to improve by? (Goal setting)
- What adult in your life displays these expectations regularly? Why do you think that adult chooses to follow those traits in their life like you do at Lincoln?
There are probably tons of questions that you could add to this list but these are starters to get the conversation rolling at home.
January PTO Meeting
Students Supporting Others
Grade Level Updates
Pre-K is back in full swing after a great Christmas break. We are right back into our letter and number work. Calendar is also now a part of our morning routine. We have implemented classroom jobs and everyone is doing a great job! Please keep reinforcing those letters and numbers at home and just read, read, read. :)
Kindergarten
Literacy:
- please practice the kindergarten sight words with your child at home.
- compare and contrast stories
- please continue reading with your child.
Math:
- solve addition and subtraction story problems
- count by ones to 75
- write numbers 0 to 20
Science:
- matter (solids and liquids)
First Grade
First graders will be learning the power of persuasion. We will compare and contrast texts, characters, events, and make connections between texts. Students will write an opinion piece using text evidence to support their decision of agree or disagree. Again, we will use a graphic organizer to help us plan our writing. For phonics, we are focusing on long vowels spelled with digraphs variations. Our language focus will be every syllable has a vowel. In math, students will understand, represent, and solve problems involving addition and subtraction. We will understand equivalence and place value. This unit has several math games for homework practice. Students need to practice reading analog clocks to the hour and half hour. Please continue to practice the addition fluency flash cards sent home earlier this year. First graders must be fluent with facts up to 10.
Second Grade
In January we will spend two weeks learning about different cultures and how where you live affects your beliefs, customs and traditions. Students will learn about fairy tales and fantasy. One of the themes of the stories that we will be reading is about kindness. Students will write an essay explaining how kindness is rewarded in the texts that we read.
Toward the middle of the month we will be reading about how characters can overcome their fears. We will develop an understanding of how to write an effective explanation that states an idea, supports the idea with text evidence, and includes a strong conclusion. Students will be writing a narrative about a time that they were afraid as well as writing to the characters to give them advice about how to overcome their fears.
We will be celebrating reading Thursday, January 11. Students that have turned in their calendars with at least 18 days of reading completed will be recognized. Thank you for reading with your child!
Second graders are beginning to work with larger numbers in January. Students will continue to work on solving addition and subtraction 2-digit numbers with story problems, understand place value, and the composition of 3-digit numbers. Students are expected to be able to read, write, count, and compare numbers to 1,000 by the end of this unit. They will also be expected to add and subtract 10 or 100 to/from numbers within 1,000. We will also continue laying the foundation for multiplication by skip counting by 5s, 10s, and 100s within 1,000. Students should be able to skip count starting from any 3-digit number.
Our weekly fact fluency checks will be about subtraction facts within 30. Students will be introduced to telling time by the quarter hour this month. Please continue to help your child by practicing using coins and telling time with an analog clock.
Third Grade
Third grade continues to work hard to help each student grow in their reading, writing, math, and reasoning skills. In literacy we will soon be starting our unit on man-made disasters. It’s a very interesting unit and the students usually enjoy it quite a bit. Through this unit we will focus on finding and using text evidence, as well as responding to a writing prompt based on the text. Our weekly word work units will resume on each week that we are in school a full 5-day week, with quizzes on Fridays. Please encourage your child to read at home each night and log that time on the reading logs.
In math this month we are focusing on cube patterns, arrays, and multiples of 10 (multiplication and division). The students will be working to understand the meaning and structure between multiplication and division, solving multiplication and division problems, including multi-step problems and problems with multiple solutions. They will also be learning multiplication facts and making sense of multiplying multiples of 10 by one-digit numbers. The students will do this by thinking abstractly and quantitatively and looking for and making use of structure.
Fourth Grade
Math:
Fourth graders are still deep in their study of fractions during January. This is considered a major work of the grade level. By the end of the unit, students should be able to: explain why fractions are equivalent using a visual model, recognize and create equivalent fractions, compare fractions with different denominators, solve story problems that involve adding and subtracting fractions with the same denominators, multiply fractions by whole numbers, express fractions to the hundredths place as a decimal number, compare decimals, and add fractions with denominators of 10 and 100.
Science:
Students are exploring how the components of an ecosystem and the different roles in a food web are dependent on one another. They will discover how removing or adding a new species can damage the balance in an ecosystem. Soon, students will begin to research how fossils provide us with information about the past!
Literacy:
The students are continuing to review making inferences, cause/effect, main idea and supporting details, theme, and point of view. Also, the students have been introduced to prefixes and the skill of compare/contrast. During this month, they will continue to review the expository opinion writing process.
Social Studies:
The students will continue to examine the causes/effects of the Revolutionary War. Also, they will understand how specific individuals played an important role during the war.
Fifth Grade
Fifth grade students will begin their study of our fourth ELA unit, Child Labor and Labor Unions. This unit is always a favorite of our classes, as students enjoy learning about children in history. We will be seeking to respond to the question, "How did young children utilize perseverance in the past to overcome difficult situations throughout history?" This unit not only enhances students' abilities in literacy and social studies, but lends valuable learning in character building.