Ms. Kaley's Classroom Room 24

Hello Everyone!

Updates & Reminders:

READING KITS!  If your 1st or 2nd grader brought home a plastic bag reading kit, they are DUE MONDAY!  I have only received a few.  I have the next books and materials ready to go.  I have now added materials for ALL 1st graders (adding Ella and Ethan).  Please sign the check off list and send the kit back.

Conferences start Monday!  Please sign up, if you haven’t.  I will be taking the link down at 7pm.  If you haven’t signed up and need to and I have taken the link down, or you need to change your time, please email me.  I disable the link so I have everything organized in order of those who signed up.

The book fair opens during conference days!

Our field trip is on Oct. 21st.  Remember to let me know who is driving your child.  Most of you will meet us there at the farm.  Those who arrange someone to take their child at North Shore will be picked up there.  Please see my post below on Black Island Farm info and times for drop off and pick up.  I will be reminding at conferences too 🙂

Fall Festival is Oct. 23rd.  Time is from 4-7.  You can buy wrist bands for $8.00 or separate tickets, 4 for a $1.00.  Tickets and wristbands will be on sale during conferences.

Past Week:

In group lessons:

Level 1s: 4 square writing, alphabetizing, 1 more/1 less/10 more/10 less, triangle review

Level 2s: 4 square writing, 4 kinds of angles review, Common nouns vs Proper nouns

Level 3s: 4 square writing, classifying triangles

In cultural: Geography

Level 1s: Review of continents, Globes vs. maps, Types of maps

Level 2s: Tectonic plates

Level 3s: The Earth’s atmosphere 

Upcoming Week:

With the 3 half days this coming week, I will be focusing on mini projects with the students.  No spelling this week.

Remember Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday are 1pm dismissals.  Conferences start at 1:30.  I do my best to keep conferences on time, so please remember your sign up time.

Monday

1:30- Dustie

1:50- Alden

2:10- Kennedy

2:30- Tae’Lynn

3:10- Anna

3:30- Cael

5:30- Karsten

6:10- Jayce

Tuesday

1:30- Ella

1:50- Ethan

2:10- Sophia

3:10- Aiden B.

3:30- Arianna

4:30- Peyton?

5:30- Kailyn

5:50- Lydia

6:10- Romeo

Wednesday:

1:30- Kylie

1:50- JayCee

2:10- Naomi

2:30- Aidan L.

3:10- Nicholas

3:50- Ashley

4:10- Daxton

4:30- William

5:30- Tae’Lynn

6:10- Stevie

Hey Everyone!

• Picture day is Oct. 7, but that is a Wednesday, not tomorrow (Tuesday)
• Also, I need 10 of you to sign up for conferences 🙂  The post is a couple of posts down.  See everyone next week!

* Permission slips went out today.  Please return them ASAP!

* Reading kits went out today too.  If you can have your child do it by Friday or Monday at the latest, please have them do their reading 🙂  It is helpful to have them practice those 2 books every day for fluency, especially if they are having a harder time with it.  Feel free to make any notes on my check off list for anything you want me to know.

Updates & Coming Week!

Picture day is Tuesday Oct. 7th.  Students brought home a long form if you know you already want to order pictures.  All students will get their pictures taken.  A proof will be sent home in a few weeks and if you like them then you will get another chance to order pictures.  Some students were absent most of the week and their forms are on their desks.  If your student is not there then there will be a make up day.

Please sign up for our first Parent Teacher Conference!  They begin next week!  I will close the sign ups Sunday the 11th.

I forgot to send home the reading kits on Friday.  I put each kit on certain student’s desks when they come in tomorrow.  When your student gets home, please ask them if they have their Take Home Reading.  It says to return the kit, signed, by Friday.  If you need until Monday the 12th with your child, no problem.

Field Trip forms are being made by Ms. Jalee.  She said she’d have the forms for us Monday.

Volunteers Thursday: If you would like to help with Spelling Test this Thursday, please let us know as soon as possible.

Volunteer Friday: We are at our annual lesson on the 3 states of matter this Friday!   A fun activity is root beer floats!  If anyone would like to help get root beer, cups, and vanilla ice cream please let me know!  Thanks!

Past Week:

Group lessons:

Level 1s: 4 square writing, kinds of triangles

Level 2s: 4 square writing, obtuse & acute angles

Level 3s: 4 square writing, kinds of triangles

In cultural: Zoology/Physiology

Level 1s: 5 classes of vertebrates overview, vertebrates vs. invertebrates

Level 2s: Nutrition and exercise

Level 3s: What are Cnidarians (Jellyfish), Jellyfish information and making a model.

Science: Gravity

Have a great upcoming week!

Ms. K

Hello Everyone!

Reminders:

• The MMA Cafe is open on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  Please see my last post for prices.
• Pizza money is due Wednesdays in a sealed envelope.  $1.75 a slice
• I will be making and sending out our Black Island Farms permission slip this week!  They are due to the office 24 hours before we go.  If your child doesn’t turn in his or her permission slip, that child will not be able to go and will spend the day at MMA in Ms. Jill’s classroom completing their work chart.

Upcoming week & Volunteer opportunites!

The 2nd graders will be going over nutrition for their cultural this week.  On Thursday 10/1 in the afternoon (starting at 1pm), if anyone would like to help the 2nd graders make a simple nutritious snack, please email me and let me know if you would like to help out.  No more than 2 volunteers for this one.  If you are interested and want to plan the snack yourself, by all means, please!  They will make the snack for themselves and the rest of the class.  I would also like the 2nd graders explain where the ingredients in the healthy snack falls in the food pyramid.

This week I am introducing the students individual spelling lists.  Last year, every Thursday, it took me and Ms. Emilee all morning to get through spelling lists.  My hope is that I have you guys, who want to help, come in on Thursdays to give spelling tests.  3 volunteers would work out great, but if only 1 or 2 of you want to come in, it still helps us out.  Email me if you would like to help give Spelling tests this Thursday or if you can/willing to come most or all Thursdays.  Spelling tests start in the morning, but if you can only come in the afternoon, I will assign you a spelling group and just let that group know they will taking it in the afternoon.

Misha and Anna’s grandmother are going to come in Thursdays/Fridays to help prepare some reading homework for our kiddos who need extra practice.  We’ll send home their reading group sight words to practice and some reading works.  Misha if you come Friday, we start studio in the morning.  If you want to come in Thursday afternoon, I can show you how to work the printers.  If anyone can donate some gallon sized Ziplock bags, we could use a box to send home the student’s work in 🙂

Updates:

This year our IXL account was not renewed (for our class).  However, have no fear you IXL lovers, a new program has come our way.  Friday the lower el teachers were trained in a program called MyOn (myon.com).  It is an online, Netflix-like, program that gives students an online library based on their reading level.  What is even better is that it doesn’t require an internet connection, so if you don’t have internet at your house, but you have a smart phone, iPad/Kindle etc, you can have your child still use it!  This program is very similar to the free reading, Netflix-like, app called Epic!  Though similar, MyOn is much more beefy.  It gives students comprehension questions about the books they are reading and tests them every 2 weeks or so.  It also allows me to make reading, writing, and comprehension assignments and projects.  Our logins are coming very soon and then we as the lower el team will take some time to set everything up.  Expect some home and in class assignments after our 1st conferences!  3rd graders will especially benefit from the assignments as it will help their typing and language test prep.  I’m pretty stoked for it.  We’ll ease into it since it is a very new program.

Past Week:

In group lessons this week:

Level 1s: “I can___ ” handwriting, 3 kinds of triangles

Level 2s: Straight & right angles intro, Dictionary intro, cursive practice (d,g,t,a)

Level 3s: Comma practice, Dictionary defining, 2 step word problems, cursive practice (d,g,t,a, Names)

In cultural: History

Level 1s:  Timeline of their life

Level 2s: Lifecycle of a star

Level 3s:  Timeline of Life

Friday: Monet introduction and water lily project

Have a great upcoming week!

Ms. K

Starting on Tuesdays and Thursdays the MMA cafe will be open during lunch time to sell items.  They are starting off slow and will add more items.  Here is what they plan on selling until October:

Hello!

I tried putting this in the last post, but when I go back to edit, my post won’t show up…technology…

Anyway!

First graders are going to work on a timeline of their life this week.  If you could send in pictures Tuesday (they will begin Wednesday, so if you send them Wednesday, then there is some wiggle room if you forget) for every year of their life, they will be learning what a timeline is this week in History.

Thanks!

Hello Everyone!

Past week and reminders:

Please make sure your child has slippers/inside shoes.  There are a few that do not.  If you can’t get your child slippers, please email me.  Inside shoes are part of dress code.  In addition to shoes, remember PE is on Mondays, so please make sure your child has some sort of athletic shoe to run around in.

This week’s lunches went better!  Please remember to pack your child utensils and things that DO NOT take a few minutes to heat up.

If you would like your child t get pizza on Fridays, please submit money in a sealed envelope with your child’s name, teacher, and amount you want to pay for.  Pizza is $1.75 a slice.  Money is due on Wednesday mornings.

Group lessons this week:

Level 1s: Rainbow boxes, golden beads/stamp game (for some), Alphabetizing intro., Syllable train (for some), Geometric solids review.

Level 2s: Acrostic name poem, alphabetizing review and dictionary intro.,  cursive (a,d,g,t), types of lines review

Level 3s:  Acrostic name poem, what is a noun review, plane figures, alphabetizing review, cursive (t,a,d,g), commas (in dates and separating cities and states)

In cultural: Botany

Level 1s: Lifecycle of a plant, importance of plants

Level 2s: Parts of a leaf, veins in a leaf

Level 3s: Parts of a flower

Science: Scientific Method with a milk experiment

Coming week:

Friday the 25th is an early release!  Please make sure to pick your child up at 1pm.

Have a good upcoming week!

Cheers!

Ms. K

Hello Everyone!

Week 3 and 4:

Everything went well while I was away.  Your child worked on a Zoology project while I was away.  If you came across an animal report, brochure, or 3D paper plate animal creation, could you send that back to school, please.  Some kiddos took theirs home by mistake.  I would like to save those first projects as a portfolio piece.

When I returned on Wednesday, I started easing the students into their work charts.  They were SO excited.  I have been going over with them that I want them to take their time on what they are working on, so there is NO set number of works to accomplish in the morning.  This helps Ms. Emilee and I pin point those who are making individual work choices and who might need extra help in making choices.  So far, everyone has enjoyed that.  For instance, those who have been with me and just have been dying to get back into their math works, got that chance and did a page and a half of dynamic multiplication problems with the checkerboard work.  Remember, I have worked extra time in the afternoons to have students work more on their work charts in the afternoon.

I am diligently working on seeing where kids are.  The reading specialists at our school have done DIBELS (a fluency reading test) with the whole school.  Ms. Emilee has done the UURC (reading level/comprehension test) with our new students.  We just have 1 more to do.  I was able to put together reading groups.  They will start this coming week.  You lovely parents who want to help with reading, as soon as normalization is over, you will be beckoned!

I am also finishing up a Math test with 1st graders.  This week, Ms. Emilee and I will get 2nd and 3rd graders tested.

In level lessons this week:

Level 1s: Easy CBM Math testing (Algebraic Operations and Geometry)

Level 2s: Alphabetizing introduction and 3 letter words

Cultural: Geography

Level 1s: Where is Earth and what is a Globe?, Longitude & Latitude, Zones of the Earth

Level 2s: Parts of the Earth

Level 3s: Size of the Sun, Parts of the Sun, Day & Night

Science: Scientific Method foldable

Volunteer Opp:

I have a HUGE stack of lamination.  They are works for the pink, blue, and green reading series.  Our junior high mentor, Brannock, and some of our students have been helping Ms. Emilee and I cut them out.  If anyone would like to cut some out for me, I will send a little stack home.  I do need them cut as soon as possible, so I can’t start sorting them and have our beginning readers get on those works.  Please email me if you would like to help!

As soon as normalization is over (Oct. 1) I would love to have a parent come in to copy some sight words and printable take home books for those students who need to work on reading.  I’m thinking this would be person(s) who can come in on certain Fridays and put them together for those children.  Email me if that sounds like you would like to do.  I’m thinking this will be a bi-weekly job, so students have a few things to work on.

Lunch Time:

I get a lot of students who need spoons, forks, and sometimes, knives in order to eat their lunch.  Please pack your child the utensil needed to eat their lunch, as we don’t always have those items.

Ramen Noodles, EasyMac, lunches that require 3:00+ mins to heat up, take awhile to cook.  Your child may have to wait awhile to heat their lunch up, and then when they do, it takes awhile to cook and then cool down in order to eat.  By the time they start eating, lunch is almost over.  Lunch is 30 mins.  I know a lot of you tell your children to eat all their lunch, but sometimes they just can’t because of heating up their food.  If those items can be cooked at home and then put in tupperware, it makes heating up and eating more successful.  If your child comes home with most of their lunch, they either didn’t like that item, were taking too much at lunch and not eating, or were waiting too much to heat up and eat their food.  Ask your child about how lunch was if you notice those things.  It will make lunch time more successful for everyone 🙂

Upcoming week:

Please make sure your child has some sort of comfortable athletic sneaker for Mondays!  Monday afternoons, right after lunch, is PE.

The weather this week is supposed to be cooler and rainy.  Please have your child dress accordingly for recess time.  We go outside if it isn’t pouring.  We stay inside when it is pouring and when there is thunder and lightening.  It may rain when kids are dismissed this week, so an umbrella might be advisable while they wait to be picked up 🙂

Have a great upcoming week!

Cheers!

Ms. K

Hi Everyone!

This Past Week:

This past week we began the 5 Great Lessons.  We got through “The Birth of the Universe,” “Timeline of Life,” and “Timeline of Man.  Everyday after the lesson, I would present the students with activity choices.  It was great to step back and see who is following what choice and what students needed help making a choice.

Friday we started our first class meeting, science, and Library.  In the afternoon we had a great time making our galaxy art shirts!  Thank you Lori, Kristie, Sarah, and Elene for helping out!  Sorry if some of your kids came home with very colorful hands!  Ms. Stephanie loved the project and is making possible decision to let any classroom shirt project be an acceptable MMA approved T-shirt.  Stand by on that.  As soon as I find out anything, I will let you know.

Everything else is going pretty swimmingly.  We are working on grace and courtesy towards each other and when a teacher is talking.

We started cultural lessons as well!  Cultural will slowly work its way into morning lessons, but as we work into transitioning into work cycle, it is in the afternoon time.  Every week we rotate the subject.  The rotation schedule is: History, Zoology/Physiology, Geography, and Botany.  This week we started with History.

Level 1s: Intro. for the year, Months of the year, Months by seasons, Making a Sept. calendar

Level 2s: 3 forms of matter, Cohesion, Centripetal & Centrifugal forces, Friction

Level 3s: Life on Earth, Clock of Eras, Rope timeline with labeling of eras

Upcoming Week:

Monday begins PE and Music in the afternoon right after lunch.  Please make sure your child has some sort of athletic shoe for PE every Monday.

I will present the last two Great Lessons Monday and Tuesday: “The Timeline of Language,” and “The Timeline of Math.”  Wednesday I leave for my trip and will be back in school the 9th.  Our class will take some breaks and do classroom team building games with Ms. Jill’s class

Pizza Friday is going to begin very soon.  I got an email saying it will begin Sept. 4th, but the flyers didn’t go out.  It may still happen on the 4th, so, if you would like your child to get pizza on Fridays the instructions are for you to,  “The forms ask parents to send in the money or check in a sealed envelope for either the week, month, semester, or year.”  Forms must be SEALED, with child’s NAME, TEACHER, and AMOUNT OF $.  Teachers will not be handling the forms this year, the 6th graders are.  ALL MONEY IS DUE ON WEDNESDAYS BY 12:00 NOON!

HOMEWORK! While I am gone, students are going to be working on animal related projects.  Here is what each level will need:

Level 1s: 3 magazines that have examples of living and non-living things in them.  On Wednesday they will make 2 posters: 1 for living things and 1 for non-living things.  1st graders will then be asked to write a sentence or 2 about what a living thing is and what a non-living thing is.  Thursday, 1st graders will choose 1 living animal choice.  They will make a paper plate 3D pop up project on this day.  Students will write 3 sentences about their living animal.  One sentence will explain why it is living, one will be a small fact about that animal, and the last sentence will be why it is not a non-living thing.  If a student has a great animal book at home, send it with them Thursday.  Ask them Wednesday night what alive animal are they thinking of doing!  

Level 2s:  If your 2nd grader has any animal books, please send a few with them for Wednesday and Thursday.  They will making an animal brochure.

Level 3s:  If your 3rd grader has any animal books, please send a few with them for Wednesday and Thursday. They will doing an animal report and make their own non-fiction fact book.

* Reading help will begin after normalization is over (Oct. 1)

Have a great rest of your weekend and upcoming week.  When I get back, I will post another blog entry.

Cheers!

Ms. K

Hi Everyone!

Can I just state how amazing our group is this year!  It feels good to see everyone and their excitement.  Our returning students are begging to start work.  I joked with them saying, “I want to recored each of you saying that so, that when you get grumpy at me in a few months, I can go back and play it.”  They thought that was funny.  I shared with them the changes in work cycle this year, what their work chart is going to look like, and some expectations.  They will get a chance to do some projects this upcoming week and next week.

Great Lessons Start!:

This coming week is the start of Great Lessons.  We will spend Monday and Tuesday on: “The Birth of the Universe;” Wednesday, “Timeline of Life,” Thursday, “Coming of Man,” and Friday, we will do some reading, science, Europe studies, and some art.  The following Monday (Aug. 31), we will do “History of Language and finish our Great Lessons on Tuesday, Sept. 1st with “History of Math.”  For each Great Lesson I give, there will be a few choices of activities for each lesson that students will get to choose.  It is their chance to start easing into work.

Cultural lessons will also being this coming week.  I plan on using the afternoons to introduce our first cultural lesson, History.  As I introduce lessons in the morning, cultural will start working its way into morning work.

Volunteers:

I have heard from a number of you about wanting to help out in our classroom.  If my memory serves me, here is who I have:

• Lori- reading
• Misha- anything
• Tammie- writing and reading
• Michelle- typing up projects and books for students
• Anna’s grandfather (I didn’t catch a name!  Katie, if you could please email me his name and contact, I would love for him to come in a do some art!)- art

If you signed up on the volunteering sheets at Back to School Night, Heidi Bradley is copying those, so when I get those back, I will see who signed up for what.

Do I have anyone who is in the science field?  Do you have anyone in your family who works in a science field?  Has anyone every been to Europe and would love to share facts from their trip?  Do you or someone in your family love to cook and come do some cooking?  I would love to have more guests this year!   Email me if you or someone wants to help.

Friday August 28th Art Help!

I am looking for some helpers for this coming Friday!  I want to do some galaxy art!

Galaxy art project

This project involves a black shirt.  If you would like to purchase your child a  100% cotton all black t-shirt for Friday, please have them bring it in Friday.  NAME PLEASE ON LABEL!

If you do not wish to get your child an all black t-shirt, would someone like to get our class 1 yard of 100% black fabric?  It will get cut into pieces for those students to have.  Email me ASAP if you would like to get our class 1 yard of black fabric 🙂

I’d like to do this activity in the afternoon after their recess (1pm), but I can adjust to move it to the morning if need be.  Email me if you would like to help out and I can base the activity’s time on who’s coming.

Flagging writing/coloring supplies volunteers!  Ms. Emilee and I would like help putting small pieces of Duct tape on each student’s writing and coloring supplies.  We are using the lime green Duct tape to “flag” each supply with their name on it.  If you can email me if you would like to come in this coming week (week of Aug. 24th) or next, please let me know.  Having volunteers will make that job go faster.

Room Mothers:

We have a dynamic duo for our Room Moms!  Jaida Ryan, is our planning room mother this year.  Sarah Boudreaux will help Jaida in class and be her right hand woman 🙂

These ladies will be helping me out with class parties/events, class needs, reminders, and some organization

• Our first big event will be our Fall Class Party on Oct. 30th (a Friday).  I will email Jaida and Sarah more about it.
• Our first field trip is on Oct. 21st to Black Island Farms.

Out of Town:

I will be going out of town on Sept. 2nd and will return the following Wednesday, Sept. 9th.  This is over Labor Day weekend.  That is 4 school days that I won’t be in class.  Ms. Emilee will take over for those days.  Mrs. Chris Lemmon, will help on Sept. 2nd, 3rd, and 4th.  Mrs. Melinda Montgomery will help out on Sept. 8th.  Ms. Chris is Ms. Anna’s (Anna in the office) mom and Ms. Melinda in on the MAPA committee and helps out with Junior High.

Any students with sensitive to change will be notified so that it isn’t a big surprise to them.  If you are parent to a student who has a sensitivity to transitions, help me by talking to your child in advanced.

Snack:

Our snack sign up is going great!  Please email me if you don’t get an email update.  We have spots available for later in the year, so if you want to take a look at the sign up and see what is left, there are still sign ups available 🙂