Original Works keepsakes will be delivered to your children on Friday, November 30th. If you would like to help sort, please let Rachael Bush know (rachael.bush@gmail.com)! We’re going to be opening boxes and checking order forms in the conference room right after drop off Friday morning!

Red Group – nap, wag, cap, rag, map, bag, tag, lap

Orange Group (beginning sound only) – horse, shark, sock, ham, seal, shed, house, ship, soap

Yellow Group (beginning sound only) – scarf, snap, swim, scale, snow, swing, scooter, snail, switch, snake

Green Group – lost, drove, road, love, soft, slope, cross, soap, none, toad, stone, chose

Blue Group – her, deer, ear, earth, germ, steer, dear, spear, herd, cheer, fern, heard, clear, beard, near, learn

First, my apologies for getting this out so long after the fact. Many of you know that I was sick a few days before the break began and unfortunately I stayed sick until just a few days ago, which means I’m behind on things like blogging!

Tidbits

1 – This Thursday the 29th is our field trip to Hill Aerospace Museum. We are still in need of more drivers and chaperones! Please email myself or our room mom if you are able to contribute to this event for our class.

2 – As we go into the holiday season, please keep in mind that the children will likely be experiencing heightened emotions from all the excitement. One way to help them to fully enjoy the season is to keep their home routine consistent. From the food they eat to the time they go to sleep, anything we can do to keep things running smoothly will help them to not be overwhelmed by all the fun, extra things around them.

Recap

By far the biggest highlight of our week before break was the Cultural Festival. Thank you SO MUCH to all of you parents who helped support your child with his or her project and who came to visit the festival. The children were so excited to share what they had researched and to see all the projects around the school. I was amazed by how much they learned and all the facts they were able to share. Most of all, I loved how they found new areas of interest–one of the major goals of Montessori education is to create a passion for learning and I think our festival did exactly that!

We also had another botany with Ms. Rachel, which is always a treat. She brings such enthusiasm and knowledge to our botany sessions that we all look forward to them.

November 24th is the annual Ogden Electric Lights Parade. Our school will be represented and the marketing committee has come up with a float that will represent MMA.

We are looking for students from MMA who would like to be part of our parade! The meeting place will be in front of the Ogden Temple. The parade starts promptly at 5:30pm. The floats will be lined up at 5pm.

Students 12 years and younger must ride in the trailer or truck. If you are over the age of 12, then you may walk next to the float. Students who ride or walk will be carrying white peace signs or holding tea lights.

If your child would like to be a part of the parade then we will have waivers to sign in front of the temple.

The parade starts on 22nd and Washington and then ends at 27th. My advice would be for our MMA parents whose child(ren) are in the parade park towards the end of the parade so when we are done you can find your child.

We have some, but if your child would like to wear glow necklaces and bracelets during the parade we highly suggest the more the better! (It is a light parade!) the glow wear is also our symbol to honor Troy and Molly Cox.

If you have any questions you can ask Autumn in the office or Ms. Kaley. They will do their best to answer anything they know.

Dear parents,

In an effort to reduce paper usage, I am copying our information sheet about our upcoming field trip to Hill Aerospace Musem here so that you can refer to it as needed. If for some reason you need a paper copy, please let me know and I will send one home with your student. Our amazing room mom, Natalie, will be reaching out soon to coordinate carpooling if she hasn’t already!

Maria Montessori Academy Field Experience on November 29, 2018 at Hill Aerospace Museum

7961 Wardleigh Road, Hill AFB, UT 84056

The lead instructor is Christina Miller; cmiller@mariamontessoriacademy.org.

We will be going to Hill Aerospace Museum to learn about simple machines, electricity, astronomy, flight, magnetism, and see life size models of aircraft.

• Attend a workshop on simple machines
• Tour the museum
• Go on a scavenger hunt of the displays

• School uniform, good shoes for walking in.
• Coat for outside exploration (last year it was COLD)

• 11:30 am – Leave for the museum (parents will transport)
• 11:50ish – Arrive at museum and check in
• 12:00-2:10 – Attend workshop on simple machines: 12:00, 12:45 or 1:30.
• 12:00-2:15 – Explore the inside and outside of the museum when not attending workshop.
• Parents will pick up children and transport them back to the school at 2:15 pm.

I’ve gotten a few questions about this, so I want to put the information out there again for anyone confused. Home projects are due by this Friday, the 16th. From 1-3 PM on the 16th we will be doing a cultural festival (similar to past years’ International Festivals) that parents are welcome to come attend to see their child’s projects as well as the other projects throughout the school. The layout will be similar to past years, but instead of looking at countries around the world, we will be focusing on the United States.

If you have a child in another class, they may have been given a more specific assignment relating to US History, such as the 13 colonies. I chose to leave the project more open-ended so our students could research their own interests.

As always, please let me know if you have any questions!

Tidbits

1 – Picture proofs were sent home last week. If you would like to order picture, there was an order form included in the envelope. If you would like to order reprints, please let me know. Since I only have a few of them, I won’t be sending them home unless you request it. Picture makeup day is this Thursday, November 15th. I will only send the children whose parents have reached out to me in advance.

2 – THANK YOU to the many parents who offered to help with our book labeling. I can’t tell you how much it meant to me. I’m so excited for our Dyad Reading program and truly feel it will be a great benefit to your children. I am hoping to have the program started before the end of the week.

3 – Several of you have asked about reading groups. We will be starting them after Thanksgiving. If you are interested in coming in and being part of our reading groups, please let me know and I will be in touch with more details.

Recap

We had so much fun this week! Between Red Ribbon Week activities and our Gary Hogg author visit, we had extra activities every single day. The children in particular loved our assembly and classroom workshop with Gary Hogg. He came to our class to go over writing techniques and also gave a great presentation about the power of stories, putting in our full effort and so much more. The children wrote some great stories!

With all the special events, our classroom excitement level was high and our classroom behavior was not as good as usual. There were several frustrating moments, but I am very hopeful that with a return to our normal routines this week, we will get back into our regular rhythm. I was very pleased with so many of our students that worked hard this week–some completed record amounts of work! Of course, our real goal is mastery of knowledge and skills rather than number of works completed, but I love to see the pride on their faces and in their voices as they realize how much they are capable of. It is truly a joy to be in class with them!

Red Group – fan, pan, dad, sad, mad, man, van, can

Orange Group – pig, pill, wig, lip, mill, hill, dig, zip, rip

Yellow Group (beginning sound only) – spoon, ski, smell, spill, skip, smoke, spear, skunk, smile, skate

Green Group – space, rain, Jack, want, place, paint, frame, said, black, camp, tail, chain

Blue Group – care, hair, part, wear, hair, stare, dark, where, stair, bear, pear, shark, pair, square, heart, sharp

Dear parents,

Tidbits:

1 – Early release Monday, November 5th. School will be dismissed at 1 PM.

2 – This week is red ribbon week and we have an in-school field experience with author Gary Hogg. Because of all the extra actvities this week, we will be compressing our instruction and our work cycle into less time. It is important to practice spelling at home this week as there will be less time for in-class practice.

3 – Picture Retake Day is coming up on the 15th. Please let me know if you want your child to have their picture retaken so that I can send them to the gym at the appropriate time.

Recap

This past week we started two new things: new work plans and daily handwriting practice. The new work plans made an immediate and positive difference in our classroom. I’m so pleased with how everyone adjusted to them and they are helping us stay on task and move through our work so much better. Plus, since we use the same plan for the entire week instead of needing a new one every day, they’re also helping save paper! We discussed expectations for work completed last week and starting this week, I will be sending home work plans on Fridays for parents/guardians to see what their student is accomplishing during the week. I will explain more details about this in a coming blog post.

As always, thank you for all you do!