Spelling Lists 12/17-12/21

Red Group – run, cut, tug, sun, rug, nut, bug, bun

Orange Group (beginning sound only) – thumb, wheel, thorn, whistle, think, whale, thimble, whip, thirteen

Yellow Group (beginning sound only) – crab, cloud, frog, flag, crib, clip, frame, fly, crown, flashlight

Green Group – when, dead, trees, each, sled, death, queen, steam, reach, head, east, street

Blue Group – turn, sure, curve, purr, turkey, cure, purse, burst, pure, curse, purple, curb, hurl, church, hurt, burn

Our Class Pledge

Good afternoon, parents! Today 3 pieces of paper went home: an invitation to the Winter Concert this coming Monday, a flyer about an awesome summer camp called Camp Invention that is doing special early bird pricing right now (a great Christmas present for your child!) and also a copy of our new class pledge.

Every morning after the Pledge of Allegiance, we will be repeating our class pledge. I developed it after talking to other teachers about similar pledges they use to reinforce positive behavior and remind their students about their responsibilities.

Ms. Christina’s Class Pledge

I am the boss of me and no one else.

I will treat others the way I want to be treated.

I am the boss of me and no one else.

Today we did an activity where we talked about examples of how we should and should not behave. Your student should have either written or drawn a personal response to our class pledge. I am hopeful this will help us all to be mindful of our behavior and think before we act.

As always, please let me know if you have any questions and thank you for all you do!

Spelling Lists 12/10-12/14

Red Group – peg, net, leg, jet, ten, beg, wet, men

Orange Group (beginning sound only) – cheese, sheep, ham, shave, hat, shoe, chain, chop, house

Yellow Group (beginning sound only) – slide, block, plus, sled, blade, plum, sleep, blanket, plate, plug

Green Group – less, feet, mean, web, keep, heat, next, teeth, peach, been, sleep, speak

Blue Group – form, shore, board, word, four, world, floor, more, worm, horse, storm, corn, poor, oar, work, roar

Fifteenth Week Recap and Tidbits

Tidbits–there is so much coming up!

1 – Next Monday, December 17th is the school-wide Winter Concert at 6:30 PM. Students are asked to wear dark bottoms and a solid-color shirt. They have been practicing hard and it should be a fun night!

2 – The Feast of Ages Play will be held this Wednesday and Thursday evening at 5:30 PM. Tickets are still available!

3 – We have updated information for our next home project, which is due Friday, Janaury 18th. The students will be presenting school-wide after STEM week starting January 21st. Following is the updated information: 1st grade will research and present on any scientist of their choosing, 2nd grade will do a project using the scientific method and 3rd grade will present on either simple machines or forces of motion. The theme STRUCTURE is what your child will be studying during our third thematic unit, which can mean certain processes scientists use or explore such as the scientific method, the physical structure of matter or the structure of the universe, the structure of the classification of living things and so much more. There’s a lot to explore! We want to treat our STEM Fair as a celebration of science, so your student is not limited to just a tri-board.  Listed below are ideas your child can choose from (but are not limited to) for the STEM Fair. Some ideas include, but are not limited to:

  • Poster or tri-fold board
  • Brochure
  • Hands-on experiment with write-up
  • Experiment demonstration by student (must be able to show over and over)
  • Create a board game
  • Create a simple machine
  • Video (Example: Make their own Bill Nye)
  • Performance or skit
  • Diorama
  • Create a book
  • Create a lesson or work

Recap

We are getting farther into our curriculum areas and the children are loving what they are learning! Many of you have asked what you can do to help your child, and as always, reading is the most important! Ideally, reading with your child next to you while you trace you finger under the words and they read along at the same time is best, but any reading is helpful. For some of our more advanced readers that don’t need support in that area, we are also working on math fluency facts. Each member of our class in working to memorize addition facts by families (such as adding 1s, adding 2s, adding 3s, etc.) and practicing these at home will help them to do learn them more quickly and thoroughly.

As we get closer to the holidays, I am noticing that the added excitement is making it difficult for many members of our class to focus and follow classroom expectations. We are reviewing daily as a class what our behaviors should be, but reinforcement of practicing kindness, politeness, patience, etc. at home would be greatly appreciated. Thank you again for all you do!

Spelling Lists 12/3-12/7

Red Group – pot, dog, hot, hop, log, top, jog, mop

Orange Group (beginning sound only) – cat, hand, chair, cake, heart, chop, coat, hat, chin

Yellow Group (beginning sound only) – pig, lamp, plus, pot, log, plant, pin, leaf, plug, lock

Green Group – cube, food, fruit, crust, build, dude, spoon, juice, skunk, tooth, suit, trust

Blue Group – bird, fire, drier, first, tire, crier, fur, chirp, wire, pliers, girl, birth, shirt, stir, hire, thirst

Original Works

All original works have now gone home. If you have not seen/received your order yet, please ask your student about it and if they say they did not receive it, please let me know and I will be in touch with Ms. Rachel. For those of you who ordered quilt squares as part of our classroom project, I decided it would be easier for me to remove the quilt squares before sending the order home rather than asking you to return them, so I have them at home already. If I presumed wrong and you did NOT want me to take the quilt square, please let me know and I will send them back to you ASAP.

Thank you so much for all your support! The kids LOVED getting their orders on Friday and it was fun to see all the different things they got.