Week of January 6, 2020
Hello Parents,
Happy New Year to you all! It is hard to believe we are already in the year 2020. We will begin the new year with many new themes. First off, we will start by focusing on habit 4 from Sean Covey’s book The 7 Habits of Happy Kids, which is “Think Win-Win”. In this habit we will be moving from the private victory to the public victory. Our first 3 habits were all about bettering ourselves and improving our own lives. With “Think Win-Win” we will learn about 4 outcomes that are available when you interact with someone else; win-win, win-lose, lose-win, and lose-lose.
Win-Win- “Let’s find a solution that works for both of us.” People who search for solutions that make them happy and at the same time make others happy. People in this category have both the courage to say what they want and the consideration to work toward mutual benefit.
Win-Lose- “I am going to beat you no matter what”. People who fit in this category are only concerned with themselves they want to win and make others lose. They have the courage to say what they want but are low on consideration. With win-lose you think of competition, comparison, power, and position. This is actually a very common interaction in our society. As parents we naturally have position over our children and sometimes put our agenda over theirs. We must remind ourselves to constantly be on guard for situations in which we can change a win-lose to a win-win when interacting with children.
Lose-Win- “I always get stepped on”. People in this category have lots of consideration for others but they lack the courage to express and act on their own feelings and beliefs. Too much time in this category creates the victim mentality and people who just follow the crowd. They may bury a lot of their feelings, have no demands or expectations of others, and they are quick to please others even at the expense of themselves.
Lose-Lose- “If I’m going down, you’re going down with me.” People in this category are low on courage and consideration they envy and criticize others. They put themselves and others down. This situation can be the long-term result of a win-lose.
In class we will talk about ways to make situations a win-win, we will think of cooperation, communication, and seek for mutual benefit.
We will also begin the introduction of our new continent study (Antarctica); our new biome study (Polar); and our new vertebrate study (mammals). In science we will learn more about weather and will keep a log on the weather this month. The element in art that we will be learning about is shape. And to go along with shape, the artist we will study is Henri Matisse.
We look forward to seeing your dear children soon.
Ms. Martha & Ms. Valerie
P.S. We need help in gathering items for our GALA basket. Our room parents emailed the follow to you, but just in case it did not reach you, I copied and pasted the information to include in this blog. Any help will be greatly appreciated. Here it is-
Hello Families of Ms. Martha’s Class!
We hope you all have been enjoying this holiday season with your friends and family! In March, MAPA will be hosting the Gala Fundraiser for MMA, which is another great way that fundraising is done for the school. Each class has been asked to put together a basket of goodies and items to be auctioned off at the Gala. Our assigned basket theme is “1st Grade Here I Come”. Myself and the PM class room parent, Kami Johnson will be working thru the months of January and February to put together an amazing basket. We will be looking for donations of new items to put in our basket. Some ideas of items that we can include are: books, games, a lunch box, a backpack, puzzles, art supplies, flash cards, first day of school props, and school supplies, etc. We will also need a nice sized basket or school type container to hold all our items. We are open to any suggestions of other items or ideas that you all think would go great with our theme. Here’s the part where we need your help: with the Christmas holiday just ending, there will be some great sales going on or maybe even some great items that our little ones got gifted doubles of. Maybe even things that we purchased and forgot where we hid them, so they never got wrapped and put under the tree (me!). Perhaps you have connections with a business in our community that would be willing to donate an item or experience that is on theme. We greatly appreciate anything that you are able to donate and these items can also count towards your volunteer time for the year. Please reach out to myself (Andrea McMahan) or Kami Johnson with any questions or any donation items that you are able to give. We will be creating a spreadsheet to keep track of all the items and can make arrangements to get the items from you at drop-off/pick-up or the classroom. Thank you all so much for your help and support!
Andrea
Ms. Martha’s AM Class Room Parent
Andrea McMahan Kami Johnson
(951)634-7566 (text) (702)355-5238
almcmahan01@yahoo.com kami.leah.johnson@gmail.com