Ms. Hall

May Is Here!

WOW! I can't believe we are closing in on the end of the year!  Be sure to check the calendar for some important dates.  Friday May 9th all library books are due.  Thursday May 15th is Kindergarten's Performing Arts program at 8:30 a.m. We will see a puppet show in the cafeteria.   Friday May 16th is school-wide field day.  The last week of school we will have a small end of the year awards day in the classroom. Each child will receive a Nicholson Star Award.  We will also honor anyone with perfect attendance. More information will follow soon with the time and date.

Our language arts activities will be integrated into science as we learn about ocean animals.  Our writing will be informational and some creative writing through sticker stories. We are continuing to practice our sight words.  We are also focusing on beginning, middle and end of stories we read.

In math, we will continue with addition and subtraction and continue working on problem solving. They are doing a wonderful job in math and everyone seems to understand the concepts. Be sure to watch the plus or minus sign on homework sheets.

Thank you all for all you do and for your support.  Have a great week!

April 21st

I would like to extend a special thank you to all the parents and grandparents who helped chaperone the Cagle Dairy Farm field trip.  I would not have been able to do it without your help.  We had a beautiful day and learned a lot about a working farm.  We will continue talking about farm animals this week in many of our literacy activities. 

Our writing focus is simple directions. They are doing a great job writing a direction using first, next, then and last.  We will work on this one more week and then finish out the year focusing on creative writing using all of the 6 traits of writing that we have learned.

In math we are beginning subtraction.  We will focus on this for three weeks and then practice some mixed addition and subtraction problems.  We will also continue doing problem solving.  They are doing an amazing job with this.  They can explain and show  how they got their answer. 

As I look ahead to the May calendar, our time is quickly running out.  Some important dates to remember are:

May 2nd - last day to check-out books

May 9th all library books are due

May 16th Field Day

There are a few more special event days at the end of May. I will get those dates to you as soon as they are finalized.

Have a great week!  Thanks again fopr all you do to support us!

Laura Hall

 

HAPPY SPRING!

Dear Parents,

Happy Spring to all!  Our egg hunt last week was wonderful!  Thank you for sending in all the filled eggs to make our hunt possible. The children had a great time.  A special thanks to all the treats sent in last week by parents for St. Patricks day and the egg hunt.

As we begin the third nine weeks of the school year, we are studying the letter Ww.  Our sight words are: will, with, and went.  Continue to practice take home reading and sight words also practice sounding out simple short voweled words, for example: m/a/p. Our writing focus for the fourth nine weeks is simple directions.  We will continue to focus on the 6+1 traits as we incorporate them into our writing.

In Math, we are beginning combining sets (addition).  We will do lots of hands -on activities as well as some worksheets.  We  will also focus on problem solving.  Children will be expected to show their work and explain how they solved the problem.

In Science, we have studied living and non-living things.  We learned about rocks and soil.  Now we are beginning plants.  We will plant sunflowers seeds to watch how a plant grows. We will learn how to take of a plant and why plants are important to the earth.  We will integrate our writing lessons of simple directions with some of our science activities.

Some important reminders:  Our report cards went home last week.  Please sign the card and return the card and envelope as soon as possible.  Our field trip to Cagle Dairy Farm is  April 18th.  Please return all permission slips and money by next Monday. 

Have a great week!

Laura Hall 

February 25th/March is coming!

It's hard to believe it is the end of February.  We are focusing on the letter Qq and the sight words "said" and "did."  In our centers we are making a class ABC quilt and writing a book about questions.  We are listening to Dr. Seuss stories to get ready for next week's Read Across America.  It kicks off with Dr. Seuss' birthday on Monday, March 3rd. We will enjoy a mystery reader and some special readers reading Dr. Seuss books during lunch.  We will have a book fair all week in the library and a special "Reading Roadtrip" Thursday night. It will be a fun but busy week!

In Math, we are continuing to work on money.  Please  practice identifying coins and their value and making fair trades.  Play store with your child and have them give you the correct amount of money to buy an item  under 20 cents.

In Social Studies, we are finishing Presidents. In Health, we will be talking about the importance of dental health care. Next week we will begin livng and non-living things.

Be looking for the March monthly homework calendar, which will be sent at the end of the week.  Have a great week!

"Vv" Week

First, I'd like to thank you all for my 1/2 birthday celebration.  What a nice surprise!  I especially want to thqnk our room moms, Marsha and Missy for all their hard work of putting it all together.  The book of children's pictures with their drawings and notes is absolutely precious!  Please stop by anytime to see it.  Also thank you for the gift certificate for a relaxing manicure and some delicious oatmeal raisin cookies.  It is all very much appreciated.

This week we are studying the letter "Vv".  Many of our center activities will reinforce the letter and sound.  We also will celebrate Valentine's Day on Thursday.  Please send in finished valentines and box Thursday morning.  Our first activity after calendar will be exchanging valentines.  To finish out Vv week, we will have a "Vegetable Visitor" day on Friday.  Be creative and have fun making it.  We will write about our visitors on that day.

In Math, we will formally do a unit on money.  Our standard states that each child will identify penny, nickel, dime and quarter and state its value.  The child will also be able to do a fair trade of 5 pennies for a nickel and 10 pennies for a dime.

In Social Studies, we are finishing up our unit on community helpers.  Our firemen have rescheduled their visit for Friday, Feb. 15th.  We also will be talking about President's day and patriotic symbols.  We will focus on George Washington and Abe Lincoln.

Don't forget next week students have Monday and Tuesday off from school.  When we come back on Wednesday it will be letter review week.  All other units will continue into next week. 

It definately will be a busy but fun week!

Laura Hall

January 28th

It was a pleasure talking to everyone during conference week.  It's hard to believe we are starting the 3rd quarter of school already.  Time flies when you're having fun!

Our letter for this week is "Jj".  We are focusing our literacy center activities aound the book "The Jacket I Wear in the Snow". Our literature and writing activities are tied into our winter season theme. Our new sight words to practice are:  just, are. 

In Math, we are continuing to work on numbers.  The standard states: each child will be able to count objects up to 30, produce models for number words zero through ten, and write numerals through 20 to label sets.  Also at calendar time, we focus on ordinal numbers (1st-10th) and money.  Be sure to practice identifying penny, nickel, dime and quarter.  Also practice naming their value and doing fair trades. (5 pennies for a nickel)

In Social Studies, we will begin talking about  our community.  We will locate on a map our state and city.  We will also talk about community helpers and the services they provide.  Friday we have a fireman coming in to tell us about his role in the communty and to talk about fire safety.

At the end of the week be looking for the new February calendar.  Also some information about valentine boxes to make and valentines to address to classmates.  I hope you have a great week.

                                                                Laura Hall

January

It was good to be back last week and see so many smiling faces!  We worked on the letter Gg last week along with the words:  good,get and six.  This week we are working on the letter Ii.  We will talk about the long and short sound the vowel makes.  Our sight word focus will be you, big, and this.  We are talking about the trait of "word choice" in our writing. We are reading books about winter and snowmen and looking at ways authors use word choice in their stories. 

In math, we are beginning the teen numbers.  Your child is expected to write the numbers correctly and count sets up to twenty and label correctly.  We will also focus on the number words six, seven, eight, nine and ten.  During our calendar time we will continue to work on money.  Your child has to identify and know the value of a penny, nickel, and dime.  We also practice "fair trades".  (Five pennies for a nickel and 10 pennies for a dime)

Our social studies and science themes are tied into our literature about the seasons and weather.  We are also comparing day and night.

I am looking forward to talking to everyone at conference time.  If you have not returned the sheet, please do so as soon as possible.

Have a great week!

Laura Hall

December 19th

        I want to thank all the parents and grandparents who helped chaperone the field trip.  Your help was very much appreciated.  We could not have done it without you.

We have started “Celebrations Around the World” this week.  We visited

England

and learned the tradition of sending Christmas cards was first started in

England

.  The children enjoyed making their own special card to give to someone.  Then we went to

Sweden

and made crowns to celebrate the Festival of Lights.   Yesterday we visited

Israel

and learned about Hannukah.  We will finish the week out with visits to

Mexico

and

China

.

        In language arts we are reviewing letters, sounds and sight words.  In math we are finishing a unit on shapes.  The children are expected to know circles, triangles, squares, and rectangles.  Also they must know the solid figures:  spheres and cubes.

          Friday is a school-wide pajama day.  Pay $1.00 (for relay for life) and you can wear p.j.’s. 

        We do go outside on cold days. Please make sure your child is dressed for the weather.

        The January calendar will go home when we return.  We will study the letter Gg .  Please send in pictures that begin with the Gg sound on Tuesday Jan 8^th.  Also we will have a “goggle day” on Friday Jan.11^th.  I am sending the pattern home now.  You can trace this onto tagboard and decorate them over the winter break.  You may adjust them to fit your child.

        The report card will not go out on Jan 11^th.  You will be given the report card at conference time.

        I hope you all have a relaxing and safe holiday season.  Happy New year to you all!

                                                                                                                                                        Laura Hall