Dear Parents,
Happy New Year! We hope you all had a wonderful vacation & are rested and ready to get back into the swing of things!
First of all, I wanted to thank everyone for all the help I received with the Nutcracker performance. From making the paper pieces of the costumes at the paper party, to applying the make-up and helping them get dressed, to photographers-- every job was covered! The kids did a wonderful job and they all looked so cute! We had a great cast party afterward, thanks especially to our room moms for coordinating. A huge thanks to Anna Rubilcava for updating our Ribbon Candy tutus by making those beautiful red & white candy cane tutus. Finally, a huge thanks to everyone for their generosity and thoughtfulness with all the wonderful gifts I received. I have been so touched by how giving this class is, and I appreciate it so much.
We have a pretty academic month ahead of us with no breaks other than the observation of Martin Luther King's Birthday on the weekend of the 17th-20th.
We will start right in with a new letter-- Pp-- and a new word-- and. The Alphafriend's name is Pippa Pig. We will have centers all this month. Art projects will revolve around the theme of weather, especially snow! We will conclude our math topic on addition, and then begin the topic of subtraction. Again, plenty of at-home reinforcement is appreciated on this topic, as it can be quite difficult.
Our sharing this week is toy in a bag to give the children a chance to show off all those favorite holiday gifts!
Now that we are coming up on our half-year mark (the 90th day of school out of 180 days is in the upcoming week), we do need to refresh a few of our supplies. Especially needed are glue sticks and baby wipes. If you can donate either, we'd appreciate it.
Blue bags will go home on Wednesday, of course. Remember that from now on, the blue bags will contain a "book report" component. Very specific directions about our expectations with the book report will be in your child's homework folder this week. Please leave it there for your continued reference. Basically, your child will use the journal page attached to the homework packet to respond to the book that's in the blue bag. Children need to write at least one sentence about the book-- what they liked/didn't like, who their favorite character was, etc. We DO NOT want children to copy a sentence from the book or copy a sentence that you have written for them. This is their chance for developing writing skills, which will help their confidence when we take our first writing assessment in February. A sentence written: "I like the fune got" for "I like the funny goat." is great and is what is expected from them at this time. If you would like to go over spelling with them once they are done, you can pencil it in underneath their words and show them what the conventional spelling looks like. However, do not make them correct their writing at this time. We want to encourage them in their thinking before we start focusing on the mechanics.
Enjoy your final days of vacation, and I look forward to seeing your children on Monday!
Upcoming Events:
12/21-1/5: Winter Break
1/17: No School: Staff Development Day
1/20: No School: MLK B'day
1/29: January's Wacky Wednesday
2/15-2/23: President's Week Vacation
2/26: February's Wacky Wednesday
