Week 21:
Welcome back! I hope everyone had a relaxing and restful vacation. It was just incredible to see the students again this week. I couldn't believe how much taller everyone looked. I'd like to say I am extremely impressed with how well the students fell back into the rhythm of the class, and how little they forgot. I was planning on doing more review this week, but was pleasantly surprised I didn't need to.

I'm very eager to start my next round of art classes after school with the students. This session we will be covering the world of making artist books- one of my favorite things to do.

Thanks to those who have been selling the magnets. Please remember to bring in your photos for the pen pals in Indian.

Things to work on:
We've been talking about tenses in English. We covered future continuous and simple and are moving into the present, and past in the weeks to come. We'll be studying rocks and minerals in science and after a little more review  this week we'll be jumping into telling time next week.

Week 17:

There was one thing on the student's mind this week and one thing only, and I refer to that thing as the the 5 letter S word. Well, before we could even say his name, guess who appeared at Rockaway Gardens? The man himself....

Our trip to Rockaway Gardens this week was absolutely fantastic. The students learned about getting change at the register (thank you to the staff for not charging us tax...totally forgot to teach that), we learned about all the different evergreens typically used for Christmas Trees, how to find out how old a tree is, and how the seeds are harvested from pine cones. Santa was simply a HUGE added bonus. 

To add to the excitement, our Pen Pal letters arrived from India this week, so PLEASE remember to bring in a picture of your child so we can send that overseas as soon as possible. 

Things to work on at home:

We've been learning how to identify verbs, and the future tense of verbs. We'll continue to work on that this week. In math we've been learning about the greater than or less than signs, and we will continue to review that this week. We also have been talking about gravity, which will segue into a conversation about the solar system and the moon. 

Week 15

Week 16: Dec. 2

Welcome back to school. We had no problem getting back into the swing of things this week. I was really impressed with how well the students adjusted to the change. For the first time the weather finally agreed with us and we were able to have our first Beach Day. We also had the school's first magical Lantern walk, and our first Closing Ceremony.

Things to work on this week:
We really only have one more full week of school left until the break. We've been working on identifying if something is living or non-living, measuring, creating bar graphs, and identifying verbs. This week will be a lot of review, with a little more information: we'll be talking about tenses of verbs, more detailed measurements (getting to the half inch). I've noticed the students are getting a little rusty with their addition and subtraction. We've moved away from that, and I will be reinforcing it in the classroom. If you could continue to ask your child addition and subtraction problems that would be very helpful.

Week 14: November 18

Our class worked hard to fill our compliment jar and we celebrated all our hard work by making cookies this past Friday. A humongous thank you to Mrs. Silverman, who not only got the supplies for the cookies, but also organized everything for our class.

Week 13: Nov 11

Even though it was a short week we started and ended with a bang! Mrs. Peters brought the baby chicks home over the weekend, and on Monday (right at the 21 days) she was blessed with 21 little fluff balls. The children were absolutely ecstatic to see the baby chicks.

On Friday we had a visit from a local Recycling Company. They talked to the students about Recycling Day, and how important it is to recycle. Fortunately, our students already know the importance of recycling. 

Things to work on at home: We're working on bar graphs and collecting data in class this week. Talk to your child about how to conduct a survey. We're also working on sorting for science, which is a great opportunity for you to get cabinets and drawers organized. 

Week 12:
We had a very exciting and windy week! May I begin with a special thanks to Emilia's parents, Mr and Mrs. Thorpe. We had some VERY special visitors on Thursday. The whole school came to see them.

In honor of all this fall wind we build kites. This week we learned about R controlled vowels, we wrote letters to honor our Veterans, we prepared for the last day we would see the baby chick eggs (they are supposed to hatch today, we build obstacle courses and learned to count by tens.

Things to review at home:
Please continue reading with your child. Encourage them to write letters to family members and friends. Also, please do not correct the child's spelling, remember that their love of writing is the most important. If your child is struggling with the spelling help them sound out the word. In math have your child count to you by ten. We're also working on double digit math equations- subtraction and addition. The kids love to do practice problems!

Here the class is making their lovely magical egg paintings!

Week 11: Oct. 28

Another week full of surprises and action. In addition to our amazing trip out to Navera Farms (please send me an email with any photos of that), we also had Halloween. I'd say Halloween might have trumped everything this week. Somehow every conversation revolved around Halloween and costumes. Our class was so excited to share their experiences and tell Halloween jokes.

We made pumpkin poms and beeswax candles this week. The students were so proud of their autumnal creations.

In preparation for the St. Martin festival we created some lovely watercolor paintings.