First full week!

Upcoming Dates

* Sunday, September 16th: Cupertino Jubilee Chicken Dance @ 1:00pm
I look forward to seeing some of you on Sunday! Please arrive at 12:45pm so your child won’t miss our performance time! Remember to wear your chicken hats!

* Friday, September 21st: Picture Day
Picture envelopes will be sent home the day before (Thursday, September 20th)

* Monday, September 24th: Happy Hollow Field Trip
If you have not returned the blue permission slip, please do so by Monday! Thank you to Mrs. Shindler, Mrs. Aloni, and Mrs. Okawaki, who have volunteered to chaperone. We still need one more parent, so please contact me if you are available (you do not have to drive!)

* Friday, September 28th: NO SCHOOL – Staff Learning Day
The teachers will receive training on our new Social Studies textbooks and curriculum.

* Thursday, October 4th: Cupertino Library Visit
We will be walking to the Cupertino Library after lunch. Please send your child’s blue library card to school in the morning. Review the 4-digit PIN number with your child so they can check out books. Students who do not currently have a library card will be receiving a new one on this day. Their PIN number is the last 4 digits of your home phone number.

* Friday, October 5th: Lawrence Hall of Science Assembly 9:45-10:35am
We still need two parents to volunteer at this assembly for all the first graders. You will be helping the students with various science experiments and projects. Please email me or send a note if you can help! You will need to arrive at 9:25am and will leave around 10:50am.

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Dear Families,

Our first week of homework and sharing went very well! Also, today’s Friday Folder will have the sharing evaluation form, so you can see which areas your child can work on. Please remember to practice at home and eventually try to have them memorize all the words and sentences. Great start!

We have enough volunteers now! Thank you to Mrs. Shaaban, Mrs. Okubo, Mrs. Maruta, and Mrs. Lee for offering to volunteer on Friday afternoons, and Mrs. Okawaki, Mrs. Chang (David), and Mrs. Chang (Brian) for volunteering during computer lab on Monday afternoons! We are lucky to have supportive families!

Here are some highlights from the week:
Poem of the Week: A Circle of Friends
Song of the Week: Eaton Song
Kindness is … saying thank you when somebody helps me
Story of the Week: Lunch
Vocabulary of the Week: School Words 2
Next Week’s Sharing: Fall Poem (remember 4 lines memorized)

• Reading & Writing: We worked on our dictionary letters up to M this week. We also read Diary of a Worm and started our Weekend News journals. Please remember to review the weekend events with your child every Sunday night or Monday morning so that they have ideas to write about during journal time. Also, we continued Prince and Princess writing this week.

• Library: Remember to bring the Eaton library books back to school on Friday so your child can check out a new book! We go every Friday and Mrs. Glass reads to us!

• Assembly: We had a performance today called “Asheba” about exploring music and culture of the Carribean! It was great!

• Language Arts: We started our literacy centers this week. You will see this packet (with a green cover sheet) almost every week in the Friday Folder. Your child receives 0, 1, 2, or 3 stars each week for finishing all the activities in centers. This is a growing process. Your child may only receive 1 or 2 stars in the beginning of the year, but I hope by the end of the year, they will receive 3 stars in all categories. I have included our literacy center rubric (how I evaluate work) in this newsletter so you can see how to work with your children on improving their scores. The most difficult center is usually the listening center. This week, we did the listening center together so the students understood how to write five sentences.

The five sentences in listening center include:
o This story was about _______. (Who is the character?)
o In the beginning, _________. (Where or what’s happening?)
o In the middle, ___________. (What is the problem?)
o In the end, ______________. (What is the solution?)
o This story was ___________. (Conclusion - Did you think the story was funny, silly, great, sad, happy?)

• Math: We have finished Chapter 1! Students took the chapter test on Thursday and EVERYONE did well!!! GREAT JOB! Now we are looking at Chapter 2, which is on subtraction facts. We are completing the math word problems in our workbooks together for extra practice!

• Computer Lab: We explored KidPix this week by drawing pictures using the different tools: pencils, markers, stamps, paint bucket, etc.

• Art: We had our first visit with the art teacher, Mrs. Blakeslee this week! She taught us about our primary colors and abstract art. This is a note from her:
The first art activity for the primary grades will focus on primary colors and lines. Abstract art will be discussed and the students will learn about tempera paint as a medium, and practice handling a brush. The artist focus will be on Wassily Kandinsky, a Russian abstract artist born in 1866. He was influenced by Eastern philosophies and brought great spirituality to his art. He taught at the famous Bauhaus School in Germany prior to WWII, was an author, and his influence on modern painting and sculpture was immeasurable. Students will spend no more than 3 sessions to complete a Kandinsky-like abstract painting.

• Science: Yikes! We started our first unit on Insects! We said hello to our new classroom pets… our mealworms! We are learning to observe them and take notes about what we see. We also will be studying butterflies this trimester.

• Social Studies: Thank you to Mrs. Aloni and Mrs. Shindler, who came in on Tuesday afternoon to teach us about the Jewish New Year! Shana Tova!

• Super Stars: Unfortunately, we had a lot of YELLOW super stars this week. Please remember to talk to your child about following school and classroom rules. We need to try our best everyday!

Have a great weekend! See you on Sunday at the Chicken Dance!

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Literacy Centers Rubric

Listening Center

3 stars= colored picture AND 5 great sentences
2 stars= picture and/or 2-4 sentences OR no picture and 5 or more sentences
1 star = no picture and/or 1 sentence or less OR picture and no sentences
0 = no picture or words

Poetry Center

3 stars = 5 or less mistakes (handwriting)
2 stars = more than 5 mistakes (handwriting)
1 star = skipped 1-2 lines or very messy overall
0 = not finished 5 or more lines

Spelling Center

3 stars= ABC and spelling correct, more than 3 sentences
2 stars= ABC or spelling mistakes, OR less than 3 sentences on the back
1 star = ABC or spelling mistakes, and incomplete in Column 3 or no sentences
0 = Column 2 & 3 not finished

Vocabulary Center

3 stars = No mistakes on vocabulary worksheet, Scholastic News and Dictionary words done
2 stars = spelling/handwriting mistakes on vocabulary sheet OR dictionary or Scholastic News not done
1 star = missing 1-2 words in vocab, OR did not do Scholastic News and Dictionary
0 = not finished 8 or more words and did not do Scholastic News/Dictionary

Computer Center

3 stars = Typed 2 sentences in the kindness website with few mistakes.
2 stars = Typed 1 sentence in the kindness website or 2 sentences with many mistakes.
1 star = Typed a few words in the kindness website.
0 = Did not type any words in the kindness website.