December 5, 2008

Upcoming Dates

Monday, December 8th: Elves and the Shoemaker Field Trip
Thank you to Mrs. Kung for coming with us on this field trip. We will be leaving school at 10:30am and will be back by lunchtime at 12:30pm.

Friday, December 12th: Canned Food Drive
Please try to donate at least one can of food for the Second Harvest Food Bank fundraiser we are having at Eaton school. Please bring it in a bag labeled with your child’s name.

Friday, December 12th: Cupertino Library Field Trip
We will be walking to the library after lunch. Please remember to bring your child’s blue library card on that day and memorize the 4-digit PIN number. We will be checking out 2 books and please return them on your own.

Monday, December 15th: Natural Bridges Butterfly Field Trip
Thank you to Mrs. Ogata, Mrs. Rueth, Mrs. Sakanaka, and Mrs. Yoon for coming with us on this field trip. We will be going to Santa Cruz to see the natural butterfly habitat. This will be an all day field trip, so you will need to send a BAG lunch with your child’s name on it and make sure to dress in layers!

Monday, December 15th to Friday, December 19th: No Spelling/Vocabulary
There will be no tests this week. However, please continue to prepare your child’s sharing, complete the homework packet, and read daily for 15 minutes for the Book-It! Reading Log. Remember the reading logs are due when we come back after Winter Recess. *** Friday parent volunteers: You do not need to come help on Friday, December 19th. Thank you!***

Friday, December 19th: Polar Express Day – Pajamas Everyone!
This will be a special day to celebrate the holidays! We will be doing activities and games based off of the story, The Polar Express, by Chris Van Allsburg. It will also be a pajama day (because we are pretending to be the children in the train)! Please send your child to school in their favorite pajamas and they can also bring one stuffed animal or pillow too.

Monday, December 22nd to January 2nd: NO SCHOOL – Winter Recess
School will resume on Monday, January 5th. Have safe travels and a wonderful holiday!

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Dear Families,

Welcome back from our long weekend! I hope you had a nice vacation with family and friends. I stayed in the area and spent time with my parents and family. I also used the extra time to clean up my home and re-organize (no shopping for me!). Always so much to do! Today I am sending home the first trimester report card that reflects your child’s progress from the beginning of the school year to November 21st. Remember that your child does not get grades on the first page (Language Arts) because they get a separate ELD report card (page 4 and 5) instead for Listening/Speaking, Reading, and Writing. In order to exit ELD, your child must be in at least Level 4 in all three Language Arts categories at the end of first grade. Please let me know if you have any questions.

Here are some highlights for the week:

• Language Arts:
Star of the Week: Fuka
Poem of the Week: I Heard a Bird Sing
Song of the Week: Skip Counting
Kindness is: giving a praise note to someone.
Word Wall Words: all, call, eat, every, first, never, paper, shall,why
Story of the Week: Snowballs, Mr. C’s Dinner
Word Families: -ip, -in
Sounds: verb endings –s, -ed, -ing, short I, possessives with ‘s
Strategy and Skill Focus: Predict/Infer, Making Predictions
Grammar: Naming Part of a Sentence

• Writing: This week we talked about writing letters to others. We reviewed the parts of a letter (date, greeting, body, salutation, name) and wrote a letter to Santa. You can read these letters in the “Classwork” section of our website, under “Dear Santa…”

• Math: This week we worked on estimating. This was a hard concept for some students because they wanted to get the exact number instead. We worked on counting only up to 10 and then guessing how many more groups of 10 remained. Keep working! We reviewed vocabulary words such as: greater, more, less, etc. and practiced more place value.

• Social Studies: Before Thanksgiving, we went to Mrs. Bachelor’s class for circuits and learned about Hanukkah. We made menorahs and began decorating our classroom with holidays from around the world. Also, we learned about Holland and how children put wooden shoes in their windows for Sinterklaas’ white horse. On Tuesday, we went to Mrs. Zankich’s class for circuits and learned about Ireland. We made a project that showed how people in Ireland put candles in the windows during the holidays.

• Computer Lab: This week we worked on another Kidspiration diagram that showed the months and seasons of the year. We chose different symbols for each month and season and personalized our pictures.

If you haven’t already, remember to turn in your November Book-It reading logs. They are always due after the end of the month. Fuka is our first Star of the Week! We choose a new Star each Monday. If you are chosen, you have until Friday of the same week to complete your poster. Please be ready to share it to the class on Friday, and then you get to take Beebear home for the weekend! Remember to write in Beebear’s Journal and return on Monday. Have fun!