April 23, 2010

Upcoming Dates
* TODAY, April 23rd: Eaton International Night from 4:30-7:30pm
Come join the Eaton community tonight and see different performances, taste different food, and learn about different cultures!

* Thursday, April 29th: All Kinders attend AM Session 9:00am-12:20pm! NO DAILY FOLDES, SNACKS, OR BACKPACKS (unless you need something for an after school class)
Field Trip to the Montgomery Theater to watch a play called, “Once on This Island” by the Children’s Musical Theater of San Jose.
Permission slips are in today’s Friday Folder. Please return the permission slip on Monday! We will also need 1 or 2 chaperones. Please let me know by Monday if you are interested in attending. It is really important you are ON TIME to school because we will be leaving right away. Also, there is a small chance we may return after 12:20pm. Please be aware that we might be late depending on the play performance length. Thank you!

* Sunday, May 2nd: May Scholastic Book Orders Due (attached to this week’s newsletter)
Please try to order your books online. Our class earns free books with online purchases. Thank you!
1. Go to: www.scholastic.com/bookclubs
2. Class User Name: Beebear
3. Password: MrsYu (no spaces or periods)
4. Browse books and place order using your credit card (no need to send money to school)
5. About 2 weeks after I receive all the orders, your books will be delivered to school!
If you prefer not to order online, you can return the order form directly to me with ONE check payable to Scholastic Book Clubs. Please hand it to me by Friday, April 30th.

_____

Dear Families,

Welcome back to school! I hope all of you had a nice spring vacation whether you stayed at home or traveled somewhere. I didn’t go anywhere, but it was nice to have a week off! I spent two days in the classroom, went to Half Moon Bay and Berkeley to celebrate my sister’s birthday, took a 6-hour yoga workshop, and got my side yard paved. It was a productive vacation for me!

Here are some highlights for the week:
• Star of the Week: Keona
(On our website under “Curriculum” and “Star of the Week.”)

• Letter of the Week: W
(You can see our computer center drawings in the “Classwork” section of our website.)

• Story of the Week: Curious George Plants a Tree

• Language Arts: In our journals this week, we had to write at least two sentences about our vacation. I wanted students to try and write their two sentences without using the word “and.” Also, I had them practice how to determine whether their sentence is a run-on sentence, and if so, they had to figure out where to add periods and capitals to break up their sentences. Later in the week, we learned a song called, “The Twelve Days of Spring.” It is to the same tune as “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” but the words are changed to talk about different vegetables, plants, and fruits, that are being planted by a family. We illustrated this song by making a book in class.

• Math: We started our final chapter in our Kindergarten math books. This chapter is starting with solid shapes. We had to identify plane shapes, such as squares, circles, rectangles, and triangles. Then we learned solid shapes, such as cubes, pyramids, cones, rectangular prisms, and spheres. Practice finding these shapes in everyday objects around your house. Students need to be able to identify these plane and solid shapes independently. Continue skip-counting and estimating 10, 20, and 30.

• Computer Lab: We are starting a long term project in the computer lab using Powerpoint and Kidpix illustrations. We are writing and illustrating an adapted story of “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” using our own personal details. This week we focused on typing the words for our personalized stories. These books will hopefully be completed by Open House for you to read!

• Science: This week, we received our silkworms! They hatched from their eggs, and were very small earlier in the week. I have been giving them fresh mulberry leaves each day and they have already grown so fast! The students are observing their growth each week and learning about how they change.

• Social Studies: On Thursday, it was Earth Day. We learned our Earth Day poem this week, and we also talked about the 3 R’s: reduce, reuse, recycle. We talked about what each of these words mean, and how each one of us can help the environment. We made a book to write down different ways we will help the Earth.

• Assembly: This week, we watched the First Grade Musical in the MP room. They performed many songs and even had a few dance numbers to show us. They had cute costumes as well!

• Buddies: On Tuesday, our fourth grade buddies came to our classroom. We worked on a project where we had to write and draw 5 things we love, then we had to find 5 other things that our buddy also loves. We practice communicating, sharing, and working together with our big buddies.

• Music: We saw Ms. Disney on Thursday. We learned a new song about fishes in the ocean and we pretended to be little plants and fish using colorful scarves. Then we sang some of our old songs such as Old Mother Hubbard, Doggie Where is Your Bone? and Bow Wow Wow, our partner dancing song!

Today, I had to attend a workshop at the District because I am a mentor for beginning teachers. I hope the children had a great day. For those of you that can, I hope you are able to attend the International Festival this afternoon and evening. Thanks to all of you who have been helping out! One more sad announcement is that Catherine and her family are leaving our class and today was her last day with us! This was unexpected news for us. She will return next year in First Grade, but she will not be back for the rest of Kindergarten. Goodbye!!!