Shalom - Week 7 - October 8-11

Shalom and welcome. What a great time I had meeting with you at our recent Parent/Teacher conference. I hope you found the time we spent together informative and helpful. As I have mentioned before, it is such a pleasure coming to school each day and working with such an enthusiastic group of learners. Please keep exposing your child to good literature and have them read each day, as well as, practice addition and subtraction facts, telling the time, totaling coins, and practice weekly spelling and vocabulary words. Your partnership in educating your child is so important and I appreciate all your support.

This week is a four day school week for the students, so the students will have their spelling and vocabulary quiz on Thursday. Each child has their own set of high frequency words to practice. You will find these on the back of this week's homework log.

The Halloween Parade/Fall Festival will take place on Wednesday, October 31st. Fall Festival forms will be coming home this week. The parade will begin at 8:30 and be followed by Fall Festival.

Session 2 After School Programs and Athletics/Intramurals will begin the week of October 29.

Picture re-take day will take place on Tuesday, October 23. Students must return their photo package to have a re-take. Students who were absent on Picture Day need to have their picture taken.

Current Events - This week, Claire, Matthew, Noah, Stella DeFrain, Nicolas and Rose get to present. Please refer to the Current Events sharing calendar in your child's Take Home Folder.

Library day is Tuesday, and it is terrific that most students are remembering to return their library books on this day.

Picture Lady/Gentleman will begin this Tuesday, October 9th and the students and I can't wait to find out what artist will be presented to us.

Here are some themes/concepts covered in class this week. If you have any questions, please feel free to email me at any time. Have a wonderful week.

Literacy
* Spelling - High frequency words (see your child's Homework Log for their individualized list)
* Stories of the Week - The Great Kapok Tree by Lynne Cherry; Christopher Columbus by Barbara deRubertis
* Vocabulary - ancestor, smoldering, ruin (n) and creatures (definitions are on the back of the Homework Log) -  students should practice reading and learning the meanings of these words
* Reading Workshop - Readers figure our tricky words by using all they know; Readers figure out the meaning of unfamiliar words by rereading tricky words and phrases aloud; Readers can retell stories across their fingers using transition words such as first, then, next, after that, and finally
* Grammar - A sentences ia a group of words that tells a complete thought.
* Writing Workshop - Editing and publish a small moment narrative
* Handwriting - Capital partners (c, o, s, v, w); letter t and magic c Bunny (change c to a)

Mathematics - Unit 2
* Subtraction from addition
* Fact families (up to and including 10)
* Exploring weights, scales and equal groups
* Review the concepts that a number can be named in many ways

Social Studies - North America
* Finish and share postcards from a famous North American Landmark

Science - Changes - Lesson 4 - Mixing and Separating Solids
Students will use two solids - kosher salt and gravel - to create and investigate a mixture

Have a wonderful week and enjoy your three day weekend together -

Ms. O'Mullane