A Post of Many Thanks~

I want to start off this post by sending a sincere thank you to all of my parents.  Thank you all for taking the time to work with your child every night on homework.  Thank you for asking them about their day and cleaning out their folders.  Thank you for being involved in their lives and letting them know they are the greatest thing in the world (because they are)!  I know that being a working parent is hard work, especially when you have other children you are caring for at home.  I realized something this week, that I’ve never really thought a lot about.  Homework takes time and being a parent is hard work!!!  For those of you that don’t know, my oldest daughter is in Kindergarten this year.  She doesn’t really have homework, but I read to her and have her read to me nightly.  We work on the sight words and talk about her day.  We go over the math pages that come home nightly.  Wheww!!!  That makes me tired just thinking about it.  I know being a parent of a school aged child can be difficult, so thank you from the bottom of my heart, for being there for your child.   I appreciate you!!!!!!! 

Another thank you is in order as well.  Scholastic book orders went home yesterday.  Thank you, thank you, thank you to all of the parents that ordered.  Our class was able to get more books for our listening center thanks to your orders.  In addition, each student in the class got a coupon for a FREE book from months book order.  Hold on to those certificates and use them next month when I send the next flyer home.   Also a huge thank you to those parents that donated candy to our classroom.  We use the candy for our Great Leaps fluency program and for students that clip up on the behavior chart.  The students were very pleased (to say the least) when they noticed the donations.

This week we have been reviewing our reading strategies:  check for understanding, back up and reread, and making predictions.  The students were also introduced to Quincy the Questioner.  Next week we will be learning how to ask questions while we read nonfiction texts. 

Our Pinto time rotations will begin this week.  Pinto time is a thirty-minute time block where the students in first grade will switch classes.  Students in our grade level will get a variety of instruction based on their academic needs during this time block.  The pinto time teachers for our grade level include:  myself (Mrs. Hogan), Mrs. Hendrickson, Mrs. Hees, Mrs. Morrow, Miss Phillips, Mrs. Dusenberg, Mrs. Dicus, and Mrs. Friedrich.

We finished our science unit on living and nonliving things this week.  The students created posters at the end of the unit to display their learning .  They used magazines to find pictures of living and nonliving things.  They were required to include five living things and five nonliving things.  Our next unit will focus on plants and animals and what they need to survive.  We will starting an experiment with bean seeds.  The students will record their observations in a journal and we will discuss our learning in class.  They are very excited about becoming real scientists. 

This coming week we will be learning about the constitution.  We will also learn about the American flag and The Pledge of Allegiance.  At the end of the week, we will recreate the flag in cookie format!  This is always a fun activity.  Please contact me by email (susan.hogan@californiak12.org) if you would be willing to donate items for our cookies.  I’ll let you know what you can bring in to help us out.

With the weather changing and getting cooler, please do not forget to send your child to school with a jacket.  Our morning recess can be quite chilly sometimes.  Please check the weather every morning.

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