Newsletter Updates for the Week of December 16th

DATES TO REMEMBER:

-Wednesday, December 18th—Library

-Thursday, December 19th—Christmas Party

-Friday, December 20th—Pajama Day for Kindergartners, Sing-a-long, & Movie

-Monday, January 6th—School Resumes

CHRISTMAS GIFT EXCHANGE: 

For our class Christmas party we are planning to have a gift exchange.  We are asking that girls bring a gift for a girl and boys bring a gift for a boy.  Please select a gift that is between $3.50-$4.00, and send it to school wrapped and labeled with who it is FROM.  If this presents a financial burden for your family, please be sure to contact me in confidence and we will work it out.  Our party will be held Thursday, December 19th beginning at 1:00.  Parent volunteers should plan to arrive by 12:30.  Our Christmas tree is up and ready, so you may send in the gifts for the gift exchange anytime on or before Thursday. :)

PAJAMA DAY:  

This Friday we will celebrate our last day before break in our pajamas.  Students are welcome to wear their pajamas and slippers in the classroom.  We will still be going outside for recess, so please be sure to send along boots and snow pants.

JUST A FEW REMINDERS:  

**We will visit the library this Wednesday.  Please be sure to return your child’s library book on or before Wednesday so that they can check out a new book over break.

**I am attaching the January Snack Calendar; it is also updated on my Blog.

**Keep reading and filling out your Book-It Calendars.  I will be awarding December Certificates after break.  I am attaching the January Book-It Calendar so that you can also begin marking it over break.

READING:  

Our focus texts for this week is Listen Buddy which we will use to practice making predictions, drawing conclusions, and describing character traits.  Our focus letter for this week is Vv and our new sightword is me.  We will continue to work on rhyming, stretching out words as we read and write, and reading and writing our sightwords.  When we get back from break, it will be time to begin assessing the students’ growth for report cards.

WRITING: 

This week we will complete a couple of journals related to Christmas to wrap up our December Journals, so that we can bring them home to share.  We will also begin writing our very own pattern books about the things we see at Christmas time.

SCIENCE/SOCIAL STUDIES: 

This week the students will take a short assessment from our Science Unit on the 5 Senses.  They have really enjoyed exploring with their senses—the smelly jars, feely boxes, sound games, and taste tests have all been a hit!  They are also enjoying role-playing in the Bakery Shop during free choice time.  This week we will read several stories in      anticipation of Christmas!

MATH:  

This week we will practice counting by 10’s and work on creating and reading several different types of graphs.  On Wednesday, we will play several games to help us with counting, adding, and subtracting numbers.

Thank you for sharing your children with me each day; what a true blessing they are! I wish your family a very Merry Christmas filled with joy, hope, love, and laughter!                                 

                                                                    ~Sherry Brinks

Christmas Party Sign-Up

Christmas Party 24 Plates—Lily 24 Napkins—Cyle 24 Cups  - Lauren 1 container of Raspberry Sherbet—Akira 1 container of Raspberry Sherbet— 2 Liter Bottle of 7-Up—Miley 2 Liter Bottle of 7-Up—Wesley 24 candy canes—Grayson Finger Jell-O—Mrs. Brinks Snack Mix—Madelyn Cheese & Crackers—Akira Parent Volunteers—Thursday, December 19th—p.m. Brandi Shepardson Alexis Snoderly Tiara Valle

Newsletter Updates for the Week of December 9th

DATES TO REMEMBER:

-Monday, December 16th—Delayed Start & Elementary Christmas Concert—1st-4th

-Wednesday, December 18th—Library

-Thursday, December 19th—Christmas Party

-Friday, December 20th—Pajama Day for Kindergartners, Sing-a-long, & Movie

CHRISTMAS GIFT EXCHANGE: 

I know that many of you are beginning your Christmas shopping.  For our class Christmas party we are planning to have a gift exchange.  We are asking that girls bring a gift for a girl and boys bring a gift for a boy.  Please select a gift that is between $3.50-$4.00, and send it to school wrapped and labeled with who it is FROM.  If this presents a financial burden for your family, please be sure to contact me in confidence and we will work it out.  Our party will be held Thursday, December 19th in the afternoon.

WINTER CLOTHES:  

The students are doing a fantastic job of getting dressed and undressed quickly for recess!  PLEASE be sure to send EVERYTHING to outfit your child for recess.  Also, please be sure to pack shoes for the classroom; and of course . . LABEL everything please! :)

READING:  

Our focus texts for this week is Bunny Cakes which we will use to work on identifying cause and effect relationships.  Our focus letter for this week is Aa and our new sightwords are look & in.  Since our focus letter is a vowel, we will be using Chunky Monkey to help us read and write words with the at, an, ag, ap, & am chunks/word families.  Our new beanie baby this week is Peekin’ Poodle’; she ties together several of our accuracy strategies.  She will teach us a cheer to use when we come to a word that we don’t know: Check the picture, check the word, does it look right, does it sound right, keep TRYING!

WRITING:  

This week we will begin learning about pattern books and how they are written so that we can begin writing our own pattern books next week.  We will complete several journal pages this week related to Christmas and our 5 Senses.  We will continue to work on sounding out our words, writing the sounds we hear, and putting spaces between our words while writing.

SCIENCE/SOCIAL STUDIES: 

This week we will continue our Science Unit on the 5 Senses.  We will be using our sense of touch to identify objects and textures.  We will use our sense of hearing to distinguish sounds in our environment and later in the week, we will taste test some different foods and describe them.  We will also read several books related to families and begin discussing the Christmas traditions that our families have to celebrate the season.

MATH:  

This week we will work on adding and subtracting to ten.  We will also practice counting objects that total 11-20 and introduce counting by 10’s.  We will create a class graph of our favorite colors and analyze our bar graph together.

Our Feast

Parents,
Thank you for generously providing food and supplies for our Thanksgiving Activities on Monday and for our Stone Soup Feast on Wednesday.  Last week was busy, but it was a fun time of learning as well. Special thanks to my parent volunteers - Katy Hill, Alexis Snoderly, Jolene Bell, & Becky Brandal - we couldn't have done it ALL without you!

Here are a few pictures of the Pilgrim children at the feast!!!

Newsletter Updates for the Week of December 2nd

DATES TO REMEMBER:

-Friday, December 6th—Kid’s Night Out

-Monday, December 16th—Delayed Start

-Thursday, December 19th—Christmas Party

-Friday, December 20th—Pajama Day for Kindergartners, Sing-a-long, & Movie

STUDENT OF THE WEEK: 

Our student of the week is Avery Gilde.  Avery enjoys horseback riding, drawing, and playing softball.  Her favorite place to go is Putt-Putt Golfing and when she grows up, Avery aspires to become a baker and make lots of sweet treats!  Congratulations to Avery on being our Student of the Week!

CHRISTMAS GIFT EXCHANGE: 

I know that many of you are beginning your Christmas shopping.  For our class Christmas party we are planning to have a gift exchange.  We are asking that girls bring a gift for a girl and boys bring a gift for a boy.  Please select a gift that is between $3.50-$4.00, and send it to school wrapped and labeled with who it is FROM.  If this presents a financial burden for your family, please be sure to contact me in confidence and we will work it out.  Our party will be held Thursday, December 19th in the afternoon.

LIBRARY:  

Students will be bringing home their library books, this Wednesday, for the first time!  Please help your child find a safe place to keep their library book at home.  We have library every 2 weeks, but I have a tub in the classroom for students to put their books for safe keeping until our next visit to the  library.  Students must return their book in order to check out a new one.

READING:  

Our focus texts for this week is Cat’s Colors which we will use to work on identifying cause and effect.  Our focus letter for this week is Cc and our new sightwords are see & is.  We will also be working on identifying color words throughout the month of December, and will have many opportunities to read and write color words.  This week we will introduce a new beanie baby strategy for Accuracy—Chunky Monkey—he reminds us to look for chunks (word families) that we know when trying to sound out new words.

WRITING: 

This week we will edit our November Journals and bring them home to share.  We will be writing about our families this week; the people who live in our house, as well as relatives that we like to visit.  We will work on drawing details and describing them using our words.  The students will also work together to create a class book inspired by Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?

SCIENCE/SOCIAL STUDIES: 

This week we will be reading several books about families, since the Holidays are all about spending time with our families and caring for each other.  We will also begin our Science Unit on the 5 Senses.  We will be reading several books about the sense of sight and smell this week, as there are a lot of neat things to see and smell at Christmas time!

MATH:  

This week we will continue to practice identifying and ordering numbers on a number line.  We will introduce probability and discuss things that are impossible, possible, and certain to happen.

BRRR:  

Please be sure to send everything to outfit your child for recess—winter coat, snow pants, boots, hat, & mittens!  Also, please remember to pack shoes for the classroom:)

**Remember to return your November Book-it Calendars!

Busy Week

Hi everyone,
We have very busy week coming up!  We will wrap up the letter T this week, and wrap up our Thanksgiving Activities this week!

Monday morning we will be rotating between all of the Kindergarten Classrooms to do activities:
-Mrs. Brinks - Apple Turkey Snack
-Mrs. Green - Macaroni Necklaces
-Mrs. Freeland - Trading Post
-Ms. Thompson - Making Corn Bread & Butter
-Mrs. Nelson - Pilgrim Games

Several of you signed up to bring items that we need for Monday:

1 Bag of Red Apples (10-15) - Madelyn

1 Bag of Red Apples (10-15) - Akira

1 Bag of colored mini marshmallows—Deven

1 Bag of colored mini marshmallows—Wesley

1 Box of Toothpicks—Lily

1 Pkg of 24 small paper plates—Drew

1 Pint of Heavy Whipping Cream—Avery

1 Box of Jiffy Corn Bread Mix—Grayson

1 Box of Jiffy Corn Bread Mix—Canden

Mrs. Hill is coming in to help out in the morning. :)

Also, we need all of our veggies by Monday morning so that we can make fair trades at the Trading Post.

-1 Onion—Deven, Dylan, Avery, Canden, Akira, Carlee, & Cyle

-1 Bunch of Celery—Angie, Coleman, Grayson, Aubrie, Anna, & Lily

-1 Head of Cabbage—Madelyn, Drew, Ayla, Miley, Lauren, & Wesley

*****************************************************************

Tuesday we will be cutting up our veggies.  Mrs. Carpenter and Ms. Snoderly will be coming in to help us with this. :)

*****************************************************************

Wednesday we will be eating our soup in the afternoon.  Mrs. Cook is coming in the morning to help prepare the soup and Mrs. Valle is coming in to help serve the soup in the afternoon.

Here are the items that we need for Wednesday:

24 Plates—Lauren

24 Bowls—Wesley

24 Spoons—Mrs. Brinks

24 Napkins—Cyle

24 Cups—Lily

2 Liter Bottle of 7-Up—Ayla

2 Liter Bottle of 7-Up—Miley

Thanks so much for bringing in supplies to make our feast fabulous!!