Newsletter Updates for the Week of December 5th

DATES TO REMEMBER:

-Monday, December 19th—Delayed Start

-Tuesday, December 20th—Wear your Beautiful/Ugly Christmas Sweater

-Wednesday, December 21st—1/2 Day, Pajama Day, Sing-a-long, Christmas Party

-December 22nd-January 2nd—Christmas Break

-Tuesday, January 3rd—School Resumes

BRRR: 

Please be sure your child has everything they need to stay warm and dry at recess—snowpants, boots, mittens/gloves, hat, warm coat, etc.  It is difficult to enjoy recess when you are cold and/or wet :( Also, please be sure to pack shoes for the classroom.

CHRISTMAS GIFT EXCHANGE:

I know 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 $3.00-$5.00 and send it to school wrapped and labeled with who it is FROM (To: a girl From: Mrs. Brinks).

WELCOME PEPPERMINT: 

One of Santa’s elves, Peppermint, has joined our classroom for the month of December to help us count down to Christmas and to also keep an eye on our behavior as Christmas approaches.  She adds a little extra excitement and fun, as well as an incentive to make good choices :)  Several of the students have mentioned having elves at home, which means double the fun and that their behavior is being monitored at home and at school! :)

READING:

This week our class will be focusing on different jobs that people have in the community. Children will read stories and learn about the tools and equipment that workers use. Here are some activities that you can do with your child to help reinforce the skills we will be practicing:

· Vocabulary—equipment & uniform—Brainstorm some different kinds of workers in your community. Encourage your child to tell about the equipment a worker uses and the uniform a worker wears.

· Sightwords—you & on—Take turns spelling out sightwords with your finger on each others arm or back. I have the students do this with a partner while waiting in line and they love it!

· Category Words—jobs—Play a game called “Guess the Worker.” Give your child clues about what a worker does and act it out and see if they can guess the job.

· Phonics—Letter Oo

· Beanie Baby Strategies—This week we will use Chunky Monkey to help us read and write words with the ot, op, & og chunks. We will also introduce Dot the Giraffe who helps with our Fluency & Voice as we read by looking at the punctuation clues. We will also introduce Flippy the Dolphin who reminds us that when we come to a tricky word we can ‘flip’ the vowel sound (long or short sound) to figure out the word.

WRITING: 

This week we will continue to learn about pattern books and practice writing our own pattern books about the things we like. We will complete a class book about things we see using the book Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? as inspiration. We will continue to work on sounding out our words, writing the sounds we hear, and putting spaces between our words.

SCIENCE/SOCIAL STUDIES: 

This week we will continue our Social Studies unit on Families, as well as our Science unit on the 5 Senses.  This week we will conduct several hands on experiments that involve the senses of hearing & smelling. The students are enjoying baking holiday treats and goodies in our classroom Bakery Shop.

MATH:

This week we will work on the ‘tricky teen’ numbers and experiment with different combinations for making numbers (ex: 2+3=5, 0+5=5, & 1+4=5).