Thanksgiving Sign-Ups

Here's a list of supplies, as well as volunteers, for our upcoming Thanksgiving activities.  Thanks for your willingness to help out and provide for our Feast:)

Parent Teacher Conferences

I'm looking forward to meeting with many of you tomorrow afternoon/evening to discuss your child's successes so far in Kindergarten, and to plan together what we can do to ensure their continued growth  Dismissal is at 11:55 tomorrow for students and lunch will NOT be provided.  Below is the schedule as a reminder of who is scheduled for what times.  Our 15 minutes together is precious, so I'll do my best to stay on schedule.  Please bring any questions and/or concerns that you may have. I'll have sign-up sheets for upcoming special days for you to look over, as well as many highlights from our year together so far. :)

Parent Teacher Conference Schedule

 Mrs. Brinks – Kindergarten

November 10, 2016

Time	Parents of:
1:00	León
1:15	Sophia
1:30	Wyatt
1:45	Justin
2:00
2:15	Easton
2:30
2:45	Brady
3:00	Riley
3:15	Delainee
3:30	Dane
3:45	Grace
5:00	Levi
5:15	Mylan
5:30	Gage
5:45	Karen
6:00	Aubrie
6:15
6:30	Dylan
6:45
7:00	Zane

Newsletter Updates for the Week of November 7th

DATES TO REMEMBER:

-Thurs. Nov. 10th—1/2 Day/Parent Teacher Conferences from 1:00-4:00 & 5:00-8:00

-Friday, November 11th—Half Day/Veteran’s Day

-Tuesday, November 15th—No School/Deer Day

-Monday, November 21st—Delayed Start & Kindergarten Thanksgiving Activities (pm)

-Tuesday, Nov. 22nd—Cutting up our Veggies (am)

-Wednesday, Nov. 23rd—Our Feast (pm)

STUDENT OF THE WEEK:  

Our student of the week is Zane Geeseman. Zane enjoys riding his horse Mickey and competing in rodeos; he is a true cowboy at heart!  He likes to eat Doritos, steak, & lunchables. He aspires to be a cowboy and a football player when he grows up. Congratulations to Zane on being our Student of the Week!

CONFERENCES:  

I am looking forward to meeting with each of you this week for conferences.  In addition to discussing your child’s progress, we will look ahead and discuss how to support their next steps to learning.  We have some very exciting things coming up as we look to the future!  Please be sure to return your yellow conference slip so that I can make adjustments in times if needed. :)

Y-TIES:

Mrs. Sluiter, our PE teacher, is offering this opportunity for you to order these kid-friendly laces. These are great to put in laced shoes, but do not require students to tie their shoes. If your child has laced shoes, I would highly recommend them, especially with winter coming and the constant switching between boots and shoes:) Please check your child’s folder for their yellow order form.

READING:

This week our class will be focusing on the rules they follow at home and in school. Children also will be reading stories about the laws people follow in their neighborhoods and communities. Here are some activities that you can do with your child to help reinforce the skills we will be practicing:

· Vocabulary—cooperate, rules—Make a chart of the rules your child follows. Encourage your child to think about the ways we cooperate, or work together with others.

· Sightwords—to & it—Fill a small pan with shaving cream. Have your child write the words in the shaving cream each time you use the word in a sentences—a great activity to do in the tub:)

· Category Words—action words—Encourage your child to think of laws and rules to follow at home, at school, and in the community.

· Phonics—Letter Ii—Help your child think of words that include the letter I, write the words on paper and have them underline the letter i.

· Beanie Baby Strategies—This week we will introduce Chunky Monkey—he helps us read and write by identifying ‘chunks’ or ‘word families’ that we know within words. We will be using Chunky Monkey to read and write words with the chunks—ig, it, in, & ip.

WRITING:  

This week we will continue to write like Scientists; we will go on a listening walk and collect some things from nature to bring back to the classroom to observe, sketch, and write about. We will also be writing about something we ‘want’ and what we would be willing to ‘trade’ for it.

SCIENCE/SOCIAL STUDIES:  

This week we will learn about one of our important responsibilities as a citizen—voting. We will exercise our ‘democratic right to vote,’ as we vote for a special treat that we will have later in the week. We will also begin our Social Studies Unit on Market Economy as we learn the difference between ‘a want’ and ‘a need’ and discuss the importance of making a ‘fair trade.’ In observance of Veteran’s Day, we will learn about how we can show honor and respect to our veterans.

MATH:

This week we will work on ordering numbers from smallest to biggest and look for patterns. We will also be graphing our vote and interpreting the data.

I will be out of the classroom Wednesday morning to meet with the gentleman from the Michigan Department of Education for a follow-up from our on-site review.  I don't like stepping away from the classroom, but this is a worthy cause and I know the students will be on their best behavior for our substitute:)

Halloween Fun

Just sharing a couple of group photos from our Halloween Party. There will be many more for you to see when you come to Parent Teacher Conferences on the 10th.

Special thanks to all the parents and grandparents who came out to watch the parade and cheer us on; also to the moms who came in to help with costumes and snacks.  I couldn't have done it without you!

Our Little Pumpkins

All Dressed Up In Our Costumes

Newsletter Updates for the Week of October 31st

DATES TO REMEMBER:

-Monday, October 31st

             -Bat Presentation in the morning

             -Parade & Party in the afternoon

-Tuesday, November 1st—No School—PD

-Friday, November 4th—Report Cards Home

-Thurs. Nov. 10th—1/2 Day/Parent Teacher Conferences from 1:00-4:00 & 5:00-8:00

-Friday, November 11th—Half Day/Veteran’s Day

-Tuesday, November 15th—No School/Deer Day

HALLOWEEN: 

*Please send your child’s costume to school in a bag (labeled with their name). Students will change into their costumes after lunch.

**Please DO NOT send any make-up or toy weapons (guns, knives, swords, etc) to school.

***Parent volunteers, please plan to arrive by 12:15 to help get students into their costumes. The parade starts at 1:00 and families are welcome to watch us parade downtown—we would love an audience to cheer us on.

****K will NOT be visiting the 4th gr. Wax Museum.

BOOK-IT: 

I’ve attached the November Book-it Calendar so that you can keep track of your child’s reading for the month of November. Please be sure to return your completed October Calendars so I can award Pizza Hut certificates.  Also, attached to the newsletter you will find an additional Pizza Hut coupon for participating in Coins for Kids.

BOOK FAIR:

The book fair is wrapping up on Monday, October 31st. If your child bought a book, but didn’t bring it home, no worries—it is on order and should be arriving within the next couple of days:)

READING:

This week our class will be focusing on different kinds of bugs and how they move. Children will also be reading about a variety of bugs they see in nature. Here are some activities that you can do with your child to help reinforce the skills we will be practicing:

· Vocabulary—curious, observe—Go outside and have your child observe different bugs. Have your child draw a picture of the bugs in a notebook and then label each one.

· Sightwords—review—the, we, see, a, I & like—practice reading and writing these words and looking for them in books.

· Category Words—movement words—say simple riddles that describe the different movements made by animals or insects. Have your child guess the animal or insect.

· Phonics—Review letters—m, a, s, p, & t—Give your child words that begin with these letters and have them practice identifying the sound and writing the beginning letter.

· Beanie Baby Strategies—This week we will introduce Iggy the Inferring Iguana who reminds us to make predictions and inferences as we read and then validate and adjust our predictions as we read. We will also introduce Pop the Weasel who reminds us to look for sightwords while we are reading—these are the words we know, they POP into our heads and out of our mouths!

WRITING: 

This week we will be observing, drawing, and writing about leaves as we practice writing like Scientists. Please send in a couple of leaves for us to use for writing this week:)

SCIENCE/SOCIAL STUDIES: 

This week we will read several stories related to scarecrows, harvest, and vegetables. We will read Stone Soup to help us prepare for our upcoming Friendship Soup project.

MATH:

This week we will practice different ways to represent numbers (ten frames, fingers, tally marks). We will also play several hands-on games to help us identify and write our numbers.

Have a safe and spook-tacular Halloween!

A couple of reminders :)

Just a reminder that we will be visiting the book fair tomorrow to purchase materials. IF you'd like to purchase any books, please send your child's wishlist back along with a check or cash (please remember to include the tax)  :)

Also, we had a lot of wet and cold kiddos today after recess - I know it's early, but it is cold and wet! Please be sure to send your child to school with all of their winter clothes to keep them warm and dry:)  Unfortunately, today was just a small taste of what's to come :(

Newsletter Updates for the Week of October 24th

DATES TO REMEMBER:

-October 21st-31st—Book Fair

              -Monday, October 24th—We Shop

              -Friday, October 28th—We Return to Buy

-Tuesday, October 25th—Picture Retakes

-Monday, October 31st

              -Bat Presentation in the morning

              -Parade & Party in the afternoon

-Tuesday, November 1st—No School—PD

-Friday, November 4th—Report Cards Home

-Thurs. Nov. 10th—1/2 Day/Parent Teacher Conferences from 1:00-4:00 & 5:00-8:00

-Friday, November 11th—Half Day

STUDENT OF THE WEEK: 

Our student of the week is Wyatt Grill. Wyatt enjoys spending time with his Dad and he loves recess! He likes to eat chicken nuggets and pancakes. He loves to play with Legos and his favorite movie is Ninjago. A couple of his goals include learning to read books and becoming a Knight—both well within his reach! Congratulations to Wyatt on

being our Student of the Week!

HALLOWEEN: 

*Please send your child’s costume to school in a bag (labeled with their name). Students will change into their costumes after lunch.

**Please DO NOT send any make-up or toy weapons (guns, knives, swords, etc) to school.

***Parent volunteers, please plan to arrive by 12:15 to help get students into their costumes. The parade starts at 1:00 and families are welcome to watch us parade downtown—we would love an audience to cheer us on.

****K will NOT be visiting the 4th gr. Wax Museum.

READING:

This week our class will be focusing on the shapes we see in nature and in our neighborhoods as we read about the shapes we see around us. Here are some activities that you can do with your child to help reinforce the skills we will be practicing:

· Vocabulary—materials & nature—Invite your child to hunt for shapes found in nature or on materials. Then invite them to draw pictures of each item.

· Sightword—like—Write the word like on paper and have your child trace it. Then say sentences and have them write like each time you say the word.

· Category Words—shapes—Say simple riddles that include different shape words and have your child guess each object.

· Phonics—Letter Tt—Invite your child to play a game of “I Spy.” Say sentences and have your child find objects whose names begin or end with the letter t, such as I spy a table. I spy a pot.

· Beanie Baby Strategy—Picturing Penguin—He helps us visualize or picture the story in our minds while we are reading—a hard skill for kindergartners who are surrounded by lots of visual stimulation in our world:)

WRITING:  

This week we will build a sentence buddy to put in our writing folders to use as a tool to help us while writing.  We will finish up our October journals by writing about what we are going to be for Halloween.

MATH:

This week we will continue our study of shapes and practice making shapes using ropes, geoboards, and a new geoboard app.  We will also practice following directions using positional words as we maneuver through an obstacle course in gym class. We will do some measuring of longer & shorter and continue to practice counting and writing our numbers.

SCIENCE/SOCIAL STUDIES: 

This week we will read several narrative and informational stories related to Halloween. We will carve our jack-o-lantern together and, with elections just around the corner, we will exercise our ‘democratic right to vote,’ as we vote on what kind of mouth to give our jack-o-lantern.