Weekly Report

It's the most wonderful time of the year! ...And it's the most hectic and crazy, too! It's so heartwarming to see the children so happy when sharing their holiday adventures, and eagerly anticipating the holidays! They are full of big smiles and laughs! We've been keeping busy; there are some things we're excited to share with you in binders and backpacks today. Look for art ornaments, math reindeer, and a "Load the Sleigh" game to play at home with your child. Have a terrific weekend, and stay warm!

MONDAY is POLAR EXPRESS DAY! Your child can wear pajamas to school. Please be sure that you also send your child wearing shoes, so that if we go outside for recess, your child's feet will be warm.

I've been VERY impressed with the reading that I'm seeing this month! Thank you so much for staying on track with your child's goals! Reading at home is so important. You're developing important comprehension skills as you read and discuss stories with your child. At school, we've been reviewing and assessing letter identification, letter sounds, sight words. Level 3 is in binders for most of the children. (That's the benchmark for the end of third quarter, and it's the most challenging list.) We're also reading every day, and the kids are growing by leaps and bounds! One of the biggest ways you can help at home is to practice sight words every day. When the children really know sight words "in a snap," they can focus on the unknown words in the story. 

I am excited for you to see our elf books when they come home next week! Every day, the boys and girls think of what the sentence will say, and they count the words to plan it out carefully. Then we write the sentence, starting with an uppercase letter, and putting a period at the end. We make sure that we can read the words by using the spaces between words. We also illustrate the sentence. We've been working hard on writing neatly and forming letters correctly, too! Now that we've had a lot of experience writing sentences, we're sometimes making them different than the one we model together. The Peeps are learning that they can use their own words to convey the same idea. Our elf books are really amazing!

This week, we've practiced our graphing skills, sequenced numbers with our "Santa and the Reindeer" project, and assessed lots of skills. We completed chapter 3 math books, also! These were sent home. Please feel free to have your child complete some of the incomplete pages at home for extra practice--there are always lots more pages than what we will have time for at school. Lots of our time is spent with manipulatives!




We've been learning about holiday traditions, and practicing our "staying calm" techniques! There has been extra time for special holiday projects, too!



Monday is E Day - Library/Technology
It's POLAR EXPRESS DAY! Please have your Peep wear warm pajamas!
Please remember library books!

Tuesday is A Day - Art

Wednesday is a "No-School" Day for the Peeps (Teachers have a record day.)

Thursday is a "No-School" Day

Friday is a "No-School" Day

Enjoy your holidays!

Click here to view our lunch menu.

Dates to Keep in Mind:

Tuesday, December 20: Winter Holiday Party
Wednesday, December 21-Tuesday, January 3: No School (Winter Break)
Wednesday, January 4: School Resumes

Have a great weekend!

Where Is the Elf?

Here are some pages from our "Where is the Elf" book this week:

Santa Needs a New Suit

We've had lots of fun looking at different suit ideas for Santa! Thank you to everyone who completed this project. (It was optional, so I'm very excited to see so many new suits for Santa!) These are absolutely AWESOME!!!

My Little Snowflakes

Each one is unique and special...and after these were finished, it was all I could do to give them to you. I wanted to keep these! You're lucky you got them! I loved the way that the children posed for these; they did such a good job! (And don't worry about lice...I photo-shopped those hats on using PicMonkey.) These Peeps are so full of personality!

Here they all are, playing in the snow!

Weekly Report

We all loved Grinch Day today! We read the book, wrote about the Grinch, acted out the story in Pretend Place, and watched the animated movie during rest time. Please check the zippered pouch in your child's binder for a special green treat to celebrate the day!

The Peeps had their hearing checked today. They all listened and behaved so well. We got compliments from the nurses who were doing the testing; I was so proud!

**Please note that next Wednesday is an Early Release Day. That means Show and Tell day for the Peeps! :)

Please look for December reading logs in binders, if you haven't noticed them already. Set your goals for December! Everyone should read at least 10 books. If you look on the back of the "sticker collection" page, you'll see the number of books your child has read each month. I always add them up at the end of the month, so I can see if I owe anyone any stickers for having a group of ten from books that carry over. I'm impressed that many of you are increasing your goal each month! 

We have continued working on our writing at the sentence level, with each child gaining confidence in doing their own writing (rather than dictating to me). When you're writing, trying to remember how each letter looks, how each letter is formed, how words and sentences should look on the page, how to spell sight words, and think about what your sentence is going to say--it is a LOT! We've done a lot of guided writing with our elf booklet each day this week, and we wrote how to make the Grinch grin. Each day we're getting better and better!

We've continued working on teen numbers, especially the concept that teen numbers are a group of 10, and more left over. We can look at ten frames and know the quantity without even counting! We're learning how to spell number words, too! Have you heard about the salamander song?




Our chain of kindness is getting VERY long! The Peeps are working hard to remember to use their words to explain how they feel, to talk nicely to others even when they are feeling angry, and to be helpful to others whenever they have the chance.



Monday is E Day - Library/Technology
Please remember library books!

Tuesday is A Day - Art

Wednesday is B Day - Music
Early Release Day; Dismissal at 1:40; SHOW AND TELL FOR THE PEEPS

Thursday is C Day - P.E.
Please remember to wear tennis shoes!

Friday is D Day - P.E. 
Please remember to wear tennis shoes!


Click here to view our lunch menu.

Dates to Keep in Mind:

Tuesday, December 20: Winter Holiday Party
Wednesday, December 21-Tuesday, January 3: No School (Winter Break)
Wednesday, January 4: School Resumes

Have a great weekend!

Grinch Day and Clarence, Our School Elf

Happy Grinch Day!

 It's always so hard to choose the very best group picture...so I'll just include them all.

Kindergarten photographers take the best pictures, I think!

During our writing time today, the Peeps wrote what they could do to make the Grinch grin. They had terrific ideas, and did AMAZING work! I am so proud of the effort that they are showing. We are working so hard on our writing and drawing skills!

We are writing down the sounds we hear in words, making sure that we can re-read our writing, remembering to put spaces between words, and even putting punctuation at the end of our sentences! There's a LOT to think about when we're writing!

Another exciting thing to write about in our room is Clarence, the school elf! Clarence is hiding in a different spot each day. We've been writing sentences about him in our "Where Is the Elf?" book!

It's so much fun to see where Clarence is hiding each morning!