Friday, October 23, 2015

Week of October 26-30, 2015

Hello Families!
We had such a fun week in room 4. Thank you again to all of the parents who chaperoned our field trip to Dave's Pumpkin Patch on Thursday. Field trips would not be possible without all of our fantastic volunteers.
I am currently working on our next trip, so stay tuned for that.

Here is what we have coming up:

Saturday 10/24: PH Harvest Festival, 3-6:30 pm. I hope to see all of you there! We did not get enough volunteers to staff our face painting booth. This is a first for Room 4. If you can spare 30 minutes, please let me know ASAP. We need your help.

Friday, October 30: jog-a-thon/fall celebration We are running at 9:15, and all parents are welcome to cheer us on.
On the 30th we will also have a small fall celebration in Room 4 from 10-11am. We will make a couple of crafts and have popcorn and juice for snacks. If you would like to help out for this, we would love to have 4-5 more parents. Please let me know.
Please note: we do have free dress on the 30th, but costumes are not allowed. Please send your child in running clothes for the jog-a-thon.

Monday, 11/9 : school picture day. More information to follow.

Language Arts:
Letter focus: Yy and Zz
New Sight words: it, no, and this
This week we are continuing to work on telling stories from pictures. We have begun talking a lot about the problems in stories and how the characters solve them. When you are reading with your child, ask your child about the characters, setting, and problem/resolution

Math
This week we will continue to work on comparing numbers to 10. So far the chapter is going very well.

Thanks for reading, everyone! Have a super weekend.

Friday, October 16, 2015

Week of October 19-23, 2015

Hello families!
We are already halfway through October! It's hard to believe.
We are getting ready for our first field trip to the pumpkin patch next week and the kids can't wait!

Here is what we have coming up:

Important dates:
Thursday 10/22: pumpkin patch field trip. Please send your child with a bag lunch, as we will be eating at the pumpkin patch.

Saturday 10/24: Phoebe Hearst harvest festival. This is such a fun event! Please be sure to come and support our school. You can also support room 4 by working in our booth. We need volunteers!

Language Arts
Letter focus this week: Uu, Vv, Ww, Xx
New sight words: big, have, and small
We are continuing to work on telling stories through pictures this week. We have talked about what characters are doing, how they feel, the setting, and details that illustrators use to help tell stories. This week the kids will begin to tell stories using several illustrations instead of just one.

Math
We have begun Topic 4 on comparing numbers up to 10. This chapter can get tricky for some kids, so if you notice your child having difficulty with any of this week's homework pages, please let me know!

Wish List Items
I would love two rolls of clear contact paper! I am going to give the kids new nametags and table spots at the end of this trimester.
We will also always take paper--any color--for the recess art table.

Thank you for reading, everyone! Please let me know if you have questions or concerns.



Friday, October 9, 2015

Week of October 12-16

Hello Room 4 families!
We had such a good week in room 4. The kids have been working so hard, and their work is showing in all of the gains I am already seeing in reading and writing. Thank you parents for reinforcing our school work at home by reading with your child daily and helping your child when necessary with homework.

Here is what we have coming up:

Friday 10/16: Jog-a-Thon envelopes are due no later than 8:10 am for your child to be eligible for prizes. You can send these in to school any day this week.
We will be working in the garden on this day with our 5th grade buddies. The kindergarteners and 5th graders are enjoying working together so much. On Friday afternoons be sure to ask your child if he or she saw their buddy at school and what they did together.

Thursday 10/22: Kinder field trip to Dave's Pumpkin Patch
Thank you to everyone who sent in the $5.50 for the trip and to those who volunteered to chaperone. I am waiting for fingerprint verification from the district office for several people, so I will confirm with many of you when our office has the verification.
Remember kids need to bring a lunch that day because we will be eating at the pumpkin patch.

Saturday 10/24:Phoebe Hearst Harvest Festival
This is such a fun afternoon for PH families and friends to come a play carnival games, wear costumes, and see friends. Each class is responsible for running a booth, which of course would not be possible without volunteers. Our class is doing a tattoo and facepainting booth, and we really need help with volunteer facepainters. I promise our facepainting designs will be simple! Volunteer shifts can be 30 to 60 minutes.
If you work at the Harvest Festival (or any school event) you can log double parent volunteer hours for yourself. Please contact our room parents Melody ( melodyaf@hotmail.com ) or Erica (ericalleonard@gmail.com ) if you can help. Thank you for supporting room 4 and PH!

Language Arts
This week we continue to work with rhymes, letter names and sounds, and listening for spoken words in sentences. We have begun counting and isolating words we hear in spoken sentences, which will help when your child begins to read and write complete sentences.
New sight words: he and she.
Letter focus: Qq, Rr, Ss, Tt
We also will continue to study how authors tell stories from pictures. We will talk about emotions that characters have and look for these details in stories we read.

Math
On Thursday we will take our Topic 3 test on numbers to 10.
On Friday we will begin Topic 4: Comparing and Ordering Numbers 0 to 10.

This week's student of the week will be Kyle. Please be sure to stop by and check out her poster and the letters from her classmates! (the letters will be up Tuesday)

Thank you for reading, everyone! Please do not hesitate to email me with any questions or concerns.
carrie.relles@gmail.com



Friday, October 2, 2015

Week of October 5-9, 2015

Hello families!
What a busy week! We worked on finding our fire through kindness and community building, worked on letters and writing sentences with our sight words, learned about self-portraits with Ms Jane, practiced comparing numbers to 5, started the Royal Reader program, met with our 5th grade buddies, and worked in the Phoebe Garden for the first time. Whew!  We all need a couple of days to rest before we get right back to work.

Here is what we have coming up:
Pumpkin Patch field trip---Thursday, October 22. 
As I mentioned at back-to-school night, we will be heading to Dave's pumpkin patch in West Sacramento on 10/22. We will leave on school buses at 9:30am and return in time for dismissal. The cost is $5.50 per student. This includes activities at the pumpkin patch and a small pumpkin. You can send the money to school beginning today--just clearly label it with your child's name. All children will need to bring a bag lunch that day. We will eat at the pumpkin patch before returning to school. Parents who have been fingerprinted are welcome to join us on the trip. Please let me know as soon as possible if you'd like to chaperone.

Student of the Week
We will begin celebrating one student each week beginning on Monday October 12. The Thursday before your child's week, I will send home a poster to complete. S/he will return the poster on Monday, and present it to the class. The other students will write letters to your child, and these will be displayed in the classroom with the poster on our student of the week bulletin board. The student of the week is our line leader and helps with any other jobs that pop up throughout the week. It is a special time for the kids. I will present a poster about myself next week as an example before we begin with kids. 

Royal Reader 
Hopefully you saw the bright orange Royal Reader form that came home with the October newsletter on Wednesday. The will take the place of our reading logs. Please help your child log the number of minutes s/he reads or is read to outside of school. The back of the log explains the program and the prizes kids can earn for reading, reading, reading. The logs are due at the end of each month. If you misplace a log, you can logs minutes on any calendar and turn that in for credit.

Language Arts
Letter focus: Mm, Nn, Oo, and Pp
New sight words: and, we
I encourage families to have a sight word wall displayed somewhere at home. Ask your child to read and write the words periodically. Use flash cards and make up games where your child reads the words, makes up sentences that include the words, and writes the words. As soon as the majority of kids have mastered the kindergarten words we move to the first grade list.
Comprehension and writing: we continue this week to focus on telling stories from pictures. We have been working a lot on details in stories and illustrations.

Math
We will take our Topic 2 test on comparing numbers 1-5 on Monday. On Tuesday we will begin Topic 3, numbers 6-10.


Science
We have begun our first life science unit on plants. During this unit we will focus primarily on pumpkins because of our upcoming field trip. Topics covered will include what plants need to live, how plants grow, how people use plants,and comparing different types of plants with one another.

Thank you for reading!! Please don't hesitate to email or stop by room 4 if you have any questions or concerns. Have a fantastic weekend.