December 13

Happy Monday!
Can you believe this is the final school week of 2010? I'm always amazed how time flies. As most of you know, my family celebrated my daughter's college graduation. It is such a joyous time, but also left me wishing she were still a third grader! Enjoy your little ones. They grow so fast!

This week:
We will see the Lower Division Chorus performance Wednesday afternoon. Several of our students are involved. It should be entertaining!

Our class party is Thursday from 10:45-11:30. You are welcome to attend.

We will have an Author's Celebration this Friday from 10:30-11:00 followed by the Lower Division sing-along. Hope you can join us for this as well.

Spirit Day is this Friday.


This week in Class:
Reading-We will have a spelling test on Friday, but no new vocabulary words.
We are enjoying The Whipping Boy as a class read as well as stories in our Voices reading series. We are also listening to 11 Birthdays.

Writing-We begin our new writing unit...realistic fiction!

Math-Our new unit involves a review of place value into the hundred thousands. Then we will move on to even larger numbers and using them in application.

Science-We continue to explore motion and design. Currently, we are building our vehicles to hold a sail in place to see how that affects it's motion.

Wishing you all the happiest of holidays. See you soon or in the New Year!

December 6th

Happy Monday!

First, I want to congratulate my class for their wonderful job hosting Town Meeting today! Everyone read their poems with expression and enthusiasm. I was very proud!

Upcoming Events:
The Holiday Gift Drive ends this Friday. This is optional. If you would like to participate please place the gifts in the bin located outside of our classroom. More information regarding this can be found on the letter previously sent home. Thanks for your generosity already!

The children will see the play, "The Hundred Dresses", this Wednesday afternoon. I read the story aloud to them. Please ask your child how the story compared with the play.

Our class party is being coordinated by our room parents. Please refer to their emails for more information regarding this.

We will have an Author's Celebration on Friday, December 17th from 10:30-11:00. The students will share their published pieces of writing to date. We hope you can join us!

Spirit Day is Friday, December 17th. This is also a noon dismissal.

This week in class:
Reading- We are working on our vocabulary. The quizzes will be this Friday. We are also practicing contractions with our spelling words. We will play the game "Sparkle" later this week. If you don't know what this is, please ask your child. They get very excited about this game! The students are enjoying the class novel, The Whipping Boy. We are spending time discussing vocabulary, dialect, and comprehension.

Writing-We are publishing our second personal narrative.

Mathematics-This week we will have a test over what we have learned about multiplication and division. The practice test will be on Thursday and the chapter test will be Friday.

Science-We learned about stored energy.

Social Studies-Since we didn't finish the Florida Indians last week, we will definitely finish this topic this week.

Wishing you all a wonderful week!

November 29th

Welcome Back! Hope everyone had a joyful Thanksgiving!
Here are the weekly reminders:
The holiday gift drive is taking place from now until December 10th. CeCe Kiefner and Heather Oleyar are coordinating this. If you have questions, please ask me or one of these two gracious ladies.
Our class is hosting Town Meeting next Monday. My hope is to have every child share a poem that they wrote. We're still in the process of writing them though! If you would like to join us we will meet in the courtyard area at 8:10.
Spirit Day is Friday, December 17th.

This week we will work on:
Reading- Main idea and supporting details, author's purpose, drawing conclusions, and understanding flashbacks.
Our Collection Vocabulary words are: incorporating, pseudonyms, mask, quickened, bellowed, aeronautics, particular, label, significant, submitted, befuddled, appeal, essential, plumped, kennel
Our Wordly Wise Vocabulary words are: act, additional, advice, crumple, fan, memorize, mystify, pause, transparent, vanish
We will have a quiz over the vocabulary words on Friday, December 10th.

Writing-We are writing a holiday poem. We will also work on publishing our personal narrative stories.

Math-Multiplication...The children should understand the meaning of arrays, factor, product and be able to quickly answer easy multiplication facts by 0, 1, 2, and 5.

Science-Motion and design

Social Studies-Native Florida Tribes. I hope to finish this unit this week.

Wishing you all a fantastic week!

Information Form Request

Dear Parents,

Just a reminder that we need a student information form completed for each child attending Shorecrest. Please fill out the form electronically, save the file using your child's first and last name, and send it via e-mail to forms@shorecrest.org. The form can be downloaded from the Parents Page on our Online Community, http://www.shorecrest.org/?page=ParentsPage.

If you have any problems using the online form, please contact Judy Roberge at jroberge@shorecrest.org or (727) 456-7513.

November 15th

Poetry in the Park was a big success!
We were so blessed to have beautiful weather, great poetry, and a wonderful audience. Thank you for your support!

Upcoming Events:
Spirit Day is this Friday.
The Holiday Gift Drive will take place November 29-December 10. More information will follow.

This week we will work on:
Reading- Author's point of view and Author's purpose
We will perform our Reader's Theater for our first grade buddies this week. Please encourage your child to read at least one of the Sunshine State books. We will vote on our favorite in the spring.
Writing-We are studying different types of poetry this week to write a holiday poem. We will also begin selecting a personal narrative piece to publish.
Mathematics-We begin our unit on multiplication this week.
Science-Motion and Design
Social Studies-The Timuca Indians

As always, I wish you all a wonderful week. I hope that you will have a wonderful week next week. Hopefully you will be able to take time to enjoy this special time of year with family and friends.

November 8th

This is going to be a busy and fun week!
*The book fair is on display in the lobby of the theater and the student activity room in between the theater and the library. You may send money with your child if you want or go to the book fair with your child. They are asking for smaller bills if you send cash.

*Poetry in the Park begins at 8:30 this Wednesday. We perform after the break. It's hard to determine the exact time, but my guess is after 9:30. You might want to bring a chair as the seats fill up quickly.

*There is no school for students this Friday. We will have the spelling test on Thursday, but will not have the vocabulary quiz until next Monday.

This week we will focus on:
Reading-The skills we are focusing on in reading are cause/effect, fact/opinion, and analyzing character's conflict. We continue to enjoy our stories from our Voices reading series.

Writing-The students will pick one of their draft personal narrative stories to begin publishing.

Math- This week will be a review week on measurement. The chapter test will most likely be this Thursday.

Science- We discovered how weight affects force last week. We will continue with our unit on motion and design.

Social Studies- We are continuing to learn about the Tocabaga Indian tribe. The students will need to access the glog for Monday night's homework.

Wishing you all a wonderful week! Hope to see you all on Wednesday!

Vocabulary

Hello All!
Here are the vocabulary words for the next two weeks.

Collection Vocabulary:
foreign, elders, translates, venture, crammed, emphasizes, socialize, tapers, dreary, conversations, awkward, champion, sweat lodge, swarming, flustered

Wordly Wise:
chasm, continent, credit, enable, foul, gust, ordeal, plateau, rig, schedule

Our quiz over these words will be Friday, November 12.

November 1st

Wow! It's November already!
We all had a wonderful time last Friday for our Fall Festival! Next Wednesday is Poetry in the Park. We stay busy here at Shorecrest!
The children are doing a wonderful job memorizing their poem. I know you will enjoy the event.

A few reminders...
The book fair will be held next week. The children will have the opportunity to purchase books through Thursday. I encourage you to stop by before school or afterward, but children will also be able to purchase books during the day.

Author, Sharon Robinson, will speak to the students this Friday morning. Please be sure to ask your child about the visit.

Spirit Day will be Friday, November 19th.

This week in class we will focus on:
Reading-We are working on our reader's theater production for our first grade buddies. We are also reading our class novel as well as stories from our Voices reading series. When checking out library books, it is important for your child to select books that they can read and understand. We will talk more about this in class. Have you checked out www.bookadventure.com yet?
Writing-We are continuing to write our personal narratives.
Math-The children are still in the unit of measurement. We will focus on area, diameters, and circumferences this week.
Science-We will stay in the unit of motion and design for the next six weeks.
Social Studies-Our focus continues to be on Florida's Native Americans.
We will have another homework assignment this week that will require them to access the glog on my blog.

Wishing you all a wonderful week!

October 25th

Happy Monday!

Some reminders for upcoming events:
Fall Festival is this Friday! We will begin the parade at 8:30. After the parade the children will come back to class for a snack. They may change their costumes at this time as well. Hope to see you there!

The children will see the play "Amber Brown is not a Crayon" this Thursday in the theater.

Author, Sharon Robinson, will visit us on Friday, November 5th.

The Book Fair will take place the week of November 8th.

Poetry in the Park will be on Wednesday, November 10th at 8:30 a.m.

This week in class we will work on the following:
Reading-As we continue to read stories in our Voices series, we will focus on prepositions, points of view, predicting and inferring. We also started a new reading chapter book.
To build reading comprehension, I sent a worksheet that is due on Friday. It should be completed with a parent's help and signed by both the parent and child. Please ask your child about this assignment.
We are also working on a reader's theater version of Charlotte's Web. We plan on presenting this to our first grade buddies. Pictures will follow!

Writing- We continue to build skills for writing our personal narrative stories. Today we focused on learning when to paragraph. We will work this week on studying other author's strategies to strengthen our stories.

Math-Measurement is still the focus. This week will focus on area.

Science-Last Friday we worked with teams to build a car/cart that will be able to roll at least 100 cm. We will test our cars this week. This is a continuation of our unit on forces of motion and design.

Social Studies-Last week we learned about the Calusa Indians. This week we will focus on the Tequesta Indians. There will be a homework assignment this week that will require them to get onto my blog and then access the glog. We did this last week in class, so they should know what to do.

Hope you all have a fantastic week!

October 18th

Hello Everyone!
Some reminders...
*This Friday is our Homecoming football game. We will have a pep rally that day! Students may wear green and gold colored clothing.
*Fall Festival is October 29th. If you have not sent in the permission form, please do as soon as possible.
*Poetry in the Park is Wednesday, November 10th at 8:30 a.m. I sent our class poem home today for your child to begin to memorize.

This week we will work on the following:
*Writing-Learning how to pick what to write about for our new personal narrative stories.
*Reading-We are reading stories in our new Voices reading book. We are talking about empathy and respect. We will finish Charlotte's Web this week as well.
Collection Vocabulary for the next two weeks is: hyena, plantains, empathized, divert, intense, shivery, trembles, hearth, trills, scrawny, rake, dribbles, resigned, crushed, handy
Wordly Wise Vocabulary: amaze, amazing, arctic, Arctic, court, elect, interval, league, limit, milestone, recreation, tackle
*Math-We are working on measuring to the nearest quarter inch and millimeter. We will also work with perimeter and area.
*Social Studies-We are beginning our unit on Native Americans in Florida.

Hope you have a wonderful week!

October 11th

Happy Monday to Everyone!

Some reminders...

There are only four days of school for the children this week. Friday is a professional day for teachers.

Our monthly Art Appreciation lesson (Picture Lady) will be on Tuesday. The children will still go to book checkout.

Tuesday the children will be allowed to wear a Rays shirt to school with regular uniform pants. Go Rays!

At 9:00AM on Thursday, October 14, there is a parent workshop on the topic of standardized testing. The presentation will be in the Student Activity Center. This is opened to all of our parents.

Fall Festival is on Friday, October 29. Please send in your Fall Festival forms in by the end of the week.

Please remember to complete the parent survey. Your ideas matter to us.


This week we will on the following:

Spelling-We will have our test on Thursday.

Reading-We are continuing to read Charlotte's Web. The class met with their first grade buddies on Friday and worked on an animal babies booklet. Hopefully, your child has told you about the "pig project". They are working in small groups to make a pig from recycled items. We will have a pig judging contest at the end of the month. It should be fun!
We are also reading stories in our Voices reading series. We continue to work on reading comprehension strategies in our literacy groups as well.
Please remember that we will have our vocabulary quizzes this Thursday. I will send home practice work for homework this week.

Math - Overall, the math test scores last week were good! We will now go on to a unit on measurement. This is our last unit where we will be concentrating on mastering the basic addition and subtraction facts. After that, it's on to MULTIPLICATION!
Here's a math facts website the children can do for fun and practice.
Sumdog.com

Science and Social Studies-Our unit on motion is still moving on! We will also begin learning about Native Americans in our Social Studies unit.

October 4th

Happy Monday!
We enjoyed meeting with our first grade buddies to work on a retell of Charlotte's Web. We will meet with them again soon to continue discussing this wonderful novel.

This week we will work on the following:
Writing-We are publishing our first personal narrative story.
Reading-Our focus is on Culture. We will continue to read stories from our Voices reading series. We are also continuing with the class read, Charlotte's Web. Literacy groups are beginning this week as well. Your child will read this assigned book and do related activities in class.
Collection Vocabulary Words are: ensemble, tour, summed up, swoops, wrangler, marveled, nosing, pesky, bawling, rebellion, longed, complicated, brocade, towering
Math-We are finishing the math unit and will take a few days to review. The math test is planned for Thursday.
Science-We are continuing to work on our unit about forces.

Halloween Costume Recycling Drive
October 4-22
Pull out those old dusty Halloween costumes that no longer fit and donate them to a good cause. Shorecrest Leo Club will lead the all-school Halloween Costume Recycling Drive this year and your generous donations will benefit the children at the YWCA's Family Village. Look for collection bins near each Division office.

A Couple More Items...

Please be aware that there will be a Parent Workshop on "Just Right Books". This workshop will inform you and better prepare you to help your child choose the right books for them to read. This workshop will take place at school on October 7 from 8:20 to 9:00 in the Student Activities Center. Mrs. McKenzie and Mrs Cameron will be presenting. If you attend and have any questions after you attend, please feel free to contact me.

Also, please don't forget to take Shorecrest's Parent Opinion Survey. The window to complete the surve opens on October 1 and will remain open till October 17. I will post a link to this survey as soon as it is made available to me. This survey is extremely important for our school in setting its goals for the future and making sure that your child receives a solid and meaningful education.

September 27, 2010

Happy Monday!
I am looking forward to meeting with you this week for conferences! Most of you are scheduled for Conference Day this Thursday, but there are some of you with alternate days. I sent a reminder with your child with your scheduled day/time. Please let me know if you are unable to attend so that we can reschedule.

This week we are working on the following:
Writing-We are picking a story to begin revising. The students will work with their writing buddy to polish up a story to publish.
Reading-We are continuing to read stories about traditions. We are focusing on adjectives, root words, as well as prefixes and suffixes. We also started a whole class novel, Charlotte's Web. Please remember that we will have a quiz over our vocabulary words this Friday as well as our weekly spelling test. I am also starting literacy circles this week. Your child will be reading another book with a small group of children. We will focus on reading comprehension.
Science-We are working with our science book to learn about how things move. Our focus will be on forces: motion, speed, push, pull, gravity, and weight.
Social Studies-We will conclude our unit about Florida this week.
Math-2.7 The Partial Sums Algorithm This is probably different than how you learned how to add. Ask your child to teach you how we do this. :-)
2.8 Subtraction Algorithms
2.9 Addition with Three or More Addends

Wishing you all a wonderful week!

September 20th

We enjoyed our speaker last week who introduced us to her amazing bird and interesting snake!

Tomorrow is The International Day of Peace. We will have a special Town Meeting to honor this day and share our thoughts. You are welcome to attend.

Today you should receive the manila envelope for you to view/keep the graded assignments. Please remember to return the envelope tomorrow with your signature. As a parent and teacher, I always want my children to receive the highest grade. However, the more important issue is...did my child do their personal best? When you review the comprehension quiz, please emphasize with your child the importance of reading the passage, the questions, and then after checking their best choice to go back and check their work again. I recently started teaching the children test taking skills. The focus at this point is trying to narrow their guess on a multiple choice quiz to two answers and then picking the best out of the two. We will learn more strategies throughout the year.

The Collection Vocabulary words for the following two weeks are:
interrupted, continuation, commences, straining, performers, crackle, scribbling, attributes, dappled, amazingly, tamales, pounces, alter, rope, drifts

The Wordly Wise Vocabulary words for the following two weeks are:
ambition, auction, coast, current, frail, intelligent, novel, resident, starve, volunteer

We are writing personal narrative stories this week. Our focus will be on strengthening our stories by adding details.

Science : We are continuing to explore The Scientific Method.
Social Studies :We are learning about Florida's Environment.

Math: We are working to review and solve "What's My Rule? problems, using parts-and-total diagrams to help solve parts-and-total number stories, and changing diagrams to help solve number stories.

How did your child enjoy www.spellingcity.com? Did you get a chance to check out www.bookadventure.com? Let me know what you think of these sites.

Conference Day is next week: I will send a reminder memo to you with the time you signed up.

Wishing you all a wonderful week!

September 13th

Hello Everyone!
Picture day is tomorrow. Please send your children to school even more beautiful/handsome than usual!
Just a reminder that we also have library checkout on Tuesdays. The children may check out three books. If you want them to check out more, please let me know. I am happy to have them reading, reading, reading!

Math-Lessons covered this week are:

1.13 "The Length-of-Day Project"

1.14 "Progress Check 1"

2.1 "Fact Families"

We will have our first math test Tuesday (9/14)

Language Arts- We will read more selections from our reading series, Voices.

I have also sent home a Family Tree exercise that is not due until Wednesday. The roots to the tree are the names of your family. I told the children that they could add more family names on the leaves or limbs, but they are to think and write words and phrases about your family's traditions and culture. This would include foods, where your ancestors are from and then just special events that are unique to your family. We have been discussing heritage and different cultures in class. In writing workshop, we are working on creating strong leads and endings for our personal narratives.

We will have a spelling test on Friday. We will also have a quiz over the Wordly Wise and Collection vocabulary words on Friday (9/17).

A couple of websites you might want to explore with your child are: www.spellingcity.com and www.bookadventure.com. I will spend more time talking about these in next week's blog.

Science- We will work on writing hypotheses for our "Potato Observation Project"

Social Studies- We will continue our unit on Florida.

Wishing you all a wonderful week!

September 7-10

Here is an overview of what we will cover in our curriculum this week:

Math-Lessons covered this week are:

1.10 "Money"

1.11 "Solving Problems with Dollars and Cents"

1.12 "Patterns"

1.13 "The Length-of-Day Project"

We will have our first math test next Tuesday (9/14)

Language Arts- We will read more selections from our reading series, Voices. We are focusing on common nouns, proper nouns, and base words. Each Friday we will have a spelling test and every other Friday we will have a quiz over the vocabulary words for the unit (Collection Vocabulary) and one from our Wordly Wise words. The next date for vocabulary quizzes will be Friday, Sept. 17th. In writing workshop, we will continue writing our personal narratives.

Collection Vocabulary Words:

deceased, documents, memento, cuddles, dewy, mingle, edible, yanking, lumber, satchels, pennants, consecutive, collegians, seamstress, advised

Wordly Wise Vocabulary Words:

attract, attractive, attraction, crew, dangle, drift, event, launch, opposite, reverse, signal, steer

Science- We will use the scientific method format to conduct another experiment on Friday.

Social Studies- We will continue our unit on Florida. Last week we started chapter one, "The Land". The Geography project will be due on Thursday (9/9).

August 30

Picture Day is coming! Lower Division children will have their photos taken in the Student Activity Center on Tuesday, September 14th. Please make sure they are dressed appropriately when they come to school. The children's picture will be taken prior to recess and lunch on that day.

The children are coming home with their spelling words this week. These spelling words not only have a sound pattern, but they also relate to the stories that we will read in our reading books. Please make sure they take the practice test tonight with you so they can focus on only the words that they may experience some difficulty for the rest of the week.

I am sending home a geography project with your child tomorrow. If you have questions after reading the project requirements, please don't hesitate to email me. Please make sure you sign the bottom portion of the letter and send just that portion back as your child will need the rest of the letter to complete the project correctly.

This week we will study common and proper nouns, review base words, prefixes, suffixes and continue our study of the Wordly Wise words. These words for this lesson are: cylinder, examine, fatal, feature, grasp, jet, marine, scar, tentacle, and vessel. There will be a quiz on these words on Friday.

We will continue with number patterns, equivalent names using name-collection boxes, and introduce the language of number chances.. ie. certain, uncertain.. high probability, low probability of things happening. We will conclude the week by using a number grid to find differences in numbers and working on calculator routines.

We are also learning about The Scientific Method in science and more about Florida in social studies.

Wishing you all a wonderful week!

August 23, 2010

Our first two days of school were fantastic! We have been working on routines and procedures and will continue with that and learning about each other during this week. This week will also begin our introduction of spelling words with a test over the words on Friday. Your child will write the spelling words in the agenda. We will also introduce vocabulary words which will be practiced for two weeks before a quiz is given. We will read several short stories in our reading book relating to our Homeland. We will also read a cute book called How to Be a Perfect Person in Just Three Days. We have an interesting homework assignment related to the story! This week we will also begin our unit on Florida. Please be sure to ask your child something they enjoyed learning about this week.

Reminder: Open House is this Tuesday at 7:00. We will meet in the theater. I hope to see you all there!

Welcome Third Graders!

Are you as excited about our new school year as I am? The room is ready...it's just waiting on all the eager students to fill the seats! I hope to see you all at Meet the Teacher this Wednesday. School begins on Thursday and is a noon dismissal.

Many of you remember me as a first grade teacher. Having taught third grade before, I welcomed the chance to return to this grade! We will have a wonderful year filled with so much learning.

We will have a snack break each day. I encourage healthy snacks as often as possible. I will bring a snack for everyone on the first day. See you soon!

Cute Stuff!

Wrapping it Up!

Here we are. The end of another school year! It always amazes me how fast the time flies! Please know that I loved working with your children and have enjoyed working with all my wonderful parents as well! I hope that you all have a relaxing, yet fun-filled summer.

Here are a few reminders for the rest of the week:
Wednesday is Spirit Day
Thursday-The kids may bring a game (not electronic) to play in the morning. We will have our class party from 12:30-2:30. They will begin with Ocean Bingo in our classroom and rotate to the other first grade classrooms for more fun! Parents are welcome to attend.
Friday is the last day of school. It is a noon dismissal.

Here are some pictures of your beautiful children at recess. Enjoy! Stop by my third grade classroom next year to say hello!

Splash Day

Splash Day!

We will be hosting the Lower Division Splash Day on Friday May 14th, 2010. The event will take place during each grade’s normal PE period and will last approximately 30 min. Splash Day consists of a variety of safe and fun water games and toys. Activities are designed to soak, spray, and splash. Students will not be swimming or submerging themselves in water in any capacity. Participants will enjoy a new addition to Splash Day, the large inflatable water slide. We are asking that all parents sign the liability waiver prior to Friday, should they wish for their child to ride on the slide. A dry area, “The Beach,” will be available to any students not wishing to get wet or participate in Splash Day. Equipment, games, activities and supervision will be present for those students playing on the Beach.

What to bring/wear:

• Bring appropriate swimwear to school to change into or wear swimwear to school under their school uniform. Please keep in mind each child must wear their regular school uniform at all times except during their PE period.
• Sunscreen and or Hat
• Towel

May Information

Hello everyone! Here are some important dates and information to consider for the next few weeks:
May 14th-Our program begins at 8:30. We will have a reception afterward. Weather permitting, Splash Day will be held during their PE period on this day. Please send in a towel and a bathing suit for them to change into.

May 25th-We will take a field trip to the Florida Aquarium. We need chaperones for this trip! Please consider attending. Please send in your reservation form and $7.00 by May 14th.

May 26th-Spirit Day

May 27th-This will be our First Grade End-of-the -Year Party.

May 28th-The last day of school will be a noon dismissal.

The Last Week of April News!

We enjoyed our visiting artist last Friday during our Celebrate the Arts day. The children learned about photography and were given the unique opportunity to take pictures with a very nice (and very heavy!) camera!

We are also in the middle of preparing for our program, "Commotion in the Ocean". The children enjoyed learning about sharks last week. This week our focus is sea turtles! Please remember that the word card words are also our spelling words for the week.

*A reminder: This Wednesday is Spirit Day.

Ocean Unit

We began our Ocean Unit this week! We will spend the next four weeks learning about sharks, sea turtles, whales, and dolphins. It is a unit that the children are very excited about!
Our class is learning about sharks this week. Take time to ask them what the most interesting thing they learned about sharks. You might be surprised at how much they know.
Our spelling words are the ocean words that they brought home on their word card ring. Some of the words are tricky and don't always following a spelling pattern. Please take time to quiz them on the words before our test on Friday.
We will learn about Sea Turtles next week.
I sent home the two poems that our class will be reciting for "Commotion in the Ocean". It would be helpful to have someone in the family that your child can practice reciting the poem to.

Thank you all for sending in the t-shirts. I will need a few volunteers that would be willing to come in and help the children paint the shirts.

As always, we are very busy here at Shorecrest! I hope to see you all at Celebrate the Arts on Friday.

April 13-17

We have been enjoying learning about our beautiful state of Florida! Please take time to ask your child what they learned.
Soon we will begin practicing for our program "Commotion in the Ocean". We need each child to bring in a new white t-shirt that we will decorate for our costumes. Please mark your child's name on the label and send to school by next Monday. We will begin learning about ocean animals next week. It is such an informative and interesting unit. I can't wait!
Robust Vocabulary:
seized, tiresome, tremendous, exhausted, outrageous, patient

Hope you all have a wonderful week!

Rays Day and More...

We had a great time visiting the Dali museum last week! We learned about surreal paintings and about the very talented artist with a funny mustache! The students enjoyed making their own mustaches!


A few reminders...
Tuesday is Rays Day! To celebrate the opening of the Rays baseball season, the students may wear their favorite Rays t-shirt.
Celebrate the Arts begins at 11:00 on Friday, April 23rd.
"Commotion in the Ocean" is May 14th at 8:30. You do not want to miss this fabulous show!

Robust Vocabulary for the week:
wriggle, prickly, interested, cooperative, construct, assist

If your child would like to read aloud to the class, please help him/her select a book, practice at home, and then let me know in the morning. We love to hear each other read!

Wishing you all a fantastic week!

March 29th-April 2nd

Reminders for this week...
Spirit Day is on Wednesday.
First grade is going on a field trip to the Dali Museum on Thursday. Students may wear their dress uniforms or regular uniforms.
Field Day is this Friday. Please wear your team color.
If you are placing a book order, please turn it in to me by Wednesday.
Class pictures are next Monday.

Robust Vocabulary:
arrived, familiar, properly, anticipate, numerous, vibrant

Wishing you a great week!

March 22-26

Welcome back from Spring Break! I hope you had a fun and relaxing vacation. Here are some reminders for the week:
Spirit Day is this Wednesday
Relay for Life is this Friday
Robust Vocabulary words- quivered, wailed, scattered, lonesome, elated, hopeless

Upcoming Events:
Field Trip to the Salvador Dali Museum on April 1st
Class Pictures on April 5th

Wishing you all a great week!

Lower Division Blog

The letter below is from Dr. Bianco. If you haven't already signed up for the Lower Division blog, please take a minute to do so.
Hope you all have a fabulous Spring Break!
Fondly,
Ms. Mitchell

Dear Parents,

The Lower School administration uses Online Community to communicate with our families. Dr. Bianco and Mrs. Weinman's letters and Lower Division reminders are posted on a Lower Division blog. This is the school administration's main form of communication, so EVERYONE should subscribe. In order to have access, you will need to subscribe to the Lower Division blog.

Directions:
First log into the Online Community. After logging into the Online Community, go to Community > Groups > Lower Division Group from the green menu bar. First, click on the icon "Join Group." Next, scroll down the page and click on the Subscribe button. This will send you e-mail alerts whenever I write a new blog post.

Volunteer Opportunities

Wanted: Someone who enjoys reading aloud, is enthusiastic, and enjoys making kids smile!
We have the following days available for our read aloud-March 26, April 2, April 16, May 7, May 14, and May 21.
If you are interested, please let me know as soon as possible. It's easy and fun!

We also have a few dates available if you wish to help with a reading/math game- April 2, April 16, and April 30.

Reminder: This Friday is Field Day. Please have your child wear a shirt in their designated color (written on the note sent home last week).

Hope you all enjoy your Spring Break!

March!

Can you believe it's already the month of March? It also amazes me that Spring Break is only two weeks away. We have a lot still to do!
If you are interested in reading aloud to the class on Friday afternoons, please let me know. There are some open time slots. Our readers usually read four or five books (have your child help you pick them out) from 2:15 to 2:40. It's fun!
Congratulations to our class for earning their third compliment party! Thank you, Dorne, for volunteering to host our party!
Reminders:
This Thursday is a dress down day, pizza at lunch, and sundaes in the afternoon to celebrate our first grade parents participation in the Big Event.
This Friday is Oldie Goldie. If you have books that you would like to donate, they will be put to good use!

Robust Vocabulary:
March 1-5
deserve, usually, peaceful, variety, incredible, typical
March 8-12
fondly, pale, shadowy, imaginative, similar, affectionate

Fun Times in First Grade!

The first grade students won a Pizza Party! We will have it during our lunch time on Thursday, March 4th. Congratulations!

Reminders:
Students do not have school this Wednesday due to Conference Day.
We are collecting used books for our Oldie Goldie sale.
There are some available slots to assist during our Art period on Tuesday mornings from 8:20-9:05. If interested, please let me know.
Robust Vocabulary:
pleased, joy, stammered, probing, puzzling, unrelenting

Hope you all have a fantastic week!

Reminders...

There is no school on Friday, February 12th or on Monday, February 16th.
We will celebrate Valentine's Day on Thursday, February 11th. The children will exchange their valentines on this day.
We will not have reading folders this week.
Robust Vocabulary for this week:
incident, gradual, downpour, seek, oblivious, indecisive
Robust Vocabulary for next week:
asserted, offended, retorted, congenial, congregate, cheerful

Hope you have a wonderful Valentine's Day!

100 Days of Fun!

We celebrated our 100th day of school last Friday! What a fun day! The children spent much of the day with centers involving math, reading, writing, building, and creating.

This week we are celebrating reading with our theme, "Shorecrest Gets a Charge Out of Reading"!

This week's Robust Vocabulary words are: sympathy, sensitive, devoted, alarmed, mysterious overjoyed

Hope you have a great week!

Celebrate Reading!

Next week the Lower Division will celebrate Reading!
Our theme is: Shorecrest Gets a Charge Out of Reading
Monday-Author Visit: We will have a visit from author Michael O'Neill.
Tuesday-Book Character Dress Up Day: We will have Town Meeting on Tuesday this week...not on Monday...so that we can see students from other grades dressed as their favorite book character. Every child needs to complete the "Act It Out" book report, but dressing up is optional. Please refer to the parent letter sent home earlier this week regarding dressing up on Tuesday.
Wednesday- Drop Everything and Read: We will all stop and read from 8:15-8:45 on this day. What a great way to emphasize the importance of reading! You might want to help your child select a few favorite books to read during this time.
Thursday-Afternoon Reading Festival: This begins at dismissal. If your child is not participating, then dismiss as usual. The workshops will begn at 3:15. There will be volunteers to help guide you to the different locations. Please attend the workshops that you are signed up for.
Friday- Friday is Grandparent's Day! We hope to see all our Grandparents and Special Friends!

I will post another blog on Monday to let you know how our 100th Day of School went!

Have a great weekend!

Math Games

A large part of our mathematics instruction involves children playing math games. It's so wonderful to watch the children excited to play the games while learning important math concepts. The photos above show them playing a game in which they add the dice sums then record their answers to make predictions as to which number will come up most frequently. They were working with a "buddy" to help check their answers. After the game, we tallied our responses to form our conclusions. This way of teaching math is a hands-on approach and involves higher order thinking. Research has proven that learning by doing is the best way to learn. So, we will continue to play in class!

Other news...Spirit Day is Wednesday, January 27th. Can you believe that the 100th day of school will be Friday, January 29th? Wow! Grandparents Day is Friday, February 5th. If you have not sent in a picture yet, please send one in as soon as possible.

Robust Vocabulary Words for the next two weeks are:

This week...courteous, devious, rapidly, unreasonable, gullible, hastily

Next week...grumbling, chided, realized, bitterly, dwelling, amusement

Hope you all have a fantastic week!

Robust Vocabulary Words

As you know, each week the students learn five new words that go along with our main story of the week. These words are called "Robust Vocabulary" since they are words that are oftentimes new to their vocabulary. Spelling the words is not the requirement rather understanding them in the context of a story is the goal. By the end of the week you should be able to ask your child what the words mean.
Robust Vocabulary Words for this week:
bulged, jostled, argue, command, labored, wary

*Reminder: There is no school next Monday.

Have a wonderful week!

Happy New Year!

Everyone was bursting with excitement to be back at school today! It was fun to hear the students share their favorite part of the winter break. Now we're back to working hard (and having fun along the way)!

A few reminders...
Word Cards are due Thursday.
Our spelling test on Friday does include a dictation sentence. I will use at least two of the word card words in the dictation sentence.
Book checkout is always on Tuesday.
School is closed on January 18th.

Robust Vocabulary words this week:
agreement, unnoticed, unthinkable, rejoice, predicament, extraordinary

Wishing you a wonderful week!