Welcome Back!

Happy New Year! I hope you had a wonderful holiday season! The kids came back excited to see friends and talk about their holiday break, and we are already back in the swing of things.

In Walk to Read, we will be continuing our study of long vowels (long o this week) in phonics. I am transitioning to more and more independent reading since these kids are ready for it! Please continue to ask students about what they read at home because reading comprehension is key!

In math, we are working on measurement and ALWAYS time, money, addition/subtraction, and number patterns. We will probably have our next test next week.

We are beginning a unit called "Earth and Sky" in science, so pointing out features of the earth and the sky would be helpful, specifically, landforms and the sun and moon, including the position of the sun and moon at different times of the day. We have already covered the reason for day and night on Earth, so ask your child what causes day and night. Next week we will discuss what causes the seasons.

Please let me know if you need anything and happy January!

Gingerbread Houses done!

Aww, your kids are so great!!!!!

Gingerbread Houses!

We did our gingerbread houses today! Thank you so much for sending in items for them!

We started with a PLAN. Of course, any well-built house starts with a plan, so students had to make two kinds before starting their houses: a money plan (they got 25 cents to spend) and a design plan.

Here is a table of girls working hard on their gingerbread house plans. For the day before holiday break, our class sure was quiet!




Here is a video (if it works on your computer) of a couple of students telling about the houses after they were done.

Gingerbread Unit underway!

Our Gingerbread Unit is well underway. We started by reading the traditional Gingerbread Man and acted it out. Students wrote about the beginning, middle, and end of the story to summarize it (see below.) (By the way, some of those are coming home unfinished. Rather than having a lot of unfinished work left in the classroom at this time of year, I prefer to send it home, and students can finish it there.) We then read The Gingerbread Baby by Jan Brett and compared phrases from the stories. Next we will be doing some gingerbread art, math, and more reading of various versions of gingerbread stories: The Gingerbread Girl, The Gingerbread Cowboy, The Gingerbread Pirates, and Gingerbread Friends. We have also already started on our own versions of a gingerbread story. They are so cute! We have Gingerbread Mermaids, Santas, Reindeer, Spiderman, Fish, etc!

Lately

Here is a few students in our class having lunch in our room on the day of the Holiday Program. Thank you for coming!! Weren't they great?!


Mr. Durham, another teacher at Hyalite, brough in "Tik," his bearded lizard to share with our class. It was great to use Tik in our discussion of how living things have different body parts that help them survive in their habitats.

Holiday Items Needed

Hi! I hope your December is going more slowly than mine! I can't believe it's already time for the Holiday Program! Remember, Tuesday's performances (10:00 and 1:15) are identical, so I would love to see you at whichever works for you!

Our class is in need of some items for our gingerbread unit and for our holiday party. I will post the sign-up sheets on my whiteboard so you could sign up on Tuesday when you're here, or feel free to stop in when you're picking your child up from school too. If you aren't able to come but want to donate, just leave a comment here or send me an email at gia.laforge@bsd7.org . Thank you for your help!

Culture and Diversity Project

If you haven't had a chance to return the paper that tells how and when your family got to the United States, please send it in right away! I would like every student to feel included as we study geography and culture through a look at our backgrounds. Thank you!