Hello families,
We have had another really great and productive week in class! We have been learning about volcanoes and just started our partner research on them. The students were asked to choose a Sheild, Cindercone, or Composite volcano to research and then design the construction of one. They will research and brainstorm today what materials they want to use for next Thursday's construction day. Please talk with your child about their list of materials as some of them may be quite elaborate (which is great!). If you would like to come in and help on this day I would so appreciate it, construction will begin at 1pm on Thursday. I have one concern I would like to address as a whole class. We have several friends who are not respecting the classroom constitution (rules), namely the "keep your hands and feet to yourself" and "use kind words". There have been a few incidents of children hitting others at random and this behavior will not be tolerated. Our school takes this kind of behavior very seriously as we want to encourage respectful and safe behavior. Please talk to your child about this; while they may think they are being silly, the student that is being hit does not find it respectful or kind. It is my job to keep everyone safe and there will be consequences for breaking this class and school rule. Please contact me if you have more questions about this. We have been talking about this issue as a class and will continue to focus on this expectation. You can also speak directly with Ms.Dene if you feel more comfortable doing so. On the upside of things, we have been rockin' and rollin' in class and it is really exciting! For the remainder of the month we will be working with volcanoes and states of matter for our science and cultural lessons. We are beginning to learn about cardinal directions and will be utilizing our world maps and globes soon as well. There is so much going on in class, the days are seriously flying by. For math we are working hard on using the Montessori materials for addition, subtraction, multiplication and we are just about to enter geometry and fractions for some students. During our enrichment time we are focusing on money and time. These are skills that you could easily practice at home with your child. You can give them a handful of change and have them identify the coin and its value or have them tell you the value of a group of coins. For more advanced work give them dollars and coins at different varieties or play an exchanging game of, "you have $3.00, this apple cost $1.00, how much do you have left?". These kinds of simple activities at home will help support what we are doing at school and the kids will love it! The days are going by so quickly in fact that parent teacher conferences are already here. Please make sure to sign up for a conference using the online scheduler. If you cannot meet at the available times we can schedule something that will work better however I cannot stay past 5pm. We can also do a phone conference if that works best for you. Half-days are October 26th and 27th, the inservice day is the 28th. Students will be dismissed at 12:30 on the half-days; they will have lunch before leaving school so please still send a lunch in. Parent Volunteer Opportunities: **If you would like to come in weekly and help with students who need support in the area of reading or math, I would love to put you to work! It would be basic number identification and letter sound work. I could use help on these days and times: Monday- 10:40-11:40am for math and reading support Tuesday- 10:40-11:40am for math and reading support Wednesday- 9-10:30am for math and reading support Friday- 9am-9:30am for spelling test proctoring and grading Friday- 1-2:00 or 2:00-3:00 pm for math and reading support Other opportunities to be involved: Thursday, October 13th - I need one or two parents to come in and help with the construction of our volcanoes. We will do this from 1-3pm. Thursday, November 17th - I need one or two parents to help create our "Thankful" books. This is an art project that will involve lots of construction paper and cutting. We will do this activity from 1-3pm. Thursday, December 1st - 9am-12 (we will be back earlier than 12) Field trip to the PAC to see 360 Allstars. We will need 5 chaperones for this walking field trip. Please let me know if you can attend and I will write you down. As always, if you have any questions or concerns please come and chat with me. I also just love to talk so I'm here for that too! I just ask that you come in before 8:30 or wait until 3:45, Monday through Thursday. I am on duty on Friday mornings and afternoons so you can find me outside on the playground at that time also. Have a great weekend! Christine Homan
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