2/7/2018

Happy February!   We have been super busy in the classroom.  The weather has made our entrance into our Christmas break interesting and our return too.  We were finally  able to enjoy a winter celebration in the classroom in January.  We watched Little Bear Winter movies and enjoyed hot chocolate and enjoyed the book exchange.  


We have a few fun days coming up in February.  Friday, February 9th, we will be enjoying our 100th day of school-even though the snow days have changed the actual 100th day-we will still be celebrating on Friday.  We will be taking part in a lot of fun activities that include counting to 100!  All activities will be done in the classroom-no home prep needed!  Next week, we will celebrate Friendship day on Valentine's Day-Wednesday, February 14th.  Children are welcomed and encouraged to bring in Valentines for their friends.  If your child brings in Valentines, we ask that they bring one for each of their classmates.  There are 14 students in the morning and 10 students in the afternoon. I will email a class list of names if your child would like to include their friends' names on the Valentines. We will enjoy decorating cookies and take part in fun activities and crafts.  There is a no need to send in a Valentine's box.  We will be making a Friendship bear to hold our Valentines, as part of our bear unit. Please feel free to send in Valentines early.  We can store them in class until Wednesday. This brings us to our next fun focus in February.  We have started our bear unit.  We have researched black bears and panda bears.  We will research polar bears and brown bears next.  The children have been so excited about this research.  I have been impressed by the children who have chosen to do extra research and bear work at home.  All the students enjoy seeing their work.  I have been impressed with all of the students interest and level of work.  We have written, drawn, and done crafts related to each bear.  On Friday, February 23rd, we will wrap up our bear unit with a Teddy Bear Picnic.  All the students can come into school in their PJ's, bring a blanket, and teddy bear.  We will watch a bear related movie and enjoy snacks.  This will happen right before our February break which is February 26th through March 2nd.

In the classroom, we have been focusing on living things and what they need to grow and how they change as they grow.  We have read about trees, plants, and what kinds of things grow on a farm. Please ready daily with your child for 20 minutes(does not have to be all at once)-half of this 20 minutes should be your child reading to you. We are writing about everything!  We are learning that ALL sentences start with an upper case letter, end with a punctuation mark, and have spaces between words.  We are starting to learn to stretch our writing and add detail.  We are learning to identify and write our high frequency words.  So far, we have learned I, can, the, we, see, a, like, to, and, go, you, do, my, are, he, with, is, and little. Please practice these words at home too.  In Math, we have focused on weight and capacity, identifying and drawing 2d shapes, the 100's number grid, working with number to 20 with a focus on teens, and beginning addition.  Please continue practicing counting to 100 with your child and playing number games where your child identifies numbers to 100.  At this point in the year, your child should be able to comfortably identify numbers through 20 and write these numbers with minimal reversals.  Your children have been working hard learning but they are also being great friends and great students.  I am so proud of how kind and thoughtful they are to each other.  They play well together, share, and problem solve.  These are wonderful qualities.  I am seeing a love of building in both the block area and legos.  I see lots of creativity in the writing area and I see young scientist exploring magnets, taking a closer look at Oliver the Turtle, and exploring sea shells.  There is a lot of great pretend play and game creations outside.  We try to go outside daily when it is not too slippery on the playground or below 20 degrees outside.  Please send snowpants, boots, mittens, hat, and a warm winter coat daily.  Keep any eye for more updates!