Thank you for taking the time to read our first Thursday classroom newsletter! I have many items to cover these first few weeks, but I promise in the future I will not give you so much to read! The Thursday newsletter will contain a lot of important information about our classroom happenings, so please be sure to read it each week. Feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns. My contact information can be found at the end of each newsletter.
We are making it through the first week of school. We’re getting into routines and have completed a lot of assessments and projects! I’m excited to get into learning and our regular routines next week! This week in math we practiced number writing, and recognizing numbers 0-10. I know, I know you say. Didn’t we do that in kindergarten? Yes, but now students are learning to look at a group of dots and know without counting the quantity that is there. I would say we’ve really got the numbers 1-5. Students can look at dots and know immediately how many there are without counting. Students are also learning fancy number terms such as for the number 10 you have the numeral (10), numeral word (ten) and quantity (……….) In writing we’ve been working towards writing personal narratives about small moments in our lives. We’ll really get up and running with that next week. For now we’re reviewing what a good sentence looks like (complete idea, capital letter at the beginning, punctuation mark at the end). Reading is all over the place! We learned the vocabulary words genuine, prefer, unique, interest, and cheerful. Our letter focus was the letter Aa and all the ways it works with other letters to make different sounds (ar, ae, ai, a, a_e, aw, au, etc). The main focus of this week, was just taking time to get routines down and set classroom norms.
Last night I was thinking of the students I had last year and comparing them with where your child is at now. It got me excited for all the growth they’re going to make as this year goes on! Already your child can do so much, but you’ll be amazed to see just how much more they can do!
Reminders
NO SCHOOL: Monday September 4 as it is Labor Day
SNACK: Send a healthy snack for your child every day. Your child may also bring a water bottle.
RED FOLDERS: Red homework folders will be going home soon. I will talk your child through all the routines of reading and doing math IXL every night! I will give you detailed information on the ins and outs of the homework folder at back to school night.
LUNCH NUMBER/COMPUTER LOGIN: Help your child practice his/her computer login and password. Your child will use this number for various purposes throughout his/her years in PSD. I will expect them to have their login and password memorized by the end of September. I’m sending home a sheet with their login info. Your child’s username is also the number they type in when they’re eating hot lunch.
BACK TO SCHOOL NIGHT: is Thursday September 14 at 5:30 pm. Please make sure you are here, as I will be providing you with all the information of what we do in our classroom, volunteer opportunities, etc.
DUATHALON: is Friday, September 22nd! The Duathlon begins at 5:30 right here at Tavelli. This is a fun running and biking activity for the entire family.
PICTURE DAY: Student pictures will be taken Tuesday, September 19th . Picture forms will be sent home with your student in September. If you are interested in purchasing a photo, please return the envelope with the correct payment by picture day September 19th . All students will be photographed, whether a picture is purchased or not.
COMPUTER LOGIN: Help your child practice his/her computer login and password. Your child will use this number for various purposes throughout his/her years in PSD. I will expect them to have both their login and password memorized by the end of September. I am sending home a sheet with their login info. Their username is also their lunch number.
BEHAVIOR: Children in my class earn tiger points for great behavior. At the end of the day, if they haven’t lost any points and have at least 10 points they get a jelly bean. Any amount of points over ten gets them tiger tickets for the amount that is in the ones place (for example, 12 points gets you two tiger tickets. Tiger tickets are drawn every week for prizes! If a child is losing tiger points for various things such as talking or hands on friends, I will let you know and talk through a plan to change those behaviors. I will explain it fully at back to school night.
BOOK ORDER: forms are going home today and will be due back on Friday September 15. Participation is optional, but a great way to get your child excited about reading. You can order your books online by following this link on my website: http://mssandberg.weebly.com/scholastic-book-orders.htm