Thank you all for making your child's education a priority and meeting with me to discuss your child and their progress here at school. I am grateful that you were all able to attend parent teacher conferences.
Apple students are still adjusting to the recent schedule changes. Amanda and I are working hard at fostering independence in students work choices. The goal being that children are engaging in meaningful work of interests, along with completing their math and language work everyday. Some children have taken a great interest in conducting research, some of which have turned into a poster presentation to share with the class. This has sparked a lot of interest in others which is great to see!
In language, students are continuing to explore nouns, articles, and have been introduced to the adjective and the noun family. Some have begun working with synonyms, capital letters, abbreviations, homophones, and suffixes. Waseca color boxes continue to be a work of interest. Third years are using the color boxes, along with 5 high frequency words, for a weekly spelling test. Second years have taken an interest to this too and have been encouraged to test one another:) First years are encouraged to practice color boxes 3 times a week, along with phonogram work.
In math, students continue to work across all operations. Students have been exploring a variety of materials. Some high interest materials have been clock work, fraction skittles and insets, dot board, snake game, and stamp game. I
f you are curious what concepts are learned through these materials
Youtube offers a variety of lesson presentations.
In writing, students continue to utilize the 4-square writing graphic for organizing their writing. All students have been introduced to organization trait. First year students were introduced to writing a How-To book to illustrate organization and order in their writing. Second years read a fable and used a graphic organizer to discuss the main idea and three sequential supporting details. Third years did the same but used a story to organize the order of events in the story and details of those events. We have also begun character trait exploration. Students have created a character and have assigned specific traits to their characters, created an outline of how their character fits those traits, and are now working on putting their character in a story.
In culture we have explored the parts of the atmosphere and phases of the moon. Some have learned about the systems of the body, land and water forms, continents and oceans of the world, biome adaptations game, and parts of the fish, amphibian, reptile, bird, and amphibian. Some independent studies have been on crystal formation, the 5 senses, inventors, and the Revolutionary War.
In art,
students are continuing to practice with color. W
e have looked at Paul Klee's art and his use of warm and cool colors. Students have an opportunity to create their own warm and cool color oil pastel art. Students are encouraged to use art as an expression and to create a follow-up activity for a work in the classroom. We are looking for donations of wrapping paper, buttons, fabric, and any holiday type of craft supply for our upcoming craft making workshop:)
BIG THANKS
A huge THANK YOU to the Martinson family for their generous donation of $250 for student Handwriting Without Tears workbooks and for replacing the percolator that was broken. Students were thrilled to get their workbooks and have begun practicing daily!
A special thank you to Kallie Craker, Anneke Wegman, and Michelle Mork for volunteering to listen to emergent readers.
Thank you to Dani Geraci and Anneke Wegman for helping Apple students make cranberry muffins for the Harvest Feast and for those of you who donated to the feast. It was an amazing event enjoyed by all.
Thank you VI Grill for allowing us to conduct our hot cocoa sales for 4 weeks in a row. Thank you families for your support with our civic project! We surpassed our revised goal of $500 and raised a total of $608!!! And donations are continuing to come in. We were able order a heifer and a goat on Giving Tuesday and double our contribution!!! Here is a link to the honor card:
DATES TO REMEMBER:
December 12: Farmraiser orders due
December 16: Supper with Santa
5-7 p.m.
December 20
: Farmraiser orders delivered
December 22:
11:15 a.m. Dismissal
Community Sing, Young Entrepreneurs, Outside Activities
December 23 -
January 2: Winter Break
Classroom Wishlist
Colored Pencils
Brown Clay
Watercolor Paint
Rubber bands (variety of colors and sizes)
Needle Crafting Plastic Canvases
Animalium Book by Katie Scott
Roman Numeral Hundreds Board (Allison's Montessori)
Happy Holidays,
