Family News letter

Dear Families,
Brrr....it is cold out there!  I hope you all had a nice weekend and feel ready to come back to school again!  This is the last full week of school before our Winter Break, which starts next Monday.  We are off the entire week and have teacher in-service on the 29th.  Students come back to school again on Tuesday, March 1st.

Our Learning:
Writing: We are currently finishing up our "All About" writing pieces and the students will meet with their editing partners this week.  We will share our stories with our Reading Buddies in Ms. Davison's Kindergarten class on Wednesday.  When we return from our Winter Break, the students will start their research writing.  This year, we are studying the Rainforest and the children will research a rainforest animal.  More information will follow later.

Reading: The Iditarod (the dog sled race in Alaska), starts on March 5th.  Once again, the students on Harmony will follow a musher and read books to earn check-points along the Iditarod trail.  We will choose mushers and update our reading logs so they reflect this for when we return from break.  Traditionally, Harmony reads "along" with the Iditarod dog sled race every year.   The students will have help choosing a musher here at school.  The musher's name will be placed inside the reading log (which is inside the red homework folder).  Each night, students will still be expected to read for 10-20 minutes.  However, the reading log requires a little more writing to reflect a deeper understanding of the books.  If you want a sneak peek, the Iditarod reading log is linked on the wiki, or you can click here.  This link also contains informational letters regarding the race and our reading logs. The official web-site for the Iditarod race and our wiki link is here too.

Technology:  The students learned how to post on our KidBlog last week.  They also learned how to insert a picture into the new format.  I will share the passwords with you all via email so you can see your child's work and perhaps write back.  We love blogging and hope you will too!

News and Upcoming Events:

• We will celebrate Valentine's Day on Monday, February 15th.  Thank you for sharing sweets and treats with our class.
• We will have our annual Movie Day at ABS on Friday the 19th.  Please let us know if your child cannot participate in these movies.  Thank you!
• Winter Break starts 2/22.  Students return to school on 3/1. 

Science presentation

We had a very special science presentation yesterday here on team Harmony.  A parent visited us and shared his knowledge and expertise about light and light energy.  We learned so much.  Here are some pictures.

Family Newsletter

Dear Families,
I hope you are all enjoying your weekend.  It feels like winter returned again, with much cooler temperatures.  Please remember to send your child to school this week with warm clothing.  Thank you!

Our Learning:
Reading:  In reading, the students are becoming more familiar with the various text features of non-fiction books.  In our guided reading groups, we are systematically exploring these features and discussing their various purposes.  We have also started to use old Scholastic new magazines that I have saved from past years.  These magazines are laminated so many students can read them over and over again.  Each magazine has a reading response.  The students choose from a wide variety of responses, but they have to respond in writing to each magazine.  We love this new reading station in our classroom.  Please visit our classroom to see, or ask your child to explain more.  If you have old non-fiction magazines for children at home, such as National Geographic for Kids, My Big Backyard, etc, and you would like to donate them to our classroom, we would gladly accept them.  Later this week, the children will work in stations finding non-fiction features in magazines and create a scrapbook for future reference.  Thank you for supporting our learning.

Writing:  We are wrapping up our "All About" writing pieces this week and hope to meet with our editing partners next week so we can publish.  We will have a small publishing celebration next Wednesday with our Reading Buddies in Ms. Davison's Kindergarten class.  After February break, we will start our rainforest research writing.  More information will follow.

Science: Although our team-wide science workshops ended on sound and light, our class will continue with some additional explorations on sound.  This upcoming week, for example, the children will be encouraged to act like scientists and try to identify "Mystery Sounds" hidden inside brown paper bags.

Technology: We are busy integrating technology in our classroom as a way to enhance learning opportunities and communicate learning and understanding.  First grade mathematicians are using an app called "SeeSaw". It is in essence a blogging tool, a visual platform that allows the students to share their understanding through videos, pictures and drawings.  We are slowly building an online presence and will share these accounts later this week.  The whole class is also using KidBlog as mentioned earlier.  Since this is also a new tool, we will share this link with you later this week so all children have work represented.  Thank you for your patience.  We hope you will log in and start blogging with your child.  Stay tuned for future updates.  Thank you.

Math: First grade mathematicians are in the midst of learning about number sense through thew number line, and chunking numbers.  They are also learning about multiple addends and expanded notation.

News and Reminders:

• We will celebrate Valentine's Day on Monday, February 15th.  The children should have brought home a class list in their Friday folders if they wish to hand out Valentine's to their friends. If your child wishes to do so, please make sure every child receives a treat/card.  We will also have a small afternoon Valentine's Day party in our classroom.  If you wish to donate treats, etc, please email me.  Thank you for your generosity.  We would like juice, plates, napkins, cookies, muffins and fruits.  Thank you!
• February break is 2/22-2/26.  School resumes on 3/1 as we have an in-service day on 2/29.

Chorus concert at WCS

We had a great time visiting WCS for the third and fourth grade chorus concert. They did an amazing job and it was fun meeting old friends from past years.

Mismatch day

Here is a picture from our school-wide mismatch day. 

Reading with our breathing buddies

Today, we started using our breathing buddies again.  Breathing buddies are small stuffed animals that help us calm our bodies and breathing.  We read to them today in partner reading.  Ask your child to explain how you can be a super reader to a stuffed animal.