Today a flyer went home about our Wonderland Gift Shoppe at Chimney Lakes. The shoppe is scheduled to open on Monday, December 11 and it will stay open until Monday, December 18 or until the gifts are all sold. (Whichever comes first.)
Be on the look out for the Budget Envelope to go home the closer we get to opening day. This envelope not only helps us so we know the money is for the Wonderland Gift Shoppe, but it also helps the "elves" know exactly how much your child is allowed to spend on others or themselves.
*** Gift prices range from $.25 up to $19.00.***
This is a picture of the Budget Envelope that was used last school year.
Today our Saxon Lesson introduced Consonant Blends. (We are so excited!!! This is FUN teaching for us.) For those of you that don't know what a blend is in reading, here is the chant the students did 40 times today... A blend is two letters that come together to make ONE SOUND! :) We discussed how up to this time we have only learned sounds in isolation (ex. /s/ /t/ /m/ etc. ) Now we get to learn how two letters come together and make one sound.
This lesson was just a step into blend work. by discussing the "Bestie Friendship" that letter S has with other letters. We talked about the following the blends for s: /sm/ /sn/ /sc/ /sh/ /sl/ /sk/ /sw/ /st/ and /sp/. (If your child is unable to read them or produce the blend sound- DO NOT PANIC!! We are just starting!) Here is a picture of the work we did today on our paper. We recognized the blends in the words and colored them. After that we watched a slideshow for /sl/ and figured out whether it was the S sound in isolation or the SL blend. Check it out at the end of the post, along with a short Youtube video!
We wanted to honor the students who are working hard learning to read Sight Words with a NEW Club!! The 2nd Quarter Sight Word Club. :) We will add the names of the students who are able to read 40+ words. Check back to see if your name is on the list!!
We sent this flyer home before Thanksgiving Break, but we thought we should post it on the blog too! We are an International Magnet School and we are looking forward to learning about what other Countries do to celebrate the holidays. :)
However, to make this time PERECT, we need your support! We are asking for donations~ material items or monetary donations and we'll purchase the items needed for the crafts. We also need some "Helping Hands!!" Please make sure you have completed the Duval Schools Volunteer Application online before signing up to Volunteer with us.
If you have any questions, send us a note or an email. :)
We hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and enjoyed the time off of school. We both relaxed and spent time with our families. It was wonderful but we're looking forward to getting back to school and seeing the smiling faces of the students.
We have a busy week of Resources, an Early Release Day on Wednesday and Scarf Day on Friday!! Aaron is bringing in Fun Friday Snacks for the class.:) Resources: Monday: #1-18ART (Schmidt) & 19-38 P.E., Tuesday: #1-18 COMPUTER LAB & 19-38 MUSIC (Biernacki), Wednesday: #1-18 COMPUTER LAB again & 19-38 P.E.
MATH
We are focusing a lot on 3D Solid Shapes. Review them with your child and discuss how they have faces. A circle face on the cone and two on the cylinder. A square face on the pyramid and six on the cube, etc.
The students are doing great finding real world objects that resemble the 3D shapes!! Here is a fun youtube video to watch.
READING SCIENCE
We have been busy learning all about plants. The different parts, what they need to survive, we have even learned about how the plant makes food for itself... PHOTOSYNTHESIS. (We're trying hard, but we haven't gotten the pronunciation down just yet, haha)
**We want to get to holiday books and focus on retelling stories. So we will be ending the Plants Module this Friday. We feel the students have learned the information they need to know for the test. They can match the words to the illustration it describes. They can also define words by using picture clues.** Your child can review the information about plants by watching this fun youtube video.
SAXON/ SIGHT WORDS/ SKILLS
Saxon is working hard at reading CVC words and matching them to pictures. Most of the students are doing a great job, however the ones having trouble need to practice their sounds. It's all about knowing and using sounds!! The class has done a really good job with rhyming and beginning/ initial sounds of pictures. We've just got to step it up for syllables!! Syllables is finding the parts of words, it is NOT chopping words up for the individual sounds. (In class we practice by placing our hand under our chin. ) Check out the Months of the Year syllable video to help your child master this skill.
Our Sight Words are getting tricky, but the students continue to meet the challenge head on!! They need to read 40 sight words this quarter. So make sure to practice!! Here are our words for the week and the ones from last week...
WRITING
We are focusing on writing a sentence using sight words, spaces, chopping up and writing unknown words with the sounds we hear, an uppercase letter at the beginning and a period at the end! We do writing at the very end of the day and a lot of time it's just modeled or interactive writing. So make sure your child practices writing at home. DO NOT SKIP this page in the Homework Packet or tell your child how to write... we notice and it hurts your child's writing grades. Allow them to build the confidence that they are a writer!!
We have a busy two days planned!! We hope to complete the Module Test in Math. Begin Sight Word Testing. And read lots of Thanksgiving Books!! We will also be discussing who the students are thankful for in Writing.
Our class really seems to like Clifford Books when they go to Media, so here is a Clifford Thanksgiving Book. :) Also, in case you were not informed. We only have school two days this week. School is closed on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday this week.
We wanted to say Thank You to everyone that sent in food for the school Food Drive. Our class collected 107 items!! WOOHOOOO We didn't hear what the total count was from the whole school... but we received this AMAZING picture from Mrs. Stevens. :)
We were so into promoting the Run-A-Thon, we'd completely forgotten about the FOOD DRIVE for TCAA!! So... we are going strong until this Wednesday. :)
The Church at Arygle needs non-perishable food items, so that they can put the food together for their Thanksgiving baskets. :) Send in any non-perishable food items by this Wednesday!!
The class from each grade level that collects the most food items wins a POPCORN PARTY!! So help us fill out box!
*For those that aren't aware, TCAA helps out our school with clothing and school supplies throughout the whole school!)
We hope your children came home saying the Run-A-Thon was GREAT and that they love their jelly bracelets. They did such an awesome job running. They made us so proud!! The students enjoyed seeing the adults cheer, seeing Mr.McDaniel's 4th grade class cheer and a few even had their parents stop by! Thank you parents for supporting the students and sending in pledges to support Chimney Lakes. Plus a BIG thank you goes out to our school's Navy Volunteers~ they arrived at 7:00a.m. to set up, ran with the students, passed out water and most didn't leave until after they broke down the Run-A-Thon track.
PTA hasn't totaled all the pledges, but we are crossing our fingers and hoping our class supported Chimney Lakes the MOST!! :) Also, in case you forgot the information on the Run-A-Thon flyer... classes could earn a popcorn party, a pizza party and two students (one boy and one girl) who have the top earnings for pledges earn a Nike bag filled with LOTS of GOODIES!!
**The Nike bag is not the one pictured, this was just the clearest clipart for me to use.
We were informed there will be a Field Trip to the Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens on January 26th. We do not know the logistics of the field trip. However we wanted to get the date out to all of you in case you plan on joining us and need to request the date off from from. :) We hope to have lots of GREAT Chaperones join us at the Zoo!!!
Note to Chaperones: We will be purchasing bag lunches from the Zoo and we will eat lunch together as a class. Then the students will be broken into small groups with a Chaperone to observe the animals in the Zoo. :)
It's a four day week and we have the Run-A-Thon, so we are going to be BUSY! :) Hope the students are ready!!
Our Resources this week are: MONDAY#1-18 Media & #19-38 Art (Phillips) and TUESDAY P.E. for BOTH groups. On THURSDAY we will participate in the Run-A-Thon. And the big one... there is NO SCHOOL on Friday, November 10.
We are beginning testing for Progress Reports, so make sure to practice all the items we are testing this quarter. :)
We have three students joining the 6 Year Old Club... Mikenzie (the 8th), Leyah (the 11th) and Ahkbar (the 12th). When you see them, make sure to wish them a HAPPY BIRTHDAY!
MATH
We completed our End of Module Test and we are beginning Module 2- Shapes! We watched a few Youtube videos in class and we wanted to share them here. :)
READING
We are continuing to listen to stories and give a retelling of each story. **The students have been informed that a great retelling uses character names and tells ALL the events in the order that they happened. We are also looking at illustrations and telling what is happening. The more we practice, the better the students get! This week the stories we will read are The Wolf and the Seven Little Kids, Momotaro, Peach Boy, Jumping Mouse Part 1 and hopefully we have time to readJumping Mouse Part 2. Make sure to also use the vocabulary beginning, middle and end. Our test expects the students to be familiar with those words so that they can figure out events from any part of the story.
SAXON/ SIGHT WORDS/ SKILLS
Saxon has us working a LOT on coding with the breve and reading the CVC words. In class we are also working a lot on intial/ beginning sounds of words. Along with syllables and rhyming. Rhyming is a little tricky, so make sure to practice it at home!!
Here are our sight words for the week...
WRITING
The students will complete a writing sample and a grade will be taken. Make sure to discuss the fundamentals of writing: Begin with an uppercase letter, spaces in between words, chop up words you don't know and write the sounds you hear, sight words are ALWAYS spelled correctly, and end the sentence with punctuation. At the current time it's a period.
OUR CLASS SCIENCE FAIR PROJECT
We are continuing to collect data for our project. So far the students have noticed that the pumpkins are beginning to smell a little "weird" and that they are starting to secrete fluids. We are really hoping for more changes this week. So stay tuned!! :)
Here is a slideshow we've been using to practice chopping up and reading CVC (consonant vowel consonant) words. I have tried many times to post the slideshow and have the audio bites work, however I have had no luck. So... enjoy the slideshow on here and if you would like us to email it to you so that you may use the sound, send us an email.
Please make sure to email both of us so that you get a quicker response. :)
You may remember the flyer that went home last week about our Run-A-Thon. Well get ready because this Thursday, Nov. 9 the Run-A-Thon will be taking place!! :)
We want all of you to help support Chimney Lakes and support this fundraiser. So there are two ways to pledge your child's running. You can do a one time donation or you can pledge a dollar amount for every lap your child runs. :)
We checked to see how many students have received pledges for our class and at the current time Lucas is the only one... So get out there and spread the word. Then get some pledges for your child!!
Here is a link to the pledge page~ https://99pledges.com/fund/cle
The students loved every bit of Friday's field trip! Multiple times through out the day they told us "it was the best day ever." Hearing them say it just made us smile. :)
Well, we are compiling all of the pictures taken throughout the field trip, but we wanted to share a few pictures now. :) Here are the pictures we took on the bus, waiting to leave school. You'll notice we even got a picture of our bus driver, Ms.Tilman. She was the sweetest!! She told the students they were the best class/ group of kids she'd ever driven. Then she mentioned to us how she drives for the high schools... so we were very proud of our class!! :)
