Monday Update: January 10, 2011

Dear parents,

It is great to be back at school after our winter break! I hope everyone enjoyed the time with family. Just want to warn you, this is a bit of a lengthy update!

This week we will be learning about the letter u, and continue talking about comparing numbers to one another (which is greater, less). Also, we will be beginning student weather forecasts tomorrow (Monday), and they will continue through February, so that every child has an opportunity to present and record a weather forecast.

Please continue practicing sight words with your child at home. I am quizzing all the students this week, and will be beginning our word clubs. They will range from the 30 word club all the way to the 100+ word club, depending upon how many words your child can successfully read upon sight. The most commonly used Dolch sight words are attached at the bottom of this e-mail for your reference.

As the end of the grading period approaches (January 20th), I will be getting in contact with parents individually if we are in need of scheduling a parent/teacher conference.

If you would like to volunteer in our classroom AND have already been fingerprinted please let me know! Volunteer times will be from 9:00 - 11:00 to complete art projects or read to children, or from 1:30 - 2:30 to assist in math activities and centers. The best days to volunteer without interruption from specials classes fall on January 11, 13, 19, 20, 26, and 31. If any inclement weather days occur, I may have to tweak these days/times.

Please pack your child a snack each day, as our class is running low on our reserve of "extra" snacks. If you would like to donate some extra snacks for our class, I would greatly appreciate any donations.

On another note, keep up with the wonderful practice sounding out words with your child at home. I have been seeing some huge improvements in sounding out and confidence in writing from when we began at the beginning of kindergarten!

Also, I had some excellent news over winter break, as our class has been funded for a Donors Choose grant I wrote at the beginning of the year. Our class will soon be receiving new reading centers to be used daily - letter sorting kits, alphabet letter magnet centers, play-dough letter stampers, and more. We are very excited to be receiving these resources, and I will soon be sending home a permission slip for your child to write a thank you note and to be included in a class photo to be sent to the donor who funded the grant. Look for the form in your child's take-home binder. If you would like to view our class' Donors Choose web site and view other projects I have listed there, you can visit it at http://www.donorschoose.org/mrs.colwell

Dolch sight words:

http://www.mrsperkins.com/files/dolchpre.pdf
http://www.mrsperkins.com/files/dolchpri.pdf


Thank you for your continued support!