January 7, 2011
Dear Parents,
It is hard to believe that 2011 is here already! It sounds like you all had
great vacations with your kids. They came back ready to learn and got back into the
swing of things very nicely. We will spend the month of January doing a unit on
winter that will include the topics of snow, penguins, and arctic animals. Also in
January, we will begin a F.O.S.S. unit called Liquids and Solids. This is a new unit
for first grade and one that is phasing out for second grade. Both grades will cover
this unit this year. Please see the plea for parent help with a special morning of
Science Stations (purple paper) in this Friday Folder!
The biggest excitement in the classroom is that we have started our formal
Writer’s Workshop! This is always a favorite for the kids. In Writer’s Workshop we
learn how to write stories, from rough drafts to published pieces and everything in
between. (Those of you who signed up at the beginning of the year to type stories, be
ready!) We will get into editing as well as the parts of a story including characters,
setting, plot, events, problems, and solutions. We will also work on the mechanics of
good writing such as using proper punctuation and capitalization. The kids like Writer’s
Workshop so much because they get to write stories about topics of their choosing. We
will continue with this through the rest of the year. The kids will keep their work in their
Writer’s Workshop folder here at school and I will keep their published stories until the
end of the year. You will be invited to an Author’s Tea at the end of the year where your
child will share their stories with you before taking them home. This is always very
motivational for the kids.
I can sure tell which students kept up with their reading over the vacation!
Thanks for all your help at home. We are back to sight vocabulary words and spelling
words as usual. Next week’s sight vocabulary words are:
Please find the attached spelling words.
We welcome Mrs. Shantelle Owen to our classroom! Mrs. Owen will be student
teaching with me until mid-April. I am looking forward to working with her….after all,
twice the teachers means twice the learning, right? Mrs. Owen will be a great asset to our
class.
Respectfully,