Announcements: Saturday,De. 5: Holiday Shop at Addison Friday,Dec. 11: First Grade Winter Literacy Day Thurs. Dec. 17: Holiday Party 1:15-2:00 Friday,Dec. 18: End of Second Quarter Dec. 21- Jan 4: No School/Winter Holidays Dear 209 Families: Thanks to all of you who donated to the Food Drive. Some of you have also been very generous, sending things in for the classroom. We appreciate your keeping us stocked and for volunteering to help in many ways. Students have had fun learning about plane and solid/3-D shapes using marshmallows and toothpicks. After Thanksgiving, we will make a class powerpoint on shapes found around us in our world and explore using geoboards and rubber bands. I hope your students are also enjoying making the Shape Creature and writing about it. The class will also make solid geometric shaped decorations for our holiday tree out of construction paper. In science, students investigated magnets by making their own "magnetic-powered" sock puppets this past week. Your 6 and 7 year olds have also been doing a lot of information processing lately about the first Thanksgiving. They have learned about some of the problems Pilgrims encountered on the Mayflower and during that first winter in our land. They each determined that there were hard things about the situation and thought about what it would be like, evaluating the pros and cons of coming over to America. Our class will be moving on to learn more about Thomas Jefferson - our second American Hero. Your children will be making connections and comparing and contrasting his life,character traits, and accomplishments with those of Ben Franklin. The December homework calendar will go home on Monday, Nov. 30. Please have students practice math facts (subraction and addition) to 12 along with homework. I will not be sending home the extra math sheets, but I will expect students to be working on math fact accuracy and speed. Some of the children are already fine with this skill, but many of them are still struggling. If you need flashcards for practicing facts, please let me know. Also, students will be expected to count 50 cents in various ways, using different combinations of quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies. The next two weeks of school will include several types of assessments for the second quarter in each subject. A new semester begins January 5 when students return from Winter Holidays. Report cards are typically not distributed until conference week, January 25-29. Thanks for helping your children be successful. Friday, December 11, is our "Winter Literacy Day." This is a fun curriculum- filled day. The students rotate for half of the day, so that they are in 6 different first grade classrooms by lunchtime. Each classroom integrates language arts, and in some cases other subjects, into the activities. The standards-based learning activities center around a "Polar Express" theme. The children have permission to wear pajamas to school that day as they become immersed in learning through fun, hands-on experiences. Our holiday party is Thursday, December 17, from 1:15-2:00. First grade classes all exchange books for gifts to classmates. You may send either a new or a gently-used book, so that you do not have to feel that you need to "buy" a new one. On Friday, the 18, students will be dismissed for Winter Break with a whole-school sing-a-long in the cafeteria. Have a wonderful week with your families. December will be busy, but very productive, as the children continue to learn and grow as readers, writers, scientists, historians, mathematicians, and great citizens. Sincerely, Mrs. Hatcher