Little Vikings

I apologize for not sending out our newsletter last week, we got busy and time slipped away from me! Don't worry I'll hit you with the highlights of both weeks.

We have completed up to the letter D as a class and will use this short week as a review of the four letters, their sound and how to write them. I have also broken the students into some learning teams. They will stay with these groups as we move through daily Language Arts and Writing stations.

We have begun shape recognition and will now start using these to make and understand patterns. Our number recognition and counting still comes primarily from calendar time and graphing things at circle time, but we will start some worksheets as well next week.

We continue to learn about farm life. So far we have learned about the cycle of apples and made apple sauce, how farmers grow pumpkins, what's inside of them and made the seeds into a crunchy treat and had a visit from Visitation's very own bee keeper John Meyers! We wowed him with our knowledge on bees and honey and he treated us to honey sticks and a video about bee keepers. We will continue to learn about animals on the farm and their jobs, create more fun art for our mural and cook some more yummy treats. Allowing your student to help cook at home is a great way to integrate math, science, reading and comprehension all into one tasty lesson.

Thanks to all for letting your students wear their awesome costumes to school, sending in fun snacks and donating your valuable time to make our party great! We did lacing art, made treats and used a chemical reaction from baking soda and vinegar to make a pumpkin blow it's top! Later we showed off our costumes to the whole school at a pep assembly, all in all a great day!

• It's cold! Please Make sure to send a warm, weather proof coat to school. We don't go to recess in the rain, but we do have to beat feet to the gym on blustery days!
• Please send a water bottle with your student daily. We get very thirsty and are running out of disposable cups which are expensive and bad for the environment.
• No school Friday November 10. 2017 to honor Veteran's Day.

This is a contest near and dear to my heart! Every time your student brings in a non-perishable food or hygiene item between now and Nov 17th we will take them to trade it for a turkey feather. We will put the feathers on our poor cold naked little turkey to warm him up! The class that collects the most feathers will earn a party and their teacher will have to wear the coveted turkey hat the whole day, it is quite an honor! There is also a note sent home each week with bonus items, an item off this list will get you 5 feathers for that week only! We are using this contest to teach the students about the Corporal Works of Mercy and how it is our job to FEED THE HUNGRY! We are also using it discuss how communities work, how everything costs money and how you have to work hard to be a part of a successful community!