February 6, 2014THURSDAY NEWSLETTER

Dear Parents,

We had another short week! On Wednesday, we celebrated the 100th day of school! It finally arrived! The children looked awesome in their cool 100-themed clothing. We joined first and second grade for a parade around the school to show other students the different ways we can wear 100 things! For snack, we made our trail mix. It took a while, but we chose ten snacks, and picked ten of each, which gave us 100 trail mix items—it was delicious! Thank you so much for sending in items that we could use for our trail mix! In the afternoon, we did a 100’s day craft. The children had to count 100 noodles and use all 100 noodles to make a picture. We still have yet to color them, but they will go home when we are finished.

Religion: We completed our unit titled “God Helps Us to Discover.” We reviewed all of the ways we can use our senses to learn about our world and enjoy God’s creation. We learned different ways of praying to thank God for the sense he gave us. We discussed our favorite things to see, smell, taste, hear, and touch, and we agreed it would be very sad if we weren’t able to sense these things. Thank God we have our five senses!

Math: We continued our unit on measurement this week. We spent the week reviewing our comparative vocabulary words (shorter/taller, longer/shorter, more/less, hot/cold, heavy/light) and the proper way to measure lengths and height using cubes. We took our test on measuring today, which are already graded and will go home Monday! We will begin our chapter on numbers beyond twenty next week. Please continue to practice the number flashcards each night—it will help your child ease through the next chapter.

Language Arts: This week, we continued Unit 7. Our focus was on seasons. We learned two new letters this week, Bb and Ll. We also learned two new high-frequency words this week and and what. The gesture for B is pretending you are swinging a baseball bat, and the gesture for L is pretending you are licking a lollipop. We practiced recognizing these sounds at the beginning and end of words. This week, we continued to identify the setting in stories we read. Setting is where and when a story takes place (ex: the forest, at a school, etc). Please practice reading each night. I also encourage you to give your child oral spelling tests as often as possible.

Science/ Social Studies: This week we learned about the last sense—touch. Our sense of touch can tell us the shape and texture of an object and how the temperature of objects. Our hands have a lot of nerves in them, which is why we most often feel things with our hands and fingertips. We also learned about Rosa Parks this week, because February is Black History Month. Rosa Parks was brave enough to stand up for what is fair. She refused to give up her seat on a bus when a white person wanted her seat. This led to a boycott of the buses, and eventually, the law changed and allowed all people to ride on the bus, front or back, and they wouldn’t have to give up their seat.

What did you do in school? This week’s questions:

How does our sense of touch keep us safe? (if something is hot, we know to move away from it)

What did Rosa Parks do? (stay in her seat on the bus) Where did this happen? (Alabama) What does boycotting the bus mean? (African Americans stopped using the bus because

they were being treated unfairly) Spell bat (b-a-t) Spell lip (l-i-p) Spell lab (l-a-b) What vowel do you hear in the word “sit?” (i) What vowel do you hear in the word “bed?” (e) What vowel do you hear in the word “mad?” (a)

This week for centers, the children played roll a sight word, put together three-scene sequence cards in order, and played a vowel sort game at the rug.

Please note the important upcoming events: Friday, February 7:

o No School—teacher institute Friday, February 14:

o No PM Buseso Casual Day—wear red!o Class Valentine’s Day party!

Monday, February 17:o No School- Presidents’ Day!

Thursday, February 27:o No Buses

Friday, February 28:o Mardi Gras Mission Party 1pm (details will go home soon)o Casual Day—Mardi Gras colors (green, purple, and gold)o No PM Buses

Monday, March 3:o No Buses

Wednesday, March 5:o Ash Wednesday

Thank you, everyone, for making the 100th day of school such a success! This is just a reminder that if anyone is willing to donate Jewel gift cards for cooking and other class activities that involve food, they would be greatly appreciated!

Have a great weekend!

Mrs. Hanrahan