October 3rd Newsletter

Dear Parents and Guardians,

Signs of fall are all around and we enjoyed some of them last Friday on our trip to Shalom Wildlife.  Many children will hopefully be writing about their experience during writing workshop.  You can help by asking them about the tour:

• What did you learn about the bears, Lewis and Clark?
• How did you feel about Hissimee (hiss - i - me), the bobcat who was declawed and couldn't hunt for food in the wild?   (We really work on empathy and trying to understand others' perspectives.  This question helps your child think from the perspective of a bobcat who was declawed and therefore unable to survive on his own in the wild.)
• I heard that cougars, or mountain lions are pretty dangerous... what did you learn about them?

Our guide knew so many interesting things about animals!  It really was a great field trip!

This week, we hope to capture some of their stories in writing!  We'll be working on making our stories clear and understandable, by telling them in sequence.  In reading, we will focus on thinking about what word would make sense when we get stuck reading because "sounding it out" doesn't work all the time.  We'll also practice retelling some of our stories, making sure to include the important parts of the story.  This will help us understand what we should be paying attention to in a story.  Both of these skills will be something we practice a lot throughout the year.  

In math this week we will be learning about telling time to the hour and half hour and counting by 2’s and 5’s.  We will also continue to work on our addition and subtraction facts.  Please practice with your child at home until they become fluent with these facts.  Look for Home Links 2.4 and 2.5 to come home this week.  It would also be beneficial to practice skip counting by 2's, 5's and 10's and counting combinations of nickels and pennies with your children!  Ask them about some of the fun games we have been playing in class to help them with these concepts.

This week we will begin our Land and Water science unit.  We will investigate rocks and recognize that rocks and soil are part of Earth's land that people use.

Special Points of Interest

• Annual Donut Breakfast is next Thursday, October 13th
• THANK YOU to all of the families that sent in napkins, Ziploc bags, paper towels and brown bags, we appreciate your generosity!