Merry Christmas

I wanted to take a moment to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! I hope that everyone has a wonderful break from school.

I hope that you take a little time to read. I know that it seems like a drag to read over a break...but it will help so much to read a little bit.

I also want to ask that you please check with your child to see if they need new crayons, twistables, or scissors. We have plenty of glue, and we will be using a new folder after the holidays. If you did not send two 1 inch binders a the beginning of the year, the students will need one after the break. We will change to a new binder in January. I will only change binders for students that have one at school.

I look forward to a wonderful second half of first grade!

Happy Holidays! See you January 6th!

Ms. Messick

December 15th - 19th

Well the final school week of December has arrived and we are counting the days until our break! We are all VERY excited.

This week in whole group, we will be working on the /wh/ as in whale sound. At least we are going to try and work on that sound. The excitement will be hard to overcome, but in class we understand business and fun.

We will also do some fun craft activities. Hopefully, this will help with overwhelming excitement of this time of the year.

THURSDAY:
We are going to cancel the Holidays Around the World that was originally planned for Thursday. Once we got our specialist schedule, we decided that it would be more difficult to try and work around the break time and lunch. We will talk about some of the different customs for other countries in our classroom, but no moving around to other classrooms.

Thursday afternoon is still on though. ALL CLASSROOM PARTIES WILL BEGIN AT 1:30 pm. Any and all parents are invited to attend. If you volunteered for DRINKS, please make sure that you bring JUICE BOXES ONLY, as we can not serve any soft drinks at school. If you have questions or have not volunteered to bring or help out and want to, please contact Cathey Sarris at catsarris@yahoo.com .

FRIDAY:
We will be viewing the movie "The Polar Express". I will be sending home a permission slip for you to sign and return. Students will be allowed to wear their pajamas to school on Friday. I have also told the students that they may bring a beach towel to use on the floor on Friday. We will be having a little snack during the movie...chocolate milk and butter cookies. YUM!

We will do our book exchange on Friday after the movie. Please send a wrapped book that is appropriate for a boy or girl. Please do not spend more than $5 on your book. I would like to have all books at school on Thursday, if possible.

I hope that this holiday season finds your families blessed and in the best of health! I wish you all the most wonderful time off, try to do something fun with your children, remember they are only this age once! Please read over the break!

Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas!

Ms. Messick

December 8th ~ 12th

I noticed today that we have less than 10 days until Winter Break! WOW, that is no time at all! I can't believe that it is almost here.

In our classroom, we are trying to conduct business as usual. This week we are working on the sound /ar/ as in star and shark. Our work this week will be about stars, farms, barns, and sharks. We will cover lots of information. Please try to reinforce the information at home by reading books about these subjects at home. Go to the Christmas tree FARM and talk about how that is different from a farm that has cows, pigs, and goats. Next week we will try to cover /wh/ as in whale. Knowing that we will be getting out of school on Friday may make that a little harder, but hopefully we will get a little bit in before all of that kicks in.

We completed Chapter 12 in math today. We will test on Chapter 12 on Wednesday and begin Chapter 13. Chapter 13 will work on addition and subtraction to sums of 12. Keep a look out for homework.

We have started doing Daily Language Review. The daily practice pages will come home in the homework folder. These DO NOT have to be returned to school, instead you should practice at home with your student. We will quiz on these on Fridays. I am going to practice the quiz with the students this week, then in January, I will begin taking grades on the quizzes. We will continue to cover the Grammar rules in the BEE Book. We have been working on Verbs.

I hope that you have found the Reading Homework packets helpful. These should help with reading ability and sight words. Over the Winter Break, I will send home some passages to read. I will also make sure everyone has new library books for the holiday. Please read with your student over the holiday. This is the time when 1st grade students make the most progress. I would love to have lots of excited readers when we come back from Winter Break.

Upcoming Events and Dates:

Thursday, December 11th: DIBELS Testing, 10:30 am.

Monday, December 15th: Reading Homework Packets Due

Tuesday and Wednesday, December 16th and 17th: January Quilt Days
Be at the school at about 12:30. I may have more than just quilt stuff for you do to, if you want to stay and help.

Thursday, December 18th (AM): Holidays Around the World
My classroom will be about England. We will make Krackers.

(PM): 1:30 to 2:15 pm HOLIDAY PARTY

Friday, December 19th: Students may wear their PJs. We will watch Polar Express in the morning. We will also have a little snack.

As always, if you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me!

Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas!

Ms. Messick

December 1st - 5th

WOW! December has gotten off to a quick start. Time is just flying by!

This week in whole group we are discussing /oo/ as in moon and moose. We have been doing quite a bit of work on information about the moon. In small group reading, we have done a little reorganizing. Several students have made quite a bit of progress and have changed reading groups. I know that I sent home quite a bit of reading homework this week, take your time and send it back next Monday. I am going to continue sending extra reading sheets and some sight word work. I hope that you find this helpful.

This week in math we have started skip counting (counting by 2s, 5s, and 10s). We will be challenged with several other ways to count. We will be taking our time with this chapter. I don't want to rush anyone through this section. It is important for the students to be able to count using this method. Practice counting this way at home, using M & Ms, Skittles, Goldfish, or anything else you can get your hands on.

Our grammar rule this week is rule 12, which is Verbs. Wednesday, I sent home the phonogram journal. We have completed our final phonogram for the year, so these folders do not need to be sent back to school. Next week, we will begin doing DOL (Daily Oral Language).

Just a head's up...I plan on putting a packet of reading passages together for Winter Break. This is a major growth period for 1st graders. You will be amazed how well they are reading after the Winter Holidays. I love January during 1st grade, because the students become so much more independent. Please make an effort to spend 30 to 45 minutes reading these passages and practicing oral reading with your child. Please continue to review and learn the word wall words, as well.

Upcoming Events:

12/4: Teacher Treat Day!

12/11: DIBELS Testing @ 10 am.
Please try to be on time and get plenty of rest the night before.

12/18: A.M. Holidays Around the World
P.M. Holiday Parties (1:30 - 2:15)
Have a wrapped book for a book exchange!

12/19: Polar Express...wear your P.J.s.

Hope you have a happy and blessed holiday season!

Ms. Messick