Ms. Maureen’s Class

November Newsletter

Dear Parents,

It’s November and soon it will be Thanksgiving! Talking about Thanksgiving, we will be making a special project that will involve the use of a pillowcase. If you have a pillowcase at home in one of the following colors: white, yellow, gold, tan, or light brown please send it in with your child by November 13^th.  If not, maybe you can go in on buying a package of two with one of your child’s classmates. He/she will be making a special outfit for our “Fall Harvest Class Party,” on November 26^th, which is an early release day at 12:30. If you would like to help by donating some fresh veggies etc, I will have a sign-up sheet posted on the bulletin board outside the classroom! Thank you ahead of time! Your help is always appreciated!

Important Dates to Remember for November!

November 4^th Tuesday is Picture Re-Take Day for those who would like pictures redone.

November 11^th Tuesday is Veteran’s Day and school is closed.

November 14^th Friday is a Special School Field Trip to the “27^th Annual Orme Dam Victory Days Celebration.”

                                   The children will be participating in the Yavapai Cultural Awareness Day on that Friday.

November 21^st Friday is Staff Development Day and it will be an early release day at 12:30.

November 26^th Wednesday is an Early Release Day. We will be having our “Fall Harvest Class Party!”

November 27 – 28^th Thursday and Friday will be Thanksgiving Break and school is closed.

I would like to gather a list of class emails and phone numbers, so we can have a class list for our parents to have. I have had many parents ask me if I had one, for they wanted to schedule a play date with a classmate and their child or write out party invitations, etc. I therefore decided to ask you to sign a clipboard outside the classroom door, if you would like to be a part of this list! You do not have to put your email or phone numbers on it, just your names! I should have that information on file. If you don’t I do and want to be a part of it, just let me know!

On the academic agenda, this month we will be studying the Native Americans of the Southwest. This is a wonderful unit which involves reading skills, sorting, and writing.

It will also be a great time to learn about the history of the Pilgrims, their first contact with the Native Americans, and their coming together in thanksgiving for the harvest they could all share and the time of peace they could enjoy.

We will also be continuing our studies of the human skeleton, which is actually a very long project and undertaking for Kinders! However they are doing it, enjoying it, and will eventually make their booklets with pride!

Mathematics has been humming along with everyone working at their own pace and getting comfortable with their knowledge and understanding. They start out working with the concrete materials and I then slowly introduce paper and pencil for them to write their calculations. It is amazing to see these very young children writing their numbers the best they can! Back in August I can remember some of them saying to me that they wanted to write down the problems and they could hardly write the numbers! So, I showed them how AND I of course gave them the paper and pencils to write their numbers! Now they are writing their numbers well and adding in their heads!

Their reading is coming along nicely and I am very happy that you are working with your children at home. The books they are reading will reinforce the concepts learned at school and the sound cards they are practicing and games they are playing will also engrain the much needed phonetic skills to help them along with their reading progress.

Your children are beginning to write creative stories on their own and with me as a group. Their own stories are a work-in-progress. In other words: there isn’t any time frame for them to be completed! You will get to see their stories after your child has perfected writing them through the many phases of the writing process. I will go through the process with each of them. It will take time, but there isn’t any rush! They will learn that there is a process to be followed and that their words can be spelled phonetically without having to ask someone how to spell them. Of course not all words follow the rules, but most do! Again, here is where that practicing at home helps! If they ask you how to spell a word, say it phonetically!

The stories they are creating with me are those which are a collaborative effort. I start the lesson with the children learning a group of rhyming words, which they will in turn incorporate into a story. They all love this lesson!

The first story we wrote was called The Funny Cake. The children had to come up with sentences about a funny cake that I could write on the whiteboard. After the story was written, the children copied it onto writing paper. When they (eventually) finish copying it, I will go over their papers with each of them and have them make the appropriate changes as needed. 

*Your child will be bringing home a permission slip today to attend the 27^th Annual Orme Day Victory Days Celebration with our school. If you want your child to go, please fill it out and have it returned to school by Friday, November 7^th. Since the whole school is going it is important that we have an accurate count very soon! Thank you!

I want to thank all of you for coming to your child’s conferences! It was so great to meet with you and to talk with you about your wonderful children! Thank you! See you soon!

Cordially,

Ms. Maureen and Ms. Kristin