Happy Fall

September 25, 2015

Dear Families,

Wednesday was the first day of fall. In the morning, you can feel the chill in the air. You can see the leaves turning beautiful colors. I love autumn! Our first Spirit Night fundraiser of the year is at Mooyah in The Orchard Town Center. On Tuesday, September 29th, from noon until 9:00, Mooyah will donate 15% of all sales generated by Prairie Hills back to our school. But if our sales surpass $1,000 they will donate 20%! Just be sure to mention you are with Prairie Hills when ordering; no flyer needed.  In addition to raising money for our students, all purchases made at Mooyah during the month of September also benefit the No Kid Hungry campaign. 

Our fall fundraising envelopes are due Friday, October 2! Just remember if every student sells at least one item or a $10 donation they will get to attend the one-item party!

In reading, everyone is in a reading group based on their reading ability. I want to remind you that homework should not be a battle. You are the best judge of what your child can handle. Send me an email, note in the folder or give me a call. I want your child to LOVE school. Hopefully, last week’s note helped answer some questions in this area.

As promised, I am going to talk a bit about writing this week. We teach writing with Interactive Writing, Guided Writing, writing mini lessons and Independent Writing with conferences. Interactive Writing (IAW) is where the students and I share the pen to write a story we negotiate together. Together, we go through the steps an author must go through to write a story, a list, a poem or a letter. Along the way I teach punctuation, grammar, sentence structure, word choice, organization, fluency, and try to help the budding authors develop a style. Guided Writing is where I meet with small groups that have similar writing abilities or have similar needs. Independent Writing is where everyone is writing about a topic of their own choosing. I am floating around conferencing with students on their writing. At conferences (October 8), I can be more specific with you.

 In math, we continue to focus on number concepts – counting (forward and back by 1s, 2s, 5s, and 10s), graphing, number combinations for 10 and using the number grid to solve problems. I will share the results of their first unit test with you at conferences. I am sure you will be pleased.

In Social Studies, we are finished talking about past, present and future and we will be able to share this first unit with you at conferences. I realized that I didn’t send the personal timeline in the Friday folder and sent it in the homework folder. I hope I didn’t stress anyone out. I just needed for you to give your child some things in their past to put on their personal timeline. This week we will complete the timeline and take a look at traditions.

October is Read Aloud Month and the beginning of the Pizza Hut Book-It program. It is based on reading (student reading or being read to) 20 minutes each night (the Pizza Hut program will continue with new monthly goals until March). If your child meets the goal, he/she will earn a certificate for a free Personal Pan Pizza at Pizza Hut. We will be using a color sheet for your child to keep track. Do not turn it in weekly. Return it by the first week of November to be eligible for the pizza. This is not extra reading. This is just an extra incentive for completing the reading homework – book bags and other reading you are asked to do daily. This can either be you reading to your child, reading with your child or reading by your child (or any combination of these).

If you have a specific question or concern, you may write in the comments section and I will address your question. As always, feel free to call or email with any concerns or just to check in. I also check email at home, so often times this is the quickest way to contact me.

 Please find the October book order in the Friday folder. I will send it in on October 2. Thank you for your support.

Sincerely, Susan Stark

susan.stark@adams12.org

720-972-8804

P.S. As you look at your child’s papers, you might notice a coffee stain on some of them. My husband had a little bit of coffee left in his cup he put by the computer. My daughter knocked the cup off and onto my very organized student file folder stored carefully by the usually food and drink free computer. I am sorry.    

September is in full swing!

September 18, 2015

Dear Families,

It’s hard to believe that we have been in school for about five weeks. The weather is getting a little cooler and I can tell fall is right around the corner. Before long, I expect to see the little white flakes tumbling out of the sky.

At school, we have been very busy learning. Our volunteer schedule began this week and I want to thank you. Everyone was so supportive and wonderful! I love assistants!

Since first grade is your child’s first real encounter with reading, it is natural to wonder how things are going for your child. Many parents have questions about levels, how their child is doing compared to other children and why I choose the books I do for their child. I will try to briefly explain a few things here. At conferences, I will be better able to individualize the explanation. Conference time is coming (Oct. 8). Watch for the Sign-up Genius invitation.

Books can be leveled by many different standards, but there are some common elements that are addressed. These include, but are not limited to, placement of text, repetition of sentence patterns, vocabulary, familiarity of objects and actions, illustrations and language structure. Learning to read is as developmental as learning to talk and children pass through similar stages, but at different rates. We use a system of leveling that uses numbers in our District. By the end of Kindergarten, we like to see children knowing all their letters and sounds and reading a level 3 on unseen text. So it follows that our expectation for the beginning of first grade is knowing all the letters and sounds and reading a level 3 on unseen text. By the end of first grade, the expectation is level 16-18 and knowing 100 High Frequency Words by sight. Remember, not all children pass through the stages at the same rate. Those that pass through more quickly are challenged with harder texts. Those that need more repetitions will get an additional dose of direct instruction to meet the grade level expectation. That is where we are right now – determining how your child’s needs can best be met using our testing to make a good fit (your child with other children with similar abilities).

Sometimes, a book will come home in a book bag that seems wrong for your child. You may even wonder if I am not accurately getting to know your child. Don’t despair! I carefully choose a book for your child’s group based on the number of new words in the book, the accessibility of the concepts and the level of the group.

There are times when after doing the “reading work” in group, your child may have the text committed to memory – remember they have less to remember on a daily basis. That is OK and a valuable part of learning to read. It is important to have your child point to each word. The goal is that after they have read a book they will have a larger bank of words to draw upon for the next book. At other times, it will seem as if the book is insurmountable. Soon, I will have a strategy card in the book bag that you can fall back upon to help your child. Gradually, I will teach your child many strategies. Since the English language is irregular, phonics can only help so far. Early readers need to use the structure of language and the meaning of language as supports to get to the unknown words.  Book bags began coming home on Monday. Usually book bags will come home Monday through Thursday. Next newsletter I will address writing.

Our first class book is complete and will begin to go home this week. Remember to send the book back as soon as you are finished, so the next family can enjoy it. Eventually, I hope for it to make its way around to all our families. I think you will enjoy the book. Bo Bear, our traveling bear will begin his weekend visits today. He comes with a bag, books and a journal for you and your child to write about his adventures at your house. I want your child to write as much as possible, but it is OK for your child to dictate to you as you write it. He, too, will come to everyone’s house.

For Social Studies, we celebrated Constitution Day on Thursday and signed our constitution

(which is our LARKS rules). In Social Studies, we also have been discussing the Language of Time. We sorted objects from long ago and the present. Then, we made a book about our past, present and future. Rounding out the unit, we studied a calendar and all the things we can learn from it.

As we begin out next unit of families and timelines, we will need your help to fill out a paper that will be used to assist your child with completing a personal timeline. Please find it in your child’s Friday folder. We wanted to give you the weekend to find the dates. A close estimate is fine.

In math, we have just finished our first unit on numeration and had the assessment this week. As always, thank you for your support. I couldn’t do my job without it.

Sincerely,

Susan Stark

The difference between setting and characters

https://youtu.be/NnK-iPF-8TI
https://youtu.be/HTpTB4fxigQhttps://youtu.be/lnUnxzNZzk8

Happy September

September 4, 2015

Dear Families,

       Thank you for returning the Friday Folders! I received 100% of them! Wow! I hope it helps to have all the notes and papers for the week coming home at one time. I have found that it is the best way for papers to make it home. I have told the children that when they return the folder, they will get a sticker on it. It can be a wonderful learning tool to have your child responsible for putting the folder back in their backpack after you have looked through the contents together.

Next, I want to address homework. Our first sheet of math homework went home on Wednesday. In our classroom, homework consists of 3 subject areas. First, we have home reading which will be explained in depth on another paper entitled Home Reading which will start on the 14^th. It runs Monday through Thursday. Second, I will be sending the home links from the Everyday Math 4 program. They serve the purpose of connecting what we learned in school to the home. Third, I will send home spelling words on Monday, the 14^th (or the first day of the week on any week that has at least 4 days). This page is due on Friday.

Of course, if your child needs to finish something from the day’s work, it will be in their backpack that day. Additionally, I want to encourage you to read to/with your child for 20 minutes, 4 times a week. Feel free to add more reading time or other homework. However, I strongly caution you to avoid overloading your young child. Research shows that 10 minutes of homework (+ 20 minutes of being read to) is sufficient for a first grader. Please remember that this is your child’s first real experience with homework. If they are resistant, back off a little. Reading, writing, exploring numbers and learning to spell should be a pleasant experience. Incentives are in place for those who do their homework, so hopefully, this will help. 

For reading this week, we broke up into groups and began getting used to rotating through centers. We will complete the reading and writing tests, along with MAPs (which is a computer-based test in literacy and math), by next Friday. I am now in the process of making sure I am meeting everyone’s needs. We began a poem this week to read, talk about and use to learn skills such as rhyming words, letters, letter combinations and grammar.

           For Writers’ Workshop this week, we learned about building our stamina for writing.

Now that we have learned how to make books, many stories are being written. We also began learning and writing our own meaning for the LARKS rules. With our Positive Behavior System in place, everyone works together for a more supportive learning environment. I am trying to use Class Dojo right along with my teaching so you can get a little window into our world.

In math, we have been working on tally marks, correct number formations and learning new games to help our understanding of number concepts. We will take the MAPs test in math next week. Our morning work has been addressing review of kindergarten math skills. It will evolve as we learn new first grade skills.

In Social Studies, we have been comparing schools of long ago and now. As we progress, we will also cover timelines and calendars. Using words like past, present and future, we will get a sense of time.

Thank you for your continued support. If I can be of assistance in any way, please feel free to contact me.

Sincerely,

Susan Stark