What's New!
May 17, 2015
As the final weeks and nicer weather start to arrive, so do end of the year field trips. This week we will pack three special events into one week. On Wednesday, we will be having lunch at Camden Playground and enjoying an afternoon at the park as our reward for collecting the most coins in the coin war during Advent. We will be meeting the other area Catholic Schools at the park on Wednesday to enjoy a nice play day. Please remember to pack a sack lunch and drink for the trip. We will be leaving school at 11:30 and arriving back around 2:30. Due to Wednesday mass, the students will need to wear their uniforms to school but may bring a change of casual clothes to change into before we leave for the park.
Thursday, is our zoo trip. We will be visiting Henry Villas Zoo to see an animal presentation and tour the zoo. Students may dress in school appropriate casual clothes for this trip. Please remember to pack a sack lunch with disposable containers and a drink. A morning snack will be provided on the bus as we ride up to the zoo. Please pay close attention to the weather and dress students appropriately. If your child will need sunblock, please apply before coming to school on Thursday. We will be leaving school at 8:30 and arriving back around 2:30.
Our last special event will be our school picnic on Friday. The students will be served eat a sack lunch and drink at Jefferson Park and then participate in several organized games before heading back to school for ice cream sundaes. We will be leaving school around 11:00 and walking over to Jefferson Park. We will arrive back at school between 2:00 and 2:30. The students are invited to wear school appropriate casual clothes for the picnic. Please apply any need sunscreen before coming to school.
In addition to our school days winding down, so are our take home book bags. This week will be the last time for the red book bags. We have finished up our last review unit in spelling so there will not be a spelling test this week. Please encourage your child to keep reading through out the rest of the year and summer to keep up their decoding and comprehension skills. The class has worked very hard to become fluent readers and I am so proud of all of their accomplishments.
Lastly, thank you for helping make this year's Spring Program as success. The kids did a great job show casing what they have been working on in music class and were so excited to share it with family and friends. This time of year is very busy for kids and parents so I appreciate that you all were able to make an evening of it and enjoy the show.
Week in Review:
Religion: Family continues to be our focus as we discuss how important it is for families to share love and kindness with each other and people we meet.
Reading/Language: We are finishing up with adjectives by learning how to compare nouns by adding er or est to the end of adjectives. The class also enjoyed playing a game called Sentence Chef to combine all of the parts of speech to make some very silly sentences.
Spelling: This week we spent reviewing several long vowel combinations, ed & ing endings, and compound words.
Math: We finished up with our measurement unit and began to discuss two digit addition.
Science: We continued to discuss how to keep our bodies safe and healthy. This week we focused on germs and how we can prevent germs from spreading. We experimented with different ways to cover a sneeze to see which works best and then watched the memorable video called "The Sneeze: How Germs are Spread" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssYvrtwFb8M. The kids were very disgusted. Lesson learned.
I hope you all had a wonderful weekend and I look forward to seeing everyone on Monday. I know this is a busy week so please call or email if you have any questions.
Mrs. Olson
May 10, 2015
We are quickly approaching our Spring Program. Wednesday, May 13th at 1:00 and 6:30, the Kindergarten through fifth grade students will be performing several songs that they have been working on in music class this trimester. Please send your child's program clothes to school with them on Wednesday for the afternoon performance. We will change out of our uniforms and into our nice clothes for the program after lunch. I will make sure all program outfits go home in the afternoon so the students will have them for the evening performance. Students should be dressed in their program attire and at school by 6:15 on Wednesday evening. We will meet in our classroom to line up and prepare for the program. You may pick up your child in the first grade classroom at the conclusion of the program. We look forward to seeing everyone at the program.
Last week, permission slips were sent home for our upcoming field trips to Camden Park and Henry Vilas Zoo, please sign and return the slips as soon as possible. Please remember that it is school policy that all chaperons must be VIRTUS trained before attending the trip and that younger siblings who are not part of the field trip may not attend with chaperons. Chaperon selection will be on a first come first serve basis.
The final date to take Accelerated Reader tests will be on May 18th by 3:00. Please get your final tests taken by this date. Final prizes and raffle tickets will be calculated after this date. All library books will be due on May 29th. The Hedberg Public Library will be coming on June 5th to present the Summer Reading Program at the library. The Summer Reading Program is a great way to keep kids reading throughout the summer.
Week in Review:
Religion: We began a new unit on Family this week. We have touched on the Sacrament of Marriage and how a family goes in size and strength.
Spelling: Our lesson this week focused on compound words. We worked on reading, writing, and building compound words using two small words to make a bigger one with a different meaning. WE WILL NOT HAVE A SPELLING TEST ON FRIDAY, MAY 15th. We will spend next week reviewing our last few lessons.
Reading/Language: We are continuing to work on fluency and accuracy as we read to boost our reading levels. We will be finishing up with adjectives next week as we learn how to use them to compare different objects.
Math: Our measurement unit will end this week as we work on determining which tools work best for different measuring tasks. We will start to work on double digit addition and subtraction without regrouping and fractions before the end of the year.
Science/Social Studies: We are working on various seasonal themes infused with in our reading and writing.
I hope everyone had a very special weekend and I look forward to seeing you all as we work our way through this busy week.
Mrs. Olson
May 3, 2015
In keeping with the spirit of May Day, the first graders also created May baskets for our older 6th grade and younger 4K prayer partners. The class used our religion time on Friday to make paper flowers with candy centers and baskets. Just before lunch we secretly hid the baskets in our prayer partner's lockers for a sweet spring surprise. The first graders were surprised by the 6th graders at lunch when they delivered butterflies with M&M wings to the girls at the lunch table. It was a great day of friendship and sharing mixed in with our regular Friday routine.
The annual K through 5 Spring Program will be on Wednesday, May 13th at 1:00 and 6:30. The kids have been working very hard in music class to practice their songs for the program. Each class will present a few tunes to showcase what they have been working on this trimester. Please keep an eye on the family envelope for information regarding dress requirements for the program and the arrival time for the evening performance. The kids are very excited to share their songs with you and I look forward to seeing you all again.
Lastly as the year starts to wind down, Mrs. Houge has set the deadline for the final Accelerated Reader test date. The final date to take AR tests will be May 18th. Many of the kids are very close to their final goal, so encourage them to keep reading.
Week in Review:
Religion: We finished our unit on living the Gospels and took our chapter test on the unit. The students also listened to a story of a modern day missionary, Mother Teresa. Sister Mary also came in to talk to class about her missionary experience in Honduras and Panama.
Spelling: Words with ING was the focus of our lesson this week. We worked on reading, writing, and spelling words with an ing ending.
Reading/Language: We continued to work on self-monitoring and correcting our reading errors while we read our chapter books this week. We also continued to discuss adjectives for size, shape, and color.
Math: This week's measurement focus was on measuring the weight of objects. The class learned how to use measurement tools like a balance and scale. We compared the weight of objects in pounds and determined which items were heavier or lighter.
Science: We are focusing on keeping ourselves healthy by limiting our exposure to germs. We are discussing hand washing, covering our mouth when we sneeze and cough, and getting plenty of sleep when we are not feeling well.
It was a fun and busy week. I hope everyone was able to get out and enjoy the outdoors this weekend. I look forward to hearing about all of the adventures from the weekend when we return on Monday. Have a great rest of the weekend and I will see everyone next week.
Mrs. Olson
April 26, 2015
We spent most of the beginning of the week getting ready for the Science Fair. We created our skeletal projects to display at the fair. In addition to putting our skeletal bones in the correct order, we also included the lungs, heart, and stomach in our display. Next week we will continue our discussion on the body by switching to how to keep our bodies healthy and safe.
Work also continued on our measurement unit this week. Truth be told, this part was some of the most fun of the week. The first graders learned the term capacity and what it means. We discussed the units we would use to measure how much liquid a container could hold like cups, pints, quarts, and gallons. The class learned how compare and convert the units to find out which group of containers held more liquid. We used the Kingdom of Gallon story to help us remember our equivalents. Mr. Castrogiovanni stopped by for a visit and got to see all of the excitement while we measured, poured, and compared containers.
This week, we also celebrated Earth Day. We watched a power point presentation discussing the creation of Earth Day and why it is such an important concept. The day continued with lots of discussions on how we as first graders could help the Earth and we even created a writing project to share our ideas with others. We ended the day with a school campus trash pick up with our Pre-K, kindergarten, and second grade friends. The combined efforts filled up a giant bag of collected trash.
Week in Review:
Religion: We discussed the Gospels and how they share the Good News about Jesus and how we can be like the disciples and share the Good News with others.
Spelling: Adding ed to verbs was our lesson this week. We worked on reading, writing, and spelling words with the ed at the end.
Reading/Language: We continued to talk about adjectives. This week we talked about weather adjectives and color adjectives. We also wrote about ways we can help the Earth.
Math: Measuring capacity using cups, pints, quarts, and gallons was our lesson this week. We compared several different types and sizes of containers using the units of measurement.
Science: We continued to learn about how our body works together and the different types of systems that are at work in our body at all times to keep us functioning.
It was great to see you all this week at the Science Fair. I hope you all had a wonderful and restful weekend. I look forward to seeing everyone next week.
Mrs. Olson
April 19, 2015
Our current project is the Science Fair. The middle school students have been working on a wide variety of individual science projects that they will showcase at Thursday's Science Fair. Each of the lower grade classrooms will also be showcasing units and projects that they have been working on. As a culmination to this year's Science Fair, a "Fire and Ice" science presentation will be presented by Mad Science. The first graders have been working on a health and our body unit during science. We will be showcasing our body outline with a skeleton and organs that we have studied along with a lung demonstration. The kids are very excited so we hope you are all able to be there on Thursday.
In addition to preparing for the Science Fair, we have also been working on learning how to create an explanatory writing piece. We created a piece together about a recent art project we did during class then we brainstormed other ideas we could write about. Each student picked their own topic to explain in writing. The students worked through the steps of pre-writing, drafting, editing, and publishing before the final project was completed. I was very proud of how hard they worked and were able to create a well written and illustrated paper. The final projects are displayed in our hallway.
This Wednesday is Earth Day! We will be working on several reading, writing, and science lessons centering around Earth Day. We are going to end the day with a school campus clean-up with the kindergarten and second graders. The students are welcome to bring any work or garden glove to use during the clean-up. We will have some disposable latex work gloves available to use if students do not have some from home.
Week in review:
Religion: We are focusing on the Easter season and God's forgiveness. We listened to some parables about forgiveness and worked with the second graders to create a bead cross to remind us to forgive others as God forgives us.
Spelling: This week we focused on the long o sound using the oa and ow to spell the long o sound. We read, wrote, and spelled several words using long o.
Reading/Language: We are working on how to self monitor when we read and correct any errors to help build our comprehension. We learned how to peer edit each other's writing and worked on finishing the final explanatory writing.
Math: We are continuing to work on our measurement unit. We worked with predicting and measuring in inches, feet, and yards. We will move into measuring capacity using cups, pints, quarts, and gallons next week.
Science: We worked on creating our bodies and skeletons for the science fair.
I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and I look forward to seeing you all next week.
Mrs. Olson
This week has been a very fun and busy week in first grade. We spent the week tying up loose ends and getting ready to finish up many of our units. One of the most exciting things we accomplished this week was learning how to tell time to the hour and half hour. The class is very intrigued by how the clock works and how we know what time it is...on an analog clock. All of the kids agreed telling time on a digital clock is much easier. Please encourage them to practice reading the clock for the hour and half hour. Now that their curiosity is peeked, they are anxious to learn more about time. I think we will briefly try telling time by minutes next week.
Along with telling time this week, we also celebrated Saint Patrick's Day on Tuesday. You may have heard about the terrible mess the leprechaun left in our classroom. Mr. Castrogiavanni visited our classroom during the day to read a story about Saint Patrick and the legends that he is known for. We followed up the story by making a pipe cleaner shamrock magnet for our lockers since Saint Patrick used the shamrock to teach the people about the three parts of God. We all had a great time celebrating the feast day together.
Mrs. McIntyre also visited our room this week for our monthly guidance lesson. This week she used her stuffed wolf friend, Dakota, to teach the class about the importance of accepting others and their differences. The kids listened to a story about Dakota and a forest friend and participated in a whole group activity to practice the lesson. We look forward to seeing what Dakota will teach us next month.
Next week will be our last week together before the end of the Lenten Season. Please remember to complete your Good Deed Alms Giving Crosses over the weekend. The coins from the crosses will need to be returned to school on Monday, the 23rd in a zip lock bag. We will be using the coins as part of the offering at mass on Wednesday. The students will also be attending the Living Stations of the Cross on Friday at 2:00.
Week in review:
Religion: We continued to discuss Sacraments and how they show God's love for us.
Spelling: This week we reviewed the spelling patterns for long e, long a, and long i. We worked on reading, writing, and spelling words with these patterns.
Reading/Language: We worked on identifying and writing verbs in the past tense and continued to review contractions. We also did some creative writing about leprechauns.
Math: We worked a little bit on counting coins but mostly worked on learning to tell time to the hour and half hour.
Science/Social Studies: We are continuing to work on parts of the body and how they work together.
I hope you all have a wonderful and restful weekend. I look forward to seeing you all next week.
Mrs. Olson
March 15, 2015
Welcome Spring! The long anticipated weather has finally come. The kids and I have made many interesting observations about the weather this week and continue to marvel at how quickly things can change here in Wisconsin. Last week, we were inside for recess due to below 0 wind chills and less than a week later, we are playing at recess in our spring coats. Wow, what a change. We are ready for the change for sure.
As Spring approaches, that means we are about half way through our Lenten Season. We are continuing to work on our Lenten promises and collect coins for our Alms Giving Crosses. Please remember to return the coins from the Alms Giving Crosses to school on March 23rd. During our religion classes with the second graders, we have been learning and praying the Stations of the Cross. All of the students will be attending the presentation of the Living Stations of the Cross on March 27th at 2:00 in the church. Families are invited to attend the presentation as well.
Remember to keep saving and sending in your pop tabs. At the halfway point of our collection, we have already exceeded our goal of 35 pounds of tabs. Currently, we have collected 37 pounds of pop tabs and I keep seeing more come in each day. It will be very exciting to see how many we can collect for this wonderful cause and to know that we had a hand in helping so many children and families. Keep up the good work.
Thank you to all of the families for helping this year's Salad Luncheon be a great success. The gym was transformed into a beautiful and spring looking eating area with a wide variety of delicious looking dishes to choose from. All patrons looked to be enjoying the atmosphere and meals. The Salad Luncheon has been a long standing tradition for our school and helps fund many projects for our students.
Lastly, this week we introduced some new ipad apps to the class. We used several different apps in both math and reading to work on developing our skills. The kids loved the new apps and wanted to share them with their families. I posted the new apps in the sites and apps page of the blog for those of you who are interested in looking at the apps. Have fun!
Week in review:
Religion: We are continuing to discuss the Sacraments of the church, beginning with Baptism. We are also continuing to work through the Lenten Season by learning the Stations of the Cross.
Spelling: This week we focused on the long i sound using just the letter y. We worked on reading, writing, and spelling words using the letter y. We had fun searching for long i words in our reading books and then sorting them into the different spelling patterns.
Reading/Language: This week we started our new reading groups and started focusing on strategies to build fluency and accuracy as we read. We also learned how to form contractions using not, will, is, and are.
Math: We used our knowledge of coin values to count different combinations of coins, create equal amounts of coins, and count combinations of coins to equal a dollar. We also practiced counting coin groups to determine if we had enough money to buy certain objects.
Science/Social Studies: We finally started our Health and Body unit (no side tract discussions this week). We learned how our bones, muscles, and brains work together to help us move. We had a lot of fun flexing muscles to show contracting and relaxing of our muscles.
This has been a fabulous weekend for getting outside and enjoying the weather. I hope you all were able to take advantage of the weather and have a terrific weekend! I look forward to seeing you all next week.
Mrs. Olson
March 8, 2015
Happy Birthday Dr. Suess! We had a blast this week celebrating the birthday of the beloved Dr. Suess. We started the week reading The Cat in the Hat, which was written to help small children learn some basic words and make reading enjoyable. We also created several writing and craft projects using some of our favorite Suess books. Our favorite part of the week was being able to teach our other Saint Mary's friends and teachers a few interesting facts we learned from reading Dr. Suess' biography. My personal favorite, was using some of Dr. Suess' quotes to teach the students to always follow their passions and never give up when things get tough.
Dr. Suess took up most of our week, but we did squeeze in some time to meet with our big and little prayer partners this week. When we met this week, we talked about how Lent is a time for us to grow closer to God and grow stronger in our faith. To remind us that we are always growing closer to God, we decorated a planter and planted some Easter grass seed. We will continue to care and nurture our seeds until they sprout and remind us of Jesus' Resurrection. We also checked in to see how we are doing on filling our Alms giving crosses. Lots of good deeds seem to be getting done.
This week, the first graders also collected our first round of pop tabs from each of the classrooms and our collection bin in the front foyer. We emptied all of the tabs into a bag and took turns standing on the scale to get a total number of pounds collected. We are getting very close to our Lenten goal of 35 pounds of tabs. Please continue to help us reach our goal by sending in your pop tabs.
Next week, is our annual Salad Luncheon featuring salmon loaf and spinach lasagna. Don't forget that all students will be eating in their classrooms and need to bring a cold lunch on Friday, March 13th. No hot lunch will be served on Friday. Also, remember to bring your assigned dish to the kitchen on Thursday afternoon or Friday morning. Class lists will be hung on the cupboards, please find your family's name and check off your name when you bring your item. It is also very helpful to put your item in a disposable serving dish or be sure to put your name on your bowl/tray to ensure a quick return. I look forward to seeing you all sometime during the event.
Week in review:
Religion: We started a new unit this week about Sacraments. We will be discussing the importance and meaning of each of the Sacraments.
Spelling: This week, we focused on the sound of long e using ee or ea to spell long e words. We worked on reading, writing, and spelling long e words through several smart-board lessons and games.
Reading/Language: We discussed using the being verbs is, am, and are. We also created several writing pieces using Dr. Suess books as our spring boards. See our photo section for a closer look at our projects.
Math: We reviewed the name and value of each of the coins as we put small groups of mixed coins together for counting.
Science/Social Studies: We were supposed to start our health unit, but got distracted by a student question about weather. The question lead to a teachable moment about how weather is predicted, radar, map skills, directions, and reading a map key. We had a wonderful time using Google Maps to take small field trips without ever leaving our classroom. We plan to get back on track for our health unit next week.
I hope you were all able to get outside and enjoy a little bit of the sunshine and mild temperatures. It is a small glimpse of Spring! Have a great rest of your weekend and I look forward to seeing everyone on Monday.
Mrs. Olson
March 1, 2015
With the arrival of March, Spring must be just around the corner (we hope). The kids and I have been talking a lot about the arrival of Spring. We talked about signs that show Spring is coming, like seeing robins in our yard, buds on trees, crocuses and daffodils popping up, and of course the melting of snow. We even looked at images of these items on the internet to make sure we don't miss them. After the last few weeks of extremely cold weather, we are REALLY ready for the arrival of Spring.
With the arrival of Spring, it means Lent is in full swing. The kids and I have been discussing the importance of Lent and the three major principles of the season; prayer, fasting, and alms giving. This week, we focused on the principle of alms giving by making an Alms Giving Cross. The students are trying to earn coins for their crosses by doing good deeds for others around the house or neighborhood. Once the kids earn a coin, they will put them in one of the pre-cut slots on the cross. At the end of the Lenten season, the students will return their coins to school to be used as part of the offering for our last mass before Spring Break. Please put the coins in a zip-lock bag before returning to school on March 23rd.
In addition to our regularly scheduled activities and our Lenten activities, we also took time this week to visit with two more community helpers. This week Officer Ben Biddick and Nurse Cara Biddick came to talk to the kindergartners, first graders, and second graders about their jobs and how they help our community. Not surprising, we now have several little people who want to become police officers and/or nurses. Thank you to the Biddicks for sharing their time with us.
Looking ahead to next week, we will be celebrating Dr. Suess's Birthday, planting Easter grass for our Lenten project, and beginning a new science unit on health and our bodies. Also, I will be collecting the February Book It calendars until Friday, March 6th. Please send in the signed calendars by that date. The new March calendars will be in this week's book bag.
Our week in review:
Religion: This week, we focused on the three principles of Lent; prayer, fasting,and alms giving. We worked with our big and little prayer partners to create Alms Giving Crosses to keep track of our good deeds throughout Lent.
Spelling: We worked on learning how to read, write, and spell words with the long a sound. Our focus this week was using the ai and ay spelling for long a words.
Reading/Language: We are continuing to work on verbs. We focused on the verb tenses this week by talking about present tense verbs. We are also talking about being verbs like am, is, and are. This week we also wrote an opinion piece about wanting to be the President,
Math: We began our unit on counting money. We focused on identifying the coins heads and tails and the value of each coin. Next week, we will focus on the counting of mixed groups of coins to determine value. Please continue to practice coin counting at home. :)
Science/Social Studies: We finished up our President unit. We talked about becoming President and how the office came to be.
I hope you all have a wonderful end to your weekend and I look forward to seeing everyone next week.
Mrs. Olson
February 22, 2015
This week we celebrated the beginning of Lent with Ash Wednesday mass and making a Lenten promise to show our sacrifice for Jesus. As part of our Lenten alms giving, we will be collecting pop tabs for the Ronald McDonald House. A representative from the organization came to talk to the students about what the Ronald McDonald house does for families of sick children and how the pop tabs are used to pay for the expenses of the house. As a school, we are trying to collect enough tabs to fill a tote, about 35 pounds of aluminum tabs. Please help us in our collection by saving your tabs from pop, soup, pet food, fruit, and other canned products. You can even ask friends, family, neighbors, and co-workers to join the cause. We will be collecting tabs through March 27th.
In addition to our Lenten activities last week, we also had some visitors from our community come in to talk with the students about their jobs. On Wednesday, Christy and Kim from Winter Dental came to talk to the students. They explained the procedures of a dental exam and the importance of dental health. On Friday, Jake Erlien came to talk about being a firefighter and fire safety. Next week, we have our very own Mrs. Biddick coming to talk about nursing along with Officer Biddick, to talk about being a police officer. The kids are very interested in hearing about the different types of jobs community helpers do.
As I mentioned at parent/teacher conferences, the first graders have finished up the math unit on place value and will be starting our money, time, and measurement unit. This week we will begin our unit with a quick review of coin identification and value of each coin. It is a great help to the students (and teacher), if the kids can have some hands on practice at home with real coins in order to differentiate between the silver coins. Once the students are comfortable with the different coin values, we will begin combining different coins together and practice counting coins. Thank you in advance for helping provide hands on practice with the coins.
The end of the month is quickly approaching. Please make sure to record your child's reading minutes on the February Book It calendar. You can send the calendars in on March 2nd to receive this month's pizza coupon. March is our last month for Book It. I will send home the March Book It calendar on Friday.
Lastly, the annual Salad Luncheon is coming up on March 13th. Please keep an eye on the family envelope for details on what type of food your family will need to bring for the luncheon. Also, don't forget to spread the word to friends, family, neighbors, and co-workers about the luncheon. It is always a delicious treat.
Week in review:
Religion: This week we discussed the seasons of the Church and began our Lenten preparations by creating a Lenten promise.
Spelling: Our lesson this week was the silent e. We learned how the silent e can change short vowel words to long vowel words by adding an e to the end of the words. We worked on reading, writing, and spelling words with and without the silent e.
Reading/Language: We continued to discuss verbs. This week we learned how verbs can show present tense and past tense by adding endings to the verb.
Math: We finished up our place value unit by working on some logical reasoning activities with 2 digit numbers and took our end of the unit test.
Science/Social Studies: We discussed President's Day. We read several stories about George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. We discussed some interesting facts about the two famous Presidents and the job of the President.
We had a great week together despite the cold temperatures. I hope you all had a great weekend and I look forward to seeing you on Monday.
Mrs. Olson
February 8, 2015
Well we survived the 100th day of school! On Friday, we celebrated the 100th day of school with the kindergartners and second graders. We decorated 100 day crowns, made necklaces with 100 Fruit Loops, made paper cupcakes with 100 sprinkles, made a structure out of 100 Solo cups, played Skeeball too earn 100 points, played a dice game to see who could fill in 100 scoops of ice cream first, and best of all created a snack mix with 100 pieces of snack items. Wow, we were exhausted by the end of the day, but we had a great time working with our friends and celebrating being a 100 days smarter. Thanks to all of the parents who have made these last 100 days such a pleasure. You have awesome kids!
Next week will be a short week due to conferences, so we will work on finishing up some of our units and finish our reading testing. We will not start a new spelling unit or have a book bag this week. Keep reading for your Book It goals and practicing your math addition and subtraction facts.
We will be celebrating Valentine's Day in first grade on Wednesday, February 11th in the afternoon. The students do not need to make a valentine holder at home, as we will be making a special valentine bag at school to hold all of our valentines from our Valentine exchange. We will celebrate and exchange valentines with our Pre-K 4 friends too. Please make sure to include the six Pre-K 4s when your child is making Valentines. The Pre-K 4s are Alistair, Joe, Ryan, Brody, Gavin, and Abby.
Lent will begin on February 18th with Ash Wednesday. We will be participating in several different activities throughout the Lenten season. As our Lenten service project this year, our school will be helping the Ronald McDonald House raise money to help provide families with an affordable place to stay while their child is hospitalized for medical care. To help raise money, we will be collecting pop tabs. Our goal is to collect at least 35 pounds of tabs during the Lenten season. Please start collecting now and ask your friends, family, and neighbors to help too. Together we can help bring comfort to families in a time of need.
Our week in review:
Religion: We finished our unit on the Catholic church, learning how all Catholic churches work to help those in need.
Spelling: We reviewed the th, wh, and long vowel spellings. The students read, wrote, and spelled several words with these spelling patterns.
Language/Reading: This week we focused our reading and writing on Groundhog Day. We read several books about real and fictional groundhogs and wrote an opinion paper on wanting the groundhog to see his shadow or not see his shadow. The consensus being, no shadow! We want spring!
Math: We worked on number patterns and counting by 5's and 10's. We also worked on a survey for Groundhog's Day with our second grade friends and created a graph with the collected data. The week ended with a mega math day as we celebrated 100's Day.
Science/Social Studies: We focused a lot on Groundhogs. We read several non-fiction articles and books about groundhogs and created our own groundhog den. We also read about why groundhogs are used to predict the weather. We even checked out Punxsutawney Phil's website and Jimmy the Groundhog's (from Sun Prairie) Facebook page to see their predictions.
Thanks again for helping make this a great week despite the weather and the groundhog predicting six more weeks of winter. We had a great time learning and working together. See you on Monday!
Mrs. Olson
February 1, 2015
We had an awesome Catholic Schools Week! It was wonderful to see all of the cute costumes and creativity that went into them. We had the most fun with the coin war. It is unofficial, but I think the Pre-K through 2 team collected the most money. The other two teams tried their best to bring our totals down, but we had a great push on Friday to put us ahead again. Mr. Castrogiavanni will announce the official results on Monday which will include the totals from the other Catholic Schools as well. Regardless of who wins, the students did a great thing for the community by combining together to raise money for Camden Playground updates.
Next week, we will celebrate 100 days of school. I can't believe how quickly the year is flying by. The class was looking back on some of our early journal entries and math problems and could not believe how much they have learned. I can't wait to see what the last half of the year will bring. We will be joining the kindergarten and second grade on Friday, February 6th to celebrate the 100th day. We have many fun activities planned centering around 100, as well as, a fun snack to honor the day.
Don't forget to mark your calendars for parent/teacher conferences on February 11th and 12th. Teachers will be set up in the gym on Wednesday from 4-8 and Thursday 8-12. Please let me know if you are unable to attend on either of those days so we can make other arrangements. I look forward to seeing you all and sharing your child's work.
Lastly, we will be celebrating Valentine's Day on February 11th. If your child would like to participate in our class Valentine exchange, please plan on bringing a Valentine for each student in the class. We will also be exchanging Valentines with our 4K prayer partners in the afternoon, please bring an additional Valentine for each of the prayer partners. There are 6 4Ks, Allister, Ryan, Gavin, Joe, Brody, and Abby. We will be making a Valentine collection box in class for our Valentine exchange.
Our week in review:
Religion: We stated a new chapter on the church. We discussed how all of the Catholic churches are connected and help spread the word of Jesus.
Spelling: This week we concentrated on reading, writing, and spelling words with the long e sound.
Language/Reading: We worked on comparing and contrasting two stories by Jan Brett and started our reading level testing.
Math: We continued to work on our place value unit. We learned how to compare two numbers by looking at the digits in each place. We also used a hundreds chart to create number patterns of 1-more, 1-less, 10-more, and 10-less.
Science/Social Studies: We discussed the difference between hibernation and migration. We read about several animals and discovered if they hibernated or migrated.
I hope you all have a great weekend and I look forward to seeing everyone on Monday,
Mrs. Olson
January 25, 2015
We are ready for Catholic Schools Week! We worked very hard preparing for this special week. I hope you all get an opportunity to come in and visit the school during Sunday's open house. Our school is a great place to learn and grow in faith. We asked the students to share some of the reasons St. Mary's is such a great school, and I was amazed at all of the different responses. Some of the responses were very child centered, like we have good hot lunches but others went a little deeper, like we get to pray and learn about Jesus everyday. You can read all of the responses from the staff and students on the bulletin board outside the office, you can even add your own. I personally love how well the parents and teachers work together to support our students in their learning. Our school feels like one big extended family. Let's keep it going!
In addition to our Catholic Schools Week preparations, we also took some time to honor Martin Luther King Jr. this week. We read a biography of his life and teachings and watched a short video about how he helped with the Montgomery bus boycott in Alabama. We worked with our second grade friends to reenact the bus ride of Rosa Parks, explaining the rules on the bus in 1955. After the reenactment, we had some very good discussions about that time in history and how much times have changed. It surprised me to hear the students compare the views and teachings of Martin Luther King Jr. to what Jesus teaches us to do...Love others as I have loved you. We have some pretty smart little kiddos. How refreshing to hear their thoughts.
Here is our week in review:
Religion: We finished our lesson on the Holy Spirit and how it helps us to learn and live like Jesus taught us.
Spelling: This week we focused on the long o sound. We worked on reading, writing and spelling long o words with different spelling patterns.
Language/Reading: This week we used the story The Mitten to write an opinion piece about real animals and animals from the story. Students also finished reading their group book and are working on a final project for their book. Next week we will work on reading level assessments.
Math: We are continuing to work on our place value unit. This week we learned how to determine the value of a digit based upon the place it held in a number. We also worked on ordering the numbers through 100.
Science/Social Studies: We did a short lesson on MLK Jr. and also worked on learning about animals in winter.
I hope you all have a wonderful Catholic Schools Week. I look forward to seeing all of the fun ideas for the dress up days. See you on Monday!
Mrs. Olson
January 18, 2015
We had a great week together! It was so nice to settle back into a regular routine again. It did take us a while to get back into the flow of things. I am glad everyone had a fun and restful Christmas vacation with a few unexpected extra rest days last week due to the good old Wisconsin weather.
We will be spending our next few weeks working hard and finishing up some units before conferences on February 11&12. Please continue to work with the kids on practicing their daily reading and addition/subtraction facts. I frequently hear the older grade teachers say that it is so important for students to know their basic addition/subtraction facts to be successful in multiplication and division. I have posted some sites on the Math Page and Websites & Apps Page to help students with facts.
Our Week in Review:
Religion: We are learning about the Holy Trinity and the third person of God, the Holy Spirit.
Spelling: We focused on reading, writing, and spelling words with the long i sound spelled with the i-e pattern.
Reading/Language: As part of our reading groups, we are working on being able to summarize story details and sequence events. The class is also working on doing some seasonal journal writing for our bulletin board display on the second floor landing. See the Photos Page for our display.
Math: We have started learning about place value. We are using tens and ones cubes to build, read, and learn numbers from 10 through 100.
Science/Social Studies: We are beginning a unit on Animals in Winter and Penguins.
It was so great to see you all again and I look forward to sharing all of our wonderful accomplishments at conferences. Have a great week!
Mrs. Olson
December 14, 2014
Well, the Christmas program is almost here! Please remember to send your student dressed in their program outfit on Monday morning with a uniform to change into after our morning dress rehearsal. The kids are doing a great job with the program and can not wait to share it with the SMS families. On the night of the show, Tuesday, December 16th, the students should arrive in their classrooms at 6:00 and can be picked up in the classroom at the completion of the middle school program and our program. We have a special all school presentation for you at the end of the middle school program. We look forward to seeing everyone on Tuesday and hope you enjoy all of the children's hard work.
We will be entering the third week of Advent on Monday and will finish this last school week of Advent with our final prayer partner activities, Christmas celebrations, and mass on Friday. Thank you so much for all of your generosity with our collection of items for the soldiers. The boxes under the tree are overflowing thanks to you. If you missed the turn in date last Friday and would still like to donate to the collection, you can bring your items in on Monday and Tuesday of this week. The items will be packaged up with our homemade cards on Wednesday and sent out to the well deserving and hard working soldiers to bring a bit of home while they are so far away from family and friends.
This week will be a crazy week with our rehearsals, programs, prayer partner activities, mass, and Christmas celebrations, not to mention family commitments and holiday excitement, so we are not going to have a new book bag this week (I can hear you all sighing with relief, as am I). Our next spelling unit is a review unit so we will not need to take a test, we will just have fun with some holiday review activities in class. In between all of our commitments this week we will work on reading and writing holiday stories and in math we will be finishing up our subtraction unit and taking the chapter test before the break. I hope not having a book bag this week will relieve some stress with a busy week ahead.
Our week in review:
Religion: We continued to discuss how we can get ready for the birth of Jesus and read a story about the night Jesus was born. The first and second graders are also working on creating a nativity scene.
Reading/Language: This week each group worked on reading non-fiction stories. We discussed the elements of a non-fiction story and the importance of knowing how to read non-fiction text. We also finished with our plural and singular nouns and are learning how to create a descriptive writing piece.
Spelling: Our lesson this week was on the /th/and /wh/sound. We worked on reading, writing, and reading several words with those sounds.
Math: We finished our subtraction unit and learned how to use subtraction with some real world math story problems. We will be ready for our end of the unit test next week.
Science/Social Studies: We continued to work on seasonal activities that focused on Christmas and winter.
I hope you all had a great weekend and had at least a little bit of time to rest and relax before this crazy week begins. Enjoy your day and I look forward to seeing you all at the program on Tuesday.
December 7, 2014
The Advent season is in full swing. The first graders started out the week lighting the first candle on our Advent wreath and creating Christmas ornaments with this year's theme, Joy to the World, with our prayer partners. Mr. Castrogiovanni came to our class to read the story Penny's Christmas Jar Miracle and explain our service project for Advent. Our school will be collecting items like gum, jerky, nuts, crayons, coloring books, etc. to create care packages to send to soldiers on active duty overseas. The packages are intended to bring a little piece of home to their base. After reading the story about the Christmas Miracle Jar, Mr. Castrogiavanni invited the students to bring in spare change to donate to our school's Christmas Jar. He encouraged the children to do some extra jobs around the house to earn money for our jar. The money collected will be used to pay for the shipping cost of sending the packages to the soldiers. We appreciate all of your support as we collect for the care packages. Donations for the packages can be brought in to the office or sent with your child to their classroom. We will be collecting items through Friday, December 12th.
Our Christmas program, Melton the Warm Hearted Snowman, is starting to come together. The students have been practicing very hard in music and in group practices. They are very excited to share the program with family and friends on December 16th. Please note the change in times from the December calendar. The new program times are 1:00 and 6:30. Students should report to their classrooms at 6:00 dressed in their costume clothes, colored shirts and khaki pants, and should be picked up from the classroom after the show. We look forward to seeing you all on December 16th. Please feel free to contact me with any questions.
A new month brings a new Book It calendar. The students brought home their new December Book It reading calendar on Monday, to keep track of their reading this month. The students are expected to read 100 minutes a week, each week of December, this works out to about 20 minutes 5 times a week. The children can count the reading of take home books, library books, books that are read to them, or that they read to siblings, as time towards their 100 minutes. If the students are reading on the Moby Max website or Raz Kids site, they can also count those minutes too. At the end of the month, the students should return the signed calendar to school for a free pizza coupon at Pizza Hut. I will collect the calendars after Christmas Break on January 5th.
The students also brought home the December book orders on Tuesday. There are so many great books in the orders. If you would like to order books, please either order online or send in your order to the classroom by December 9th. I will be placing the order on Wednesday, December 10th. Remember each order earns free books for our classroom library. Also if you would like to order any books as a Christmas gift, please send me an email or talk to me after school and I will make sure they are delivered to you by Santa's Helper.
You may be wondering what Moby Max and Raz Kids are or have heard the kids talking about them. Moby Max and Raz Kids are two of the apps or websites we have been working with in the last few weeks. Each of the apps help build reading and comprehension skills in a fun way. Moby Max also helps the students practice language and math skills as well. The students can also access these sites and apps at home using our class code. Moby Max is a website and our school code is wi2935. The child's fist name is the username and passcode for the site. Rax Kids can be accessed through the internet or as an app. The code for this site is ckolson. Any activity the students do at home will also transfer over to school. Give them a try over break to keep them learning.
Monday, the 1st and 6th graders will be participating in the mass celebrating the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. The students will be doing the readings and prayers for the mass. Since it is a Holy Day, there will be a collection taken. The students are asked to bring a small donation to put in the collection basket. We invite anyone who is available to come and celebrate this feast day with us.
Our week in review:
Religion: We finished our unit on Jesus's love for us and began our Advent unit. Next week, we will meet with our prayer partners to create cards to send to the soldiers in the care packages we will be sending overseas.
Reading/Language: This week we discussed story elements and how to use story details to paint a picture in our heads as we read. We also learned about plural nouns.
Spelling: We worked on reading, writing, and spelling words with the /ch/ and /sh/ sound.
Math: We learned how to use related subtraction facts to compare two groups of objects. The students also learned how to use related subtraction facts to find missing addends.
Science/Social Studies: We used this time during the week for several holiday related projects and also to practice for our Christmas Program.
I hope you all had a great weekend and I look forward to seeing you all next week.
November 23, 2014
What a week for weird weather. The kids and I enjoyed plotting the the crazy temperatures on our weather graph this week. I think the winter weather is hear to stay.
With all of the cold weather this week, we were able to take advantage of inside recess and get some of our projects for the feast completed. We created our place mats and helped the Pre K with the hats and collars for our pilgrim costumes.
During the week we took a look at what life as a pilgrim was like in the New World. We read some stories about a day in the life of a pilgrim boy and pilgrim girl. After reading the stories, we compared the lives of kids today to kids back then. The class agreed that the pilgrim life was much more difficult than ours. We also used our Smart Board to take a tour of the Mayflower and read about the journey the pilgrims took from England to Plymouth. We will be using the information we gathered to create a book about the Mayflower.
Next week we will learn about the first year the pilgrims spent in the New World and how their friendship with the Native Americans helped them survive. To culminate the week, we will share in our own feast with the Kindergarten and second graders (Native Americans) and the Pre K and first graders (Pilgrims) to celebrate Thanksgiving. We are still in need of a parent helper from our class to come and help with the feast. Set up will begin at 12:30 and the feast will be from 1:00 - 2:00. Please contact me if you are able to help out on Tuesday.
Thank you for all of your support during Tuesday's Scoopie Night. For a small class and sickness, we had a great showing. There was a full house during the hours I worked. I know the 8th grade class is very grateful for the support from all of the school families.
We ended our week celebrating mass with all of the other Catholic Schools at St. Williams. It was nice to see all of our old friends and get a chance to meet new ones. It was a wonderful way to end the week.
Due to the short week next week, we will not be having a new book bag or spelling list. We will be doing reading, writing, and math activities involving the Thanksgiving theme.
Week in review:
Religion: This week we discussed Jesus and his love of God and us. We learned that Jesus loved us enough to die so we can be saved from our sins.
Reading/Language: We continued to learn about nouns. This week, we added days of the week and months of the year to our list of proper nouns. We also finished up our books in reading groups this week and will end with a journal entry about our story setting and favorite part of the story.
Spelling: Our spelling skill this week was double consonants. Once we discussed them, it was amazing how many times the students found them while reading and writing during the week.
Math: We applied our knowledge of related addition and subtraction facts to learn about fact families. We had a lot of fun taking numbers and turning them into a family of facts. Look in the photo section to see how the kids extended the lesson to have a little fun with numbers, something only a small class could do.
Science/Social Studies: We discussed the Pilgrims reason for coming to the New World and the journey using information from the Scholastic website. The students were able to take a tour of the Mayflower and see what life as a pilgrim was like. You can take a look for your self at http://www.scholastic.com/scholastic_thanksgiving/webcast.htm.
I hope you all had a great weekend despite the rainy weather. I look forward to seeing everyone on Monday.
November 16, 2014
We had a great week together with many fun activities. We started our week by making cards to take to the Veteran's ceremony at Traxler Park and ended our week with Thanksgiving projects. The kids and I can not believe how fast the year seems to be going.
On Tuesday, the rain finally came to an end which allowed us to walk down to the Taxler Park to attend the Veteran's Day ceremony. We participated in prayer and a moment of silence for our fallen veterans as well as listened to several people speak about the meaning of the day and experiences during their time of service. It was very moving to hear the stories and put faces with people who have given so much for our freedom. At the end of the ceremony, the students distributed their handmade cards to many of the veterans that were in attendance. The cards were received with lots of joy and appreciation. The students were repeatedly thanked for taking the time to attend the service and to make cards. It seemed like the least we could do for those who gave so much. After lunch the students received a special visit from two veterans who had attended the ceremony at Traxler. The veterans wanted to personally thank the students who made the cards and the school for thinking of them. Needless to say it was a very special and emotional day. The students were able to see how much a small card and a bit of time meant so much. I was very proud of the class for the respectful behavior they showed during ceremony. We even made the front page of the Gazette.
On Thursday, Firefighter Dan Cassidy came to the class to talk with the students about fire safety and fire prevention. The whole class was able to participate in the stop, drop, and roll exercise as well as answer questions from the presentation. Firefighter Cassidy was very impressed with how well informed the girls were about fire safety and congratulated them on such well designed fire exit plans.
We continued the week with preparations for our annual Thanksgiving Feast. The Pre-K, K, 1st, and 2nd graders will again be celebrating Thanksgiving by having a feast. This year the Pre-K and 1st graders will be attending the feast as the pilgrims while the K and 2nd graders will be the Native Americans. Each class has volunteered to bring a food item to the feast to share with the group. We will also read a Thanksgiving story, make a craft to take home, and play a Thanksgiving game. We are looking for one parent from the class to come and help prepare, serve, and clean up on the feast day. We will be celebrating our feast on Tuesday, October 25th at 1:00. If you are interested in helping out with the feast, we would love to have you. Please send me an email or talk to me at school to let me know if you can help.
Hopefully, you all were able to read the costume note from the family envelope about the Christmas Program costumes. Please let me know if you have any questions about what to wear.The play is so adorable the girls can't wait for you to see it. We look forward to seeing you all on December 16th.
Week in review:
Religion: We continued our lesson on Mary and began a discussion on our new Bible story Noah.
Reading/Language: We continued with our unit on nouns by sorting nouns into person, place, or thing groups. We also introduced proper nouns and discussed different proper nouns for each group. In reading groups, we continued on with our stories and discussed the importance of the story setting.
Spelling: We worked on reading, writing, and making words with the /st/ sound. We identified several /st/ words in our other subjects throughout the week.
Math: We are putting all of our subtraction strategies together to solve word problems. We also identified related addition and subtraction facts.
Science: We are using this time to discuss the pilgrims and Thanksgiving themed projects.
Also, don't forget about Scoopie Night on Tuesday. The class is pretty sure we are winning the ice cream party again. The 8th graders hope to see you there. I hope you all had a great weekend. I look forward to seeing you next week.
November 9, 2014
It was great to get back to our regular schedule this week, although by Friday, we were all ready for the weekend. This cold weather is making us want to cozy up and hibernate. I hope you all had a chance to relax and enjoy your weekend.
Thank you to everyone for getting their Veteran's Day walking field trip slips in so quickly. The first through eighth graders will be walking down to the Veteran's Day Memorial Service at Traxler Park on Tuesday, November 11. We will attend the service and then distribute our hand made Thank You cards to various veterans attending the service. Our school has attended this service in the past and it is a very moving experience for everyone. It is a great way for our students to show support to our city's veterans. The veteran's are very appreciative of the students attending and love the cards the students make for them. Please watch the weather for Tuesday and dress students for the weather. We will be walking and standing outside for the service. Hats, gloves, and layers would be a great idea for this trip.
You may be wondering why you are hearing various holiday songs being hummed or sung in the car or around the house, and that would be because we have begun to practice for our Christmas program. This year the K-5 students will be presenting the musical, Melton the Warm Hearted Snowman as part of the school wide Christmas program. The students have been given the speaking parts they need to memorize and we are practicing our lines and songs a little bit each day. So mark your calendars for December 16th at 1:00 and 6:30. You do not want to miss this! Costume information will be coming home in the next family envelope.
Lastly, the weather is unfortunately starting to change and I have even heard that nasty s-word...snow being thrown around in the upcoming week's forecast, so I have told the kids they may want to bring an extra sweater or sweatshirt to keep in their lockers. Our room temperature fluctuates from day to day and even sometimes through out the day so if the girls have an extra sweater to put on in case they are cold, that would be helpful. We also talked about keeping an extra pair of gloves and hat in their lockers just in case they forget them at home one day.
Our week in review:
Religion: We started a new chapter on Mary, the mother of Jesus and visited with Father Steve on Friday for our monthly Bible story on Moses. We also decorated bags for the ECHO Thanksgiving Food Drive.
Reading/Language: This week all groups started a new story. We are working on using the text and pictures to make inferences. We also started to learn about nouns. We spent the week identifying and grouping nouns into person, place, or things.
Spelling: Our unit this week was on words with l blends. We worked on reading, writing, spelling, and sorting words with the different l blends.
Math: We are continuing to work on our subtraction unit. We have discussed that subtraction is starting with a whole group then breaking that into parts. Each of us took turns creating a subtraction story for the class to solve. We also have learned how to use counters, ten frames, and number lines to solve our subtraction sentences.
Science: This week we discussed the weather quite a bit and how plants and animals survive our Wisconsin winters.
I hope you all had a great week and enjoy the rest of your weekend. I look forward to seeing you all this week. Go Packers!!!!
November 2, 2014
Wow, what a week! I am not sure we could have stuffed one more thing into this very short week. The kids had a great time reading, writing, and crafting about Halloween this week. In addition to all of the regular classroom things we did this week, we also had Mix-It-Up-Day on Tuesday and our Halloween Parade and Great Pumpkin Hunt on Wednesday.
For Mix-It-Up-Day, the students were separated into groups by space themed items. The whole school went down to lunch together and sat at their respective space themed tables. While eating, they got an opportunity to get to know the students in the other grades. After lunch, the student council organized a few space themed relays where the multi-aged space groups worked together to accomplish several tasks. It was great to see the kids working together across the different grade levels and most of all having fun. I know the first graders loved it, they could not stop talking about it all afternoon. Thank you student council for planning such a fun filled day.
The week ended with our annual Halloween Parade and Great Pumpkin Hunt. The Pre-K through 2nd grade paraded outside for the parents and provided a great photo opp for families in front of the school. As we were rounding up the parade, the students found a clue left by the Great Pumpkin, inviting us to find him and his treats. We diligently followed his clues, which lead us all around the school and big kid classrooms, until Mrs. Vodak and Mr. Castrogiovani provided the final clue. The final clue lead us to the place where Mr. White keeps his tools and much, much more...Mr. White's garage! In the garage, we found the Great Pumpkin sitting on Mr. White's workbench surrounded by Halloween treats for everyone! In the afternoon,the first graders helped the 4K friends follow the clues to find the Great Pumpkin and treats for their class. We finished the day making a special Monster Mash treat and watching a Halloween movie with the 4K friends. A great day was had by all!
After all of the craziness of last week and conferences, I can say that the first graders and I are looking forward to getting back to our regular routine next week. I hope you all have a great rest of your weekend and I look forward to seeing you all next week.
October 26, 2014
We had a great time at the pumpkin patch on Friday. The sun didn't shine quite like we were hoping, but at least there wasn't any rain. We learned about the different types of gourds and pumpkins that grow on the Skelly farm, read about Jack the farmer who wanted to join the circus, on the wagon ride, found our way through the corn maze, played on the big playground, and best of all, had a delicious treat of a juice box and an apple cider donut. Thank you to Mrs. Wixom, for helping out on the trip.
It was also great to see you all at mass on Wednesday. The kids did a great job reading during mass. I am so proud of how seriously they take their role in mass. They all worked very hard both in school and at home to learn their petition and read it clearly for all to hear. Keep up the good work. The first graders will be singing in the choir for our November 5th mass.
I am looking forward to seeing you all this week for conferences. The students have finished their first big writing project of the year and are very excited to share the final product with you. Conferences are Wednesday evening from 4:00 to 8:00 with a dinner break in there around 5:30 to 6:00. Thursday conferences run from 8:00 to 12:00. The 8th grade class will be taking orders and serving samples of several different flavors of Butter Braids pastry for their Washington D.C. trip. Stop by and have a taste.
Since next week is a short week due to conferences, we will not have a new book bag, spelling test, or show and tell. All regular routines will resume the following week.
Finally, thank you to all of the families for bringing in all of those box tops! I am sure you have heard by now, we tied with second grade for first place in the Box Tops for Education contest. We earned and extra casual day. The girls and I will be selecting the best day to have our casual day soon. I will let you know the final date. Keep saving those box tops for our next contest.
Our week in review:
Religion: This week we discussed Jesus, the Son of God. We learned that Jesus, Mary, and Joseph are know at the Holy Family. We even took a small tour of the church while we were practicing for mass, to see the art work of Mary and also the Holy Family. We will finish up this chapter next week with a chapter test.
Reading/Language: This week, we worked on our reading fluency. We began taking turns reading our story into the ipad voice recorder so we could hear how we sound as we read. We also worked through the writing process to publish our very first story. We went through the process together to create a class story titled The Scoopie Party and then each student went through the same process to create their individual stories. They worked very hard and did a great job! They will each get a chance to share their story with the class next week.
Spelling: This week, we worked on words with R blends. We learned how to read, write, spell, and sort words with different R blends. Next week we will work on reviewing all of our first unit spelling words. No new list or test next week.
Math: This week, we began our subtraction unit. We began by discussing the different terms associated with subtraction like minus, difference, and subtraction story. We used different tools to help solve our subtraction stories.
Science: This week we used our science time to do some seasonal projects and begin preparations for our Christmas program. We will get back to our life science unit after conferences.
I hope you all had a chance to enjoy this wonderful fall weekend. I look forward to a great week and seeing you all at conferences.
October 19, 2014
It was great to get back to our normal schedule this week. We finished up several units and even started talking about our Christmas program. I can't believe it is already that time of year. Yikes, where does the time go?
Our first Box Tops for Education contest came to an end on Friday. We are anxiously awaiting the final totals next week and keeping our fingers crossed that our class is the recipient of a casual day. Keep saving box tops, we will be having several more competitions through out the year.
Next week, October 24th, we will be taking our fall trip to Skelly's Pumpkin Patch. It is a casual day but please watch the weather and dress students according to the day. Most of our trip will be outside. I am hoping for sun this year, almost every year we go to the pumpkin patch it seems to rain. Say a few extra prayers for sun...please. If you are interested in chaperoning our trip, please send in the chaperon note on Monday.
Our week in review:
Religion: We finished our unit on creation and took our chapter test this week. We also started our next chapter on Jesus, the son of God. The first graders will also be in charge of mass on Wednesday. We welcome any families that are available to join us for worship.
Reading/Language: We worked on sequencing story events to make a story make sense. We also worked through the steps of writing a class personal narrative and will be working on creating our own individual stories next week. We hope to have the stories completed to share with parents at conferences. In reading we worked on making inferences using the text and pictures of a story.
Spelling: This week we worked reading, writing, and spelling words with the /nt/ and /mp/ sound.
Math: We finished practicing our addition strategies and learning how to use the strategies to solve addition number sentences with three addends. We finished our addition unit with an end of the unit test and will start a unit on subtraction next week.
Science: We worked on our Earth book and discussed habitats. We learned that habitats are where plants and animals get what they need to survive. We will be working on a habitat diorama next week. If anyone has extra shoe boxes that they would like to get rid of, we could use them to make our dioramas. I do have some, but like to keep extras on hand.
Coming home in tomorrow's take home folder, will be a book order form and a Fire Prevention assignment. The book orders will be due on Friday, October 24th. Remember each book order helps earn free books for our classroom library. The Fire Prevention assignment will be due on October 30th. Please let me know if you have any questions.
I hope you all had a wonderful weekend and I look forward to seeing you this week.
October 12, 2014
I hope everyone was able to enjoy this long beautiful weekend. The fall colors were a magnificent sight on the way back from the teacher conference in Milwaukee on Friday. The conference was very beneficial and provided several new ideas to use in the classroom. I look forward to sharing them with the class in the next few weeks.
Last week was short yet full of activities. We honored all of the Steeple Chase runners from each class on Monday, sang in the choir at church on Wednesday, and visited with the firefighters after the all school fire drill on Thursday. The students were able to walk through the ladder truck after the presentation and we even got to see the ambulance go out on a call...sirens and all. In addition to these activities, we also fit in all of our class subjects.
The week in review:
Religion: In our creation unit, we learned that God created people in his image and gave us creation as a gift. We will be finishing the creation unit next week.
Reading/Language: This week we worked on using the reading strategy "stretching a word" to help us decode unknown words. We also read our stories this week to confirm our predictions from last week. We are continuing to learn the parts of a sentence. We identified both the naming part and telling part of a sentence and then learned how to use the word and to join two naming parts or two telling parts. Next week we will begin learning how to use the writing process to compose a personal narrative.
Spelling: We have finished identifying all of the individual short vowel sounds and worked on reading and writing short vowel words. Next week we will work on ending sounds /nt/ and /mp/.
Math: We put all of our addition strategies to use this week by working on several two addend addition problems. We also learned how to use different strategies to solve addition number sentences with three addends. We will be finishing up the addition unit next week and moving on to subtraction.
Science: We are continuing with our book about plants and animals working together. We will also be discussing animal habits next week.
I hope you have a great rest of your weekend and I look forward to seeing you all on Monday.
October 5, 2014
Another great week in first grade! We had our Scoopie celebration on Thursday with our kindergarten and seventh grade friends. Culvers brought chocolate and vanilla custard with sprinkles and cookie dough for the three classes to share. It was a great end of the day treat. We are also collecting Box Tops for Education through October 17th. The class with the most box tops will win a casual day. Keep collecting those box tops!!!!
Don't forget tomorrow is our Steeple Chase assembly and casual day. Students are invited to wear their yellow Steeple Chase shirt, from Sunday, to school tomorrow (jeans are allowed). If you do not have a shirt from this year's Steeple Chase, you will need to wear your uniform to school. We will be gathering in the gym in the morning to introduce the first place boy and girl from each grade.
This week will be a short week, with no school on Friday, October 10th. The teachers will be at a convention in Milwaukee. Due to the short week, we will have this week's spelling test on Thursday instead. Thursday will also be the due date for the red book bag and Show and Tell. This week's Show and Tell students are Delaney and Kalea.
The week in review:
Religion: We continued to discuss creation and how we care for God's creation. We worked with the second graders to make a creation poster and write about our favorite parts of creation.
Reading/Language: This week we worked on the reading strategy of predicting what our story will be about by writing our predictions in our reading journal. We also discussed and identified the naming part of a sentence and learned how to use "and" to join two naming parts of a sentence.
Spelling: We practiced reading, writing, and spelling words with the short u sound. Next week will be a review of all the short vowel sounds. Our spelling list will consist of all five short vowels. Our test next week will be on Thursday, October 9th.
Math: We are continuing to learn different addition strategies to help us solve addition number sentences through 12. This week we focused on using number patterns to solve addition sentences. Next week we will use all of our strategies to solve a variety of addition sentences and story problems.
Science: We learned the functions of each plant part and began creating a book to show how plants and animals are connected.
I was great to see so many of you at the Steeple Chase today and share a fun family day in the park. I hope the rest of your weekend was just as fun and relaxing. I look forward to seeing you all tomorrow.
September 27, 2014
It was an awesome week in first grade! We had fun and learned a lot. This week in review:
Religion: We finished up our second chapter on God's love and took our first chapter test. Next week we will be focusing on creation and how we are to take care of God's creation.
Reading/Language: We finished up our reading testing and worked on identifying and creating different types of sentences. Our main focus this week was identifying and using asking sentences or questions.
Spelling: We worked on reading, writing, and spelling words with short e.
Math: We are continuing to work on our addition unit. We learned how to use different tools like ten frames, number lines, and counters to solve addition problems with sums up to 12. We also practiced using these tools to solve addition story problems with missing information.
Science: We continued our unit on animals and plants. We talked about different types of bird beaks and we did an activity to discover which type of beak works best. We also identified the parts of a plant. This upcoming week we will be creating bird feeders. We will be needing 2 paper tubes for each student. If you have any paper tubes at home, please send them in by Friday.
This week we also had our first guidance class with Mrs. McIntyre, our school counselor. Our class will be working with Mrs. McIntyre and her friend Dakota the wolf (stuffed animal friend of course) to talk about getting along with others and accepting differences in our classmates and friends. The program shares Dakota's different encounters with friends from the forest and invites the students to help Dakota make good choices with the animals he meets. Mrs. McIntyre uses this program with the first graders every year. They students love hearing about his adventures and enjoy helping him make good choices. Each session ends by talking about how the kids can apply what Dakota learned to their lives.
Keep sending in those Box Tops for Education for our contest. We have a great start after last week. We even received a surprise envelope of box tops in our classroom mailbox to help us get a good start. Thank you to the anonymous contributor.
We will be celebrating our Scoopie Night win on Thursday with the kindergartners and seventh graders. Cluvers will be delivering custard for us to celebrate each class' 100% attendance at the last Scoopie Night. Great job first grade.
I hope you all had a great weekend and enjoy your day off on Monday. I look forward to seeing you all next week.
September 21, 2014
This was a busy week in first grade, but we managed to do our best and have a great week! Our first mass was a huge success, the girls were so excited to participate in reading the petitions, bringing up the gifts, and singing in the choir this week. I was so proud of all the hard work they put into doing a great job. It was great to have you all there to share in the mass.
I would also like to thank all of you for supporting our first Scoopie Night! We had a great turn out for the school and especially for our class. The first graders, Kindergartners, and seventh graders all had 100% attendance that evening and will be having a Scoopie ice cream party to celebrate.
As you read in the school newsletter, we are beginning to collect the Box Tops for Education again. The class with the most box tops will win a casual day. The box top totals will be tabulated by percentage for each class so start collecting those box tops! I don't know if teachers or students get more excited for causal days?? I have been collecting all summer!
Mark your calendars for October 24th, the Pre-K through 2 students will be taking a field trip to Skelly's Pumpkin Patch in the afternoon. The bus will leave at 12:30 and we will return to school around 2:30. Any parents who would like to join us are welcome to come along on the trip. All chaperons must be VIRTUS trained. The letter containing all of the details and permission slip will be sent home in the next family envelope. All fees will be charged to your FACTS account. Any parents interested in becoming VIRTUS trained may attend an upcoming training session on September 30th at 5:30. Please contact Mrs. Vodak in the school office for more information.
Thank you to all parents for a great job with our first book bag. Future book bags will be sent home on Mondays and follow the same format. Students should keep the spelling lists and flashcards for their studying at home. We will add six additional sight words each week as we work our way through the first grade sight word list. At school we will read, write, and spell the sight words during our word work time, the flashcards are for the students to keep and practice at home. Currently, I am having trouble posting the reading coaching sheets on the website so if you are in need of additional copies, please send me an email and I will send them to you.
This week in review:
Religion: We discussed God's love for us and how we can share that love with others by how we treat others.
Reading/Language: We worked on identifying and writing complete sentences as well as learning about the different types of sentences. Our focus this week was telling sentences or statements.
Spelling: We worked on reading, writing, and spelling words with the short o sound.
Math: We began our addition unit. We learned how to write our addition sentences both horizontally and vertically and we learned how to identify and write related addition sentences.
Science: We continued to discuss animal and plant needs. We also learned how to determine if an animal is a plant or meat eater.
Thank you again for all of your support as we work together this year. I am very blessed to have such great kids and parents to work with. I hope you have a great rest of your weekend and I look forward to seeing you all on Monday.
P.S. I finally figured out how to upload pictures to the site. Check out the pictures from the last few weeks. I hope to get more proficient at taking and uploading photos to share our weeks with you.
September 12, 2014
We had a great week together! The girls did a great job this week working on our first set of spelling words and creating good sentences. Next week the students will be bringing home their first reading book bag. I will include a letter with instructions inside the book bags next week. I will also post a copy of the letter and some reading ideas on the reading page of the website next week.
In addition to practicing short i spelling words and crafting sentences, we finished up our first math chapter. We will begin our addition unit next week. In religion, we finished discussing the Bible as God's written word and will begin chapter 2 next week. We also started a life science unit on how plants and animals work together.
Next week, the first graders and our sixth grade prayer partners will be planning, reading, and singing at mass. We invite you all to join us at 8:15 mass on Wednesday.
We will also have our first Scoopie Night on Tuesday, September 16th. Scoopie Night is a fundraiser for the 8th grade class's Washington D.C. trip. 10% of all sales will go towards the trip. In addition to the fundraising, the class with the most participation will win a free ice cream party. Don't forget to fill out your Scoopie slip and bring it with you on Tuesday night to get counted for our class's participation. Hope to see you there!
In the student's take home folders today are some book order forms from Scholastic Books. Attached to the order form is a letter with our class code and instructions on how to place an online order. If you interested, please place your order by September 19th. Remember our classroom receives free books when you place an order.
Lastly, I wanted to let you know about the new Safety Patrol we have in place before and after school. Each day, middle school students will be on duty in front of school and in the back parking lot. You will be able to recognize the Safety Patrol students by their orange vest. The Safety Patrol will be helping monitor the front sidewalk, crossing areas, and the back parking lot in order to help the younger students get safely to their parents and cars. We are asking for your help in keeping the students safe by reminding your children to wait by you and not run or play on the sidewalk in front of school or the playground. We appreciate your help in keeping the students safe.
I hope you all have a wonderful and safe weekend! See you on Monday.
September 5, 2014
We have finished our second week together and we are finally getting settled into our schedule and routines. By next week we should have it all down and have smooth sailing.
This week in class we worked on:
Religion: We learned about that the Bible is God's written word and when we listen to the Bible stories we learn how to get closer to God. We also read the parable of the Sower and the Seed.
Language Arts: We started building our personal reading libraries with leveled books from our classrooms and met in our reading groups. We also worked on reading and writing words with the short a sound as well as identifying complete and incomplete sentences.
Math: We worked on reading and writing numbers and number words through 12, the one more/one fewer concept, and identifying greater than and less than using the greater than and less than symbols.
I thank you all for sending the students happy and ready to learn each day. I look forward to next week when we will have our first spelling test and start our science unit on animals and habitats. I hope you all have a wonderful and restful weekend.
August 29, 2014
Well we made it through the week and we even received some exciting news, we will have an new student joining our class when we return on Tuesday!!! Yeah!!! Her name is Cynthia and we are so excited to add a new friend. Cynthia also has a sister Sophie who will be joining the fourth grade class. Please extend a warm St. Mary's welcome to her and her family when you meet them.
Next week we will be jumping into our regular schedule and begin our official learning journey. I look forward to seeing all of the wonderful things the kids can do and we are eager to become better readers, writers, and mathematicians.
Remember hot lunch starts next week don't forget to check your September hot lunch calendar to see what days your child is taking hot lunch. Students will also need to bring a healthy snack for our morning snack time.
I hope you all have a great weekend and I look forward to seeing all of those smiling faces on Tuesday.
