I hope you and your family had an enjoyable Thanksgiving holiday and enjoyed the short break.  I just can't believe we are almost in December.  We will begin our Holidays Around the World unit.  The students will learn about many different holidays that are celebrated around the world.  If your family celebrates a special winter holiday, we'd love to have you come in and share about it.  The students will be doing a holiday presentation about a holiday your family celebrates.  Look for a note on Monday with details.  These presentations will be scheduled during December.  If your child will be missing school prior to winter break due to a vacation, please let me know ahead of time so I can schedule your child's presentation before he/she leaves.

We will be making holiday cards....and we can use your help.  If you have any holiday cards from previous years that we can use, that would be great.  Please send them in.  You can just send in the front of the card.

The November reading calendar is due Monday.  Please add up your child's total reading minutes and sign the calendar and send it to school on Monday.  You'll be receiving the December calendar which will be due after winter break.

Many students are running low on their crayons and colored pencils.  Please check with your child and see if he/she is in need of a new box of either of these items. 

Curriculum Update:

Language Arts: This week we have read Down by the Bay and Fun with Fish.  The skills we have been working on are identifying rhyming words and finding important details.  Please enjoy these two stories with your child over the weekend.  Please return both books on Monday.  We are working on a Narrative unit in writing.  To introduce this topic, we are reading a variety of books and talking about the beginning, middle and end of a story.  We are also talking about the traits of good writing (word choice, organization, ideas, sentence fluency, conventions and voice).  We are finishing up our study of short e.  Next week we will review all short vowel words.

Word Wall Words: how, want, girl, ride, put

Math: The students have been working on using the number line for adding and subtracting, identifying patterns on the 100's chart and identifying patterns in numbers.

Science: The children have been looking closely at rocks.  The key words we are discussing are weight, texture, luster, color and size.

Important Dates:
Monday, December 3: November Reading Calendar Due
Tuesday, December 11: Holiday Presentations Begin
Friday, December 21: Winter break begins after school
Monday, December 24-Friday, January 4: Winter Break
Monday, January 7: School Resumes

Take care.
Mrs. Giarrante