Kwanzaa Holiday Kick Off

Welcome back from break!  Hope everyone had a restful and happy Thanksgiving!  Only 3 weeks left of the semester.  This truly is my most favorite time of the year.  We will continue to go strong with the academics, but we also get to hit the standards while teaching all about the holidays celebrated during this time of the year.  More of that below.  This blog is going to be full of good information, so read on...

Math:  We will begin Module 2, more operations and algebraic thinking, but fun new concepts this week like three addend addition.  Students will also be looking for ways to make a ten within those three addends.  

Language Arts:  We will be sticking with stories from our Hartcourt series for the next three weeks.  This week our story is "How to Make a Butterfly."  I will also be concentrating on teaching the children some of the CAFE strategies from Daily 5.  These are strategies they can use when reading independently to help them become better readers.  This week we will work on back up and reread and cross checking.

Science:  We will wrap up science for the semester with a lesson and test on the inquiry process.  We will continue science after we return from our winter break.

Social Studies:  I will be keeping our kids for the next three weeks to teach them all about the holidays celebrated at this time of year.  Each week we will learn about a different holiday, who celebrates it, how they celebrate, when they celebrate, and why - the importance behind that particular holiday.  I absolutely love this unit!  Each Friday we will wrap up our studies with a celebration.  I will be sending home a paper sign up sheet on Monday for supplies/items we will need to make these celebrations possible.  Please return to me by Wednesday, and I will send out a final sign up by Thursday.   Our first holiday is KWANZAA!  Please do not tell your child any information about this holiday, because I love when we sit down and do our KWL (what do you know/want to know/what did you learn) chart and they realize they really do not know a thing about Kwanzaa, and by the end of the week they are just brimming with all kinds of knowledge about this holiday!  The following week will be Christmas, followed by Hanukkah.  

Other Happenings:

• Canned Food Drive - Don't have all the details, but pretty sure it has officially started.  Please bring in your cans of food to help stock Marshall's own Parenting Arizona Coordinator's Peggy Murray's shelves.  As always, there is a contest for the class that collects the most cans.  I think it is a great way to teach the kids a small way of giving back to others.  Food will be collected during our canned food parade on Friday, December 8th.  More details to come. 

• Special Early Release - Thursday, December 7th at 12:25.  Please make plans for childcare.   

Don't Forget:

•  Thursday December  7^th – Special Early Release @ 12:25
•  Friday December 1^st – Kwanzaa Feast
•  Friday December 8^th - Christmas Craft Morning
•  Friday December 8^th – Holiday Canned Food Drive
•  Friday December 15^th – Hanukkah Celebration

That's everything for this holiday kick off week!  Habari Gani... your kiddos will know what this means by the end of the week.  Ask them to teach it to you.  - Ms. Shaw