WELCOME BACK!

Hello families, and welcome back to the end of our school year!  I cannot tell you how excited I am to see our students tomorrow.  Thank you all for your patience and support during this unprecedented time in Arizona education.  Now it is time to return to doing what we teachers love most, educating our students.  With 19 days left, there is so much to do, and I promise you I will not be slowing down!  Keep on reading for information on how we are going to be spending those 19 days.

Math:  We are continuing on with our fractions unit tomorrow and next week, focusing on quarters and halves.  After we have our assessment next week we will head straight into telling time, a unit the children always enjoy!

ELA:  We will officially begin our "Bear Snores On" lit study tomorrow, and carry it through next week.  Our Hartcourt story will be "How to Be a Nature Detective."  We are hoping to pair this with a walking field trip across the street to the pond to do some detective work of our own, so please be on the look out for that permission slip to go home tomorrow (Friday). 

Science:  We will focus on air with a few more really cool air experiments and hopefully have time at the end of the year to talk about the relationship between air and weather.

Social Studies:  We continue our switch with Ms. Reger, who will begin a fun research project with our students all about Arizona.

Heritage Square:  Although our Suzuki performance at Heritage square was cancelled we are working hard at rescheduling it for Wednesday, May 16th.  I will keep you posted with more details as the plan becomes more solid.  As always, be on a look out for a permission slip for your child to attend this performance, as we will be walking from the school to Heritage Square.

School Days:  Just to help clear thing up here is what I currently know about what days school is open and closed for the rest of the month, including early release information:

May 4th (Friday) - School Resumes - No Early Release - 3:20 Dismissal

May 10th (Thursday) and May 11th (Friday) - School is now Open no information regarding Friday release time at this time.

May 17th (Thursday) Special Elementary Early Release Scheduled - 12:25 Dismissal No information regarding a change to this date at this time.

Friday May 18th and Friday May 25th are scheduled early releases as usual, but these times are subject to change.

 May 28th (Monday) - School Closed - Memorial Day Holiday

May 31st (Thursday) - Last Day of School - Dismissal @ 12:25

I will get a new paper calendar out to you as soon as I hear final word on some of these dates, and I will update this blog with those updates as well.

Ice Cream Week:  May 21st - 25th will be ice cream week in first grade.  We will begin the week with a field trip to the public library where we will learn all about their summer reading program (and yes, I will be sending home a permission slip for you to sign😃) and eating popsicles when we return....sorta ice creamish?  Then later in the week we will be reading a cool story about how ice cream goes from cow to grocery store!  After we will make our own ice cream.  Stay tuned for more information about ice cream week to come.

Last Week of School Events:

We have two fun events the last week of school.  On Wednesday, May 30th will be our like millionth annual (seriously) First Grade End of the Year Minute to Win It Extravaganza in the Gym.  We will need many parent volunteers to pull this off, so please mark your calendars now.  More details to come very soon!  This will be followed by our last day of school field trip to Thorpe Park.  Which means, you guessed it, another permission slip to fill out.  Whoo hoo.  I will combine the Thorpe Park and Library Permission slips so it cuts back on some of the paperwork.

I think I have covered just about everything.  If you have any questions or concerns please feel free to email me.  Homework will continue next week, and for the next two weeks after that.  No homework the last week of school, but no need to tell the children that just yet!  LOL.  On a serious note, I am so thrilled to have my kiddos back with me tomorrow.  I have missed them dearly and we have so much great learning still to do!  -Ms. Shaw