Halloween 2019

Happy Halloween week! We have a lot of information coming at you in this blog, from Halloween to red ribbon spirit week to 2 assemblies. We are ending October with a big, busy bang! First, a look at what we are doing academically in room 9....

Math:  We will be working on subtraction word problems. The students will still be writing the subtraction number sentences and matching addition sentences (a huge skill to continue practicing at home. Ex 7-2=5 so 5+2=7). Also we will now learn how to make picture number bonds, and we will be learning how to label our number bonds. Although this is sometimes difficult, I love the fact that the labeling makes us think about what our numbers mean (a concept we talk about often). We learn to concentrate on what is our whole number, what do our parts stand for? These help us to not only solve but to write our sentences and number bonds correctly.

ELA:  Last week we began our read aloud "Mummies in the Morning" from the Magic Tree House series. This is a part of our cross curricular unit of study on Ancient Egypt.  We will finish our "Mummies in the Morning" lit study this week. We are learning all about pyramids, mummies, what a sarcophagus is and more! Mrs. Perkins is even incorporating mummies into our 4 picture story frame during our grammar time next week.

Science and Social Studies:  As part of our Ancient Egypt studies, next week we will learn a little about the mummification process and then make an hypothesis about what we think will happen to an apple if we cover it in natron mix. Then we will mummify our apple and see what happens! While we wait for our apple to mummify we will do some social studies and dive into expanding our learning on Ancient Egypt.  

Red Ribbon Spirit Week:  Next week is Red Ribbon week. To coincide we have incorporated a spirit week, and yes this also involves Halloween. Here are the themes each day next week:

• Monday:  Wear Red 

• Tuesday:  Crazy hair and crazy socks

• Wednesday:  Sunglasses and neon clothes

• Thursday:  Halloween - Dress as your favorite superhero or you may wear a costume (see our guidelines for this below).

• Friday:  Wear your Marshall T-Shirt/Marshall Blue

Important Halloween Information: Speaking of Halloween, we have a couple of important things to cover. Costumes and "party." Let's start with costumes. I was not going to allow them this year, for a myriad of reasons. Then I was inadvertently overruled by the Red Ribbon Week flyer. Now that costumes are going to be allowed here are our school and classroom guidelines that need to be followed.

• No masks or face paint at all.

• No weapons of any kind at all.

• Make sure costumes are easy for students to remove/unbutton/unzip independently for bathroom purposes.

• Costumes may not impede students ability to move safely and quickly out of the building in event of an alarm.

• Students must still wear weather appropriate footwear and jacket for recess.

• Absolutely NO scary/violent/gory costumes - keep it first grade appropriate or I will call you to bring a change of clothes for your child to change into.

I adhere to these guidelines to the tee and ask that you do so as well so that students will not have to be asked to remove or change out of their costume. Thank you for your cooperation!

Secondly, we will be having a harvest celebration during our day. There will not be a sign up for food, we will just be grateful for whatever comes our way. Please, if you do send something in avoid sweet treats, students will be getting plenty of candy if they go trick or treating later that night. Cheese and crackers, fruit, veggies and dip, applesauce and popcorn are a few suggestions that I have seen go over quite well.  Thank you! 

Assemblies:  We have 2 very cool assemblies coming up this week. The first is a bilingual performance by Creede Repertory Theatre. They will by telling the story "Best Foot Forward: EL Mejor Pie Adelante!" This story promotes the message of appreciating differences and reinforces positive behavior patterns. Our second assembly has become a favorite Marshall tradition. Our fifth graders have been hard at work learning the art of Taiko drumming with our artist in residence Mr. Tony Trapasso (our first graders have also had the opportunity to beat on the Taiko drums during their music time for the 3 weeks Mr. Tony has been here). Our all school assembly to see their hard work will be this Friday @ 9:00 am. 

Picture Retakes:  Wednesday, October 30th is picture retake day. If you were not satisfied with your cute little pumpkins grin just send them in with their original photos and we will have them smile for the cameras one more time!

THINK Assembly Recognition: Friday we had an assembly to recognize some of our students as part of our PBIS (Positive Behavior Intervention Support) system here at Marshall. Our slogan for PBIS is THINK like a Mustang. This week we recognized Christopher and Hazel for the letter T (Trustworthy) and Jett and Colin for the letter H (Helpful). Way to go kiddos! I want to recognize all our students for their outstanding assembly behavior. Our class is always shows exemplary assembly behavior, sitting on their bottoms and listening respectfully! I am so proud of all of them. Below are some pictures from our assembly.:

A few more dates to remember: Mark your calendars for the following dates as well:

• Wednesday, November 6th - Parent University. I will put all the information you need in next weeks blog.
• Friday, November 8th - School Closed - Teacher PD day. 
• Monday, November 11th - School Closed - Veterans Day. 

Phew, that was a lot of information. Thanks for sticking with me on this one! See you all in red on Monday! -Ms. Shaw

Mid October Updates

Hello families. I hope everyone enjoyed their four day weekend. It was so great to touch base with so many of you at conferences. This next semester is always my favorite, as we are right in the thick of learning with so much exciting holiday fun to add to the mix. Now that we are rested here is what we are diving into this upcoming week....

Math:  We begin our unit on subtraction this week. We will be relating subtraction to addition (If 3+4=7, then 7-4=3) to solve subtraction word problems, subtracting on a number line, and writing the corresponding number sentences.

ELA:  We will have new October writing journals this month. I am excited to see how the students start applying what they are learning in grammar to their sentence writing in their journals. This weeks spelling is l blends -  fl,bl,pl,gl, and cl. These are a bit tricky and will require some work at home practicing the spelling. Homework will continue back this week, but we have decided to remove the spelling sound boxes from the weekly homework packet. 

Science:  We will wrap up our science unit this week, hopefully. We will mow our lawns (now that they have grown to a height where we can). Last week we studies how seeds travel. This week we will study the parts of a plant and what each part does to help the plant grow. We will make a fun flip book to help us with this concept. Then we will end our unit with an assessment. 

Taiko Drumming:  Our amazing Taiko drumming artist is residency is back! Our students will have the opportunity to experience this amazing Japanese form of drumming over the next three weeks during their regularly scheduled music time. This has been a tradition at Marshall for quite some time and Mr. Tony does such an amazing job. I'm sure you will be hearing all about it!

That is all for this week. It seems quiet, but that is a good way to start our first week back! Trust me, we are headed into the thick of things quickly! Can't wait. Also can't wait to see the kiddos tomorrow! -Ms. Shaw

Parent/Teacher Conferences 2019

Happy fall everyone. I am loving the changing colors on the leaves outside. This is always one of my favorite times inside the classroom as well. Here is what lies ahead for our very short week:

Math:  Last week we wrapped up our doubles and doubles plus one. Doubles was an easy concept (ask your child to sing the doubles wrap for you!), doubles plus one was a whole lot trickier. We are not going for mastery on doubles plus one however, just an introduction-so we are letting that one go until the 2nd grade 😉! Now we are moving on to fluency of facts through 10 and relating subtraction to addition to solve word problems. Then we will start using the number line to solve subtraction problems. 

ELA:  Our ELA, including Grammar, will be on hold until we return from fall break. This means there will be no spelling, and no spelling means no homework for this week of school. Again - NO HOMEWORK for the week of conferences. 

Science:  We finally planted our ryegrass and alfalfa seeds. We are collecting data on what is happening to our seeds. This week, if our grass seeds have sprouted we will tend to our lawns by "mowing" them, and conclude our experiment by writing our conclusions in our notebooks. Then we will move onto to learning about how seeds travel. 

Parent/Teacher Conferences:  Thank you to everyone who has signed up for conferences this week. The final sign up list went home with your child on Friday. If your name was not on the sign up and you would like a conference, please reach out to me via agenda or email and we can make sure to get a conference scheduled for your child. Please make sure you are on time for your conference so that we may begin and end on time. If you show up late we may have to reschedule so as to be respectful of the next scheduled families time. Also, please remember all three days are early release days. Monday and Tuesday we release at 12:25, and Wednesday is an extra early release time of 11:10. Please plan for child care accordingly. 

Clothing Exchange:  While you are here at your child's conference please feel free to drop by the science lab and visit our annual clothing exchange. This is an opportunity for all our families to pick up some new to you clothes free of charge. We have all sizes for everyone in the family, babies to men, and it is FREE! Please stop by and shop! I love shopping and free!

Fall Break:  Thursday and Friday (October 10th and 11th) School will be closed for Fall Break! Go jump in some leaves and enjoy the crisp, cool air!

I hope everyone has an relaxing and refreshing 4 day! See you on Monday for our 3 jam packed days before! -Ms. Shaw