First Day Hooray!

We surely had a wonderful first day of school. You will be able to see it for yourself as soon as I post photos on Seesaw. Be sure to download the Seesaw for Parents app and scan the QR code I sent home in the blue folder.

I hope you enjoyed spending a few moments helping your child “write”. It will be an important part of our daily routine. When families join their student in the writing process, tremendous growth happens. If you are not able to stay for the first 10 minutes, please don’t worry. The helpers that are able to stay, will quickly adopt and nurture the writing process with all our students.

I am looking forward to seeing you again tomorrow.

By the Way…

Thank you so much for adjusting your child’s snack to leave out peanuts and peanut butter. I know the families of our affected classmates appreciate your efforts.

Blue Communication Folders are due every Wednesday. So that means you need to get those papers signed and back in the folder. Then put the folder in the backpack tonight so they don’t get left at home tomorrow.

If you haven’t signed up for Seesaw yet, check your email for the link or ask me for the QR code page. You won’t want to miss out. Don’t take my word for it, ask the other parents how much they love it.

Thank You!

chocolate3 I was so surprised by the many thoughtful gifts you brought to school on Friday. Note cards, photo album, scarf/gloves, coffee mugs and oh so much chocolate! I’m thinking of opening a seasonal chocolate store. I sincerely appreciate the generous Amazon and Apple Store gift cards. I will be using them to add more technology to our classroom very soon. Thank you for investing in 21st century learning!

Art Showcase Success!

paint-pallet-788947_960_720Oh my goodness! The first Carroll Elementary Art Showcase was a stunning event. The MP room was transformed into a very special art gallery. There were watercolors, finger-painting, mixed media, charcoal drawings, tissue-paper collages, wire sculpture and yarn sculpture. Over 1,100 pieces of art were displayed. Ms. Haley Hauder, Mr. Hauder’s daughter, was able to design, organize, and provide age-appropriate art lessons to every student in our school with remarkable results. Special thanks go to the group of teachers that set-up the exhibition because that was quite an undertaking in itself. Thanks also to the Student Leadership Team that provided refreshments for visitors for such a low cost.
You can see a few photos of the event in our Twitter feed. Eventually, I will add them to our Shutterfly account.

Brrr! Where’s Your Coat?

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Mother Nature has been reminding us of the change of seasons. Even though winter weather is here, some students haven’t changed to cold-weather coats yet. We go outside everyday for recess and a few students have regretted their choice of clothing. Unless it is raining at recess time, we’ll be spending part of our day getting some fresh air. This is the season to practice using zippers, snaps and buttons. We have already had several lessons on how to fix sleeves that get pulled inside out. Maybe we’ll be able to tackle the intricacies of tying shoes soon?

Classroom Happenings

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I’m sure you have noticed that we are digging deep into nutrition and food choices. MyPlate.gov has many resources to use in class and at home. The students are better able to categorize food in the five main groups. They all need more practice because some of the food is tricky. Is corn a grain or vegetable? If all fruit has seeds, why are tomatoes and peppers called vegetables? Are donuts in the grain group? Every day we come up with new questions that need researching for answers.
We are also learning how important it is to eat breakfast. Some students are missing out on breakfast. If you are running late in the morning, send an extra snack and I will give your child a few minutes to eat at the beginning of the day. It’s that important!
Look for the healthy activity pages in your child’s backpack. The first one is to keep track of breakfast for the next week. There will be a Star Comet Coupon for the students who come back on Tuesday wearing their Breakfast Badge from the first activity page.

Happy New Year!

download (7)2015 here we come! I certainly enjoyed my vacation time, but it filled me with joy to see all my smiling Kindergartners this morning. We got to welcome a new student to our class named Landan. Carson was the child of the day and he choose Landan to be his helper. How friendly is that? 😀
We reviewed Chapter 4 in Math and practiced our first 20 sight words today. We had a good time at recess because we got to visit with our A-track and D-track friends. We ended our day in the computer lab using ABCya and Lexia. Tomorrow we will visit the library and choose a new book.