The November 9th class newsletter has been posted to the class web site. Scroll to the bottom of the site to find it.

Today in science we talked about the light we see during the day and at night. We learned that the moon does not generate it's own light, but reflects light from the sun. We learned that the hotter something is, the brighter it is. Students read their B books to three peers, assembled and read, "Bears, Bears, Bears," and completed a letter B worksheet. We read, The Three Little Pigs, then did a sound matching game in which we listened for beginning sounds, ending sounds, and rhymes. Below are more videos of your sweet children.

Thank you all for coming to conferences Wednesday and Thursday. It was so nice to be able to share your child's accomplishments with you and to learn a little about your family. If you haven't noticed it, I put a link to Ian's family's Christian rock band on this blog, on the left side. Check them out--the name of the group is Servant28!

As promised, here are the videos of students sharing their picture stories yesterday. I had trouble loading them last night, so I hope it works this morning.

Your child brought home two new word carts to add to their bag of practice words: but and I. I decided to write the words this time because the cards they made last time were difficult to read.

Today we talked about how pictures tell a story. We looked at some wordless books and decided that we could still determine the basic story. I gave students a sheet of paper with a magazine picture on one side and on the blank side of the paper asked them to draw what might come next. Students shared their picture stories on the rug--only if they wanted to! Some wanted to share theirs on video, which I will share tomorrow.

Even though it was a short day, we accomplished a lot. We reviewed nouns today, and then I gave students magazines and asked them to cut out a person, place, or thing. We came back to the rug to tape the pictures under the appropriate heading on a chart. We ended up with lots of people, a few things, and no places, so we went through a magazine together until we found at least 2 places. One "place" picture that we found was a bathroom. Since the picture had people in it, we wanted to make sure we noticed the place, so we interactively wrote the word "bathroom" under the picture. We played one round of Ticket Tasket before Social Studies.

In Social Studies, students created pictures of their faces using paper plates and miscellaneous art materials (pasta, yarn, paper scraps, wiggly eyes). While we let the glue dry, I gave students white construction paper cut into the shape of a speech bubble and asked them to write what makes them smile. The most common response was, "My family" (spelled phonetically as "mi"). They are on display in the hall, so make sure you take a look when you come for your conference. They're really cute!

We went onto the ASLPro website today and learned some signs for zoo animals. First, you click on a picture, then a person demonstrates the sign. After learning all the animal signs, we clicked a button and the person did a sign and students had to point to which animal it was. Not everyone got a chance to come to the board today, so we'll learn some more signs in the same manner tomorrow.

Have a great evening. Early out (at noon) again tomorrow and Friday.

Sorry to disappoint you--no videos today. I will try to get a couple on here tomorrow. I'm busily getting ready for conferences. Don't forget that we get out at noon tomorrow, Thursday, and Friday so that I can meet with each of you.

I think the students are really beginning to put things together now. Today was the first day I saw more than one student independently sound out a word they wanted to spell. I gushed to them about how extremely proud this makes me. I am also proud that today they earned enough points to have another popcorn party! Those points are earned when another teacher or staff member notices their good behavior and comments on it--how quietly they go down the halls, how polite they are, etc. It's a big deal!

In sign language club, this class really stands out. They already know so many signs and can read finger spelling extremely well. I ended the day with a big smile on my face, thinking about how much they have learned in only 47 days. I bet you parents are beaming, too! Your kids are brilliant little stars.

We have some videos that will tell you what we did today...