I tried something new today. During Text Talk, the program for teaching vocabulary words, I asked students to draw a picture for each of the words and they did a marvelous job! The words they learned today were imagined, grumpy and tame. Our shared reading for the week is called "We Like School." It has many lines about things that kids do at school, such as "We like centers." It said nothing about most students' favorite thing -- recess -- so we worked together to write a new sentence which we added.

Don't forget to turn in November reading minutes so your child can get his or her Pizza Hut certificate. It's supposed to snow tonight so please send your child to school with snow boots and maybe even snow pants.

Today students rearranged cut apart sentences using what they know about sentence structure to put them back into proper order. We talked about "announcements" and then students made "Lost" posters for imaginary lost pets. In math we learned about symmetry. Students cut shapes and divided them into equal parts. We related equal parts to "fairness." Check out the "symmetry" link I just added to the links section. You upload a picture of your child to find out if their face is perfectly symmetrical. During afternoon recess a tree service was cutting down some trees on school property which was provided lots of entertainment! Tomorrow is library day and it's supposed to get really cold in the afternoon so make sure your child is prepared.

Students learned 2 new words today: we and can. They also worked in pairs to use pattern blocks to create new shapes. They were challenged to put together a variety of hexagons, triangles, parallelograms and squares to create a large triangle. They discovered that the square was of no use for this task. We used Google Earth to zoom from outer space to our school. We also looked up several addresses and saw some of your homes. Pretty cool! We read the book Maxi the Hero and talked about heroic acts. I also had a student tell someone else a story and then asked the child to retell their friend's story. They had a really hard time doing this, so we will practice those important listening skills.

We accomplished a lot of work in our half day of school. I think most students were able to check out a take home reader. I met with reading groups to work on strategies such as using the picture to get information about the text as well as using letter sounds to figure out unknown words. When your child is reading to you, please be sure they are pointing to the words. They need to know that they can only say as many words as there are on the page. As their reading skills improve, they will be weaned off of the pointing but for now it's important. Have a safe and happy Thankskgiving holiday!

We learned a little about the pilgrims and their journey to America. It took them 66 days to cross the ocean and we've only been in school 61 days! The students couldn't imagine being on a boat for that long. We also talked about our state, where it's located, and how it differs from other states. In Social Studies students are working on a book about their place in the world. Today they cut out the shape of Montana and also located Montana on a US map. In math students put events into proper sequence. I didn't offer students a sentence starter in writing today and I think they did more writing as a result. They impress me so much with their ability to sound out words to convey a written message.

Students did an excellent job at process spelling, a program in which I say a sight word, students write it on a mini white board, and then all the students spell the word in unison. I also pulled some small groups to my reading table and had them reading sight words. I was impressed with how well they did. I can tell that they are practicing at home, so thank you, parents! They also made these awesome turkeys and added signs saying things like, "Eat pumpkin pie, not turkey." Have a wonderful weekend and stay warm!

I just received email confirmation that our Scholastic book order has been shipped. Hopefully it will arrive before Tuesday! We had a busy day. The Very Hungry Caterpillar mobile project took much longer that I expected so we missed morning recess. We wrote questions in our journals today. Please help your child practice zipping his or her coat. Most of them can easily do it once they've been shown how. Speaking of coats, it's going to be mighty cold tomorrow. School policy is that students go out for recess unless the wind chill is below zero so warm clothes are essential, including hats and gloves.