January 3rd, 2010

Dear Parents,
Happy New Year! I hope you all had a great break and enjoyed Jesus’ birthday along with relaxation and family time. I know I did, so much so that I plan to extend my vacation time a little. I will be gone this week Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Mrs. Al-Haj will be here to sub for me. This month we have a half day on Friday the 14th for Teacher In-Service and no school on Monday the 17th for Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
This semester’s snack list is by our classroom door, in your Monday Folder, and on a tab on our web site under Kindergarten 2. Please check it for the week you are to bring snacks. Just a reminder…We have 19 students in the class and an allergy to peanuts and eggs. If possible, please bring a snack that DOES NOT contain these items. Suggestions: fresh fruit or vegetables cut up, cereal in baggies, raisins, crackers, etc.
We move on to “Pp” this week. We’ll have fun with visits from the pastors and the principal to share their work with us! This fits well as we are beginning a class book about what they want to be when they grow up! This will be published in hard back form and available for purchase in a few weeks. You may view books made from previous years on the table by our door. If you’d like to share your work with us please let me know so we can schedule a time!
For show and tell let them choose one favorite Christmas present that they’d like to share. They may also bring something that begins with “p” for tomorrow. The book buddy bags are clean and ready to go again. We switched class boxes with Mrs. Withee so they’ll have all new choices!
This week I will send home one book that they have read with me and one they have not read. Since I won’t be here I want them to get the practice they need. Please work on these two books throughout the week. There is also the new math game in the binder to work on. Really talk about not only the number identification but also the combinations that two numbers make a third.
Our themes this month are “Winter,” “Water,” and “Community Helpers.” Our art, science, and language experiences will be related to these themes. We’ll begin some fun water experiments. We’ll be making foil boats and seeing which design holds the most pennies before it sinks! This requires lots of math, too!
Our Bible lessons this week are about Jesus as a boy at the temple. We’ll learn that God gives us parents, teachers and pastors who teach God’s Word and help us learn about Jesus, who loves us and forgives our sins. Our Bible verse is Ephesians 6:1 “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.” Most parents love this verse! We’ll also spend some time with the few verses in the Bible that tell us about Jesus as a baby, including meeting Simeon in the temple at 8 days, the visit of the wisemen, and the trip to Egypt.
Everyone received a spiral notebook today that will be their diary or journal. We’ll use it to keep track of what is happening and to put our thoughts down, too. They’ll use pictures and words with words increasing as they are able. In Writer’s Workshop in January we really start emphasizing quantity of writing - at least a couple of stories a week. Some times quality suffers for a bit but that soon improves. At home now you can help with this tremendously. Just have your child write one thought down most nights. It could be a one line note to put in dad’s lunch or pocket, a note to a grandparent, a reminder for the fridge, or whatever! Have them stretch out the words themselves, listening for as many sounds as they can hear. Gently remind them to put space between words and end with punctuation. See if they are using lowercase letters consistently. Have high expectations! They can do this and it becomes much easier with just this few minutes of practice regularly. Thanks for your help on this.
You will find the book orders for January in the Monday folder this week. Please return any book orders or get your orders in online by January 11th. I did not receive a SEESAW book order this month for some reason. You can still view it online. Remember…every online order earns our classroom one free book! I also put in the January book-it calendar. Send back December’s calendar Monday or Tuesday if you want your certificate before I leave, otherwise you’ll have to wait until next week.

God’s blessings on your week!
Natalie Graumann