January 15, 2014

I hope everybody had a fantastic Christmas! Above, I've posted some pictures from before break of the students coloring with their preschool buddies and completing a parachute experiment.

Now that we've begun studying the regions of the United States, the students are going to have quizzes on the locations of the states. I gave students a blank map of the Northeast on Monday and had them fill in Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island. On Friday, they'll get a copy of the same map and need to fill those states in. Spelling does not count, but they may not use the abbreviations. We are also continuing to take our times tables test. Now that we've started multiplying numbers with multiple digits, it's really important for students to know their facts!

We finally have a field trip coming up next Friday to the Shedd Aquarium. I sent the permission slips home today. We'll need a few chaperones, so if you've completed the necessary steps, please let me know!

Catholic Schools Week is coming up from January 27-31. We will be doing a poster contest with the theme "What My St. Sylvester Community Looks Like." I gave the students their posterboard yesterday, and this will be due on January 27. Below, I've listed some other highlights for the week:

Monday, January 27: dress down with a crazy hat day, parents are welcome to visit the classrooms until 11:00

Tuesday, January 28: pajama day, students may bring pillows and blankets to school for DEAR time

Thursday, January 30: dress down in red (so we'll match our buddy class), awards ceremony

Friday, January 31: school Olympics

Don't forget that it will soon be time to register for next year! Registration for currently enrolled families begins on Tuesday, January 28. I'd definitely recommend sending in the registration before February 4, since on that day it opens up to new families as well, and several of our classes are at or near capacity.