Grade 1/2 room 3: This passed week (December 8-12)

Dear Parents/Guardians,

I hope you're all well and excited for our winter break.
These last few weeks have been extremely busy and full of events and activities.
Before I give you our overview of this passed week, I would like to inform you about some dates, events and updates.

Homework:
Homework has not been sent home for the last two weeks and the reason for this has to do with our school budget. Photocopying and using paper comes out of our budget, and as such, we are no longer allowed to use the photocopier. There is one machine that we are allowed to use which doesn't come out of our printing budget, but it wasn't working for two weeks. This printer got serviced this passed week and it is now available for our use.
Unfortunately however, paper also comes out of our class budget and it is extremely costly. I have already had a couple of parents provide some packs of paper which should carry us over for the next month, but homework will be limited from here on.
I truly apologize, but it's not my decision. I know many parents have expressed an interest in continuing to receive homework. Sending homework is optional for every teacher. With that being said, I believe that homework is great for children, as it gives them a chance to reinforce all the concepts that they are learning in class. Additionally it provides parents with an opportunity to see what their children are working on in school. With that being said, I will continue to provide homework as long as our printing Riso machine is working, and as long as we have paper.
If you don't want your child to receive homework, please let me know.

Holiday Party:
We will be having our Holiday party this upcoming Thursday in the afternoon. Although I will provide some treats for the children, It would be greatly appreciated if you could send a healthy nut-free (nothing homemade allowed) treat to school. This will make our party another huge success (just like our Halloween party). Also, if you would like to drop in and visit, please do so. Our classroom is open to everyone - no invitations needed. Drop in at anytime.
Your continued support and generosity is greatly appreciated.

Assembly Wednesday afternoon:
Our character traits assembly for Kindness and Caring is being held on Wednesday afternoon, following recess at 2:20.

Winter concert:
Our winter concert is scheduled for this upcoming Monday at 6:00pm. Students are requested to come to the school at 5:30 and wait in their classrooms until they are called down to the gym for their performance.

Turkey lunch:
A huge thank you to all the parents that worked very hard throughout the whole week to provide the amazing turkey lunch this passed Wednesday. It was truly amazing!!! What you do for the school is incredible. The kids and staff had a great time. Thank you!!!!

Elf on the Shelf:
We kicked off our letter writing unit 2 weeks ago with a letter from Santa. I informed students that I had written a letter to Santa, asking him for a class elf. Santa responded back with a letter telling us that the children needed to write a letter to him to ask for the elf. As such, we wrote a letter together asking for our class elf.
We watched the elf on the shelf movie and awaited Santa's response.
Santa responded by delivering a package to is all wrapped up in the office. Mr. Patsopoulos made the special delivery to our class. We were ecstatic to unwrap it and find our own class elf. We read the book and the students voted on a name. Our class elf is Patrick and his middle name is Tobi. Lol
Patrick had been up to a lot of things this passed week. Below you will find some of Patrick's locations.
I'm loving Patrick and all the kids' responses to him. It had been a blast having him here - I don't want him to leave.

As noted above, we have been working on letter writing in language. Additionally we have been working with the book Mama Miti. This book is wonderful - it focuses on stewardship, respect, caring for others and our environment, and making a difference in the world. Through this text, we have been looking at the author's message, inferring, and looking up words in the dictionary. Some words that we learned and inferred were drought, staff, lamenting, pure, and shimmering to name a few.
We've also focused on having an intended purpose and audience when we write. Another thing we looked at is point of view. We touched on this loosely when the students did a writing prompt from the perspective of elf on the shelf. Last Friday we found Patrick in Mr. Patsopoulos' office. When we returned to class we did some creative writing. It was such a pleasure to watch.

Math:
In math we have continued with problem solving. Students are aware of the 4 levels of achievement, and as such, they have worked to solve problems using the success criteria in teaching a level 4 response.

Art:
Students have been making little elves to go with their writing, and decorations for our class.

Science:
Presentations are coming to a wrap. The boys and girls have been doing so well with their presentations. Students give each other feedback in the form of 2 stars and 1 wish.
A very important thing to note is that we do not ask questions that have a YES or NO response.
Questions to students need to create Higher Order Thinking, and metacognitive thinking. As such, all questions in room 3 do not have yes/no responses - they require students to think about their answers.

Winter Concert Practice:
Ms. Preketes has been working and helping all classes this week to prepare for our Winter Concert.

I hope you enjoy the pictures below, and I look forward to seeing you all at the Concert!!!

Sincerely,

Ms. Nikoletopoulos