Monday October 31, 2011

A big THANK YOU to all of the parents who helped out today for our Halloween activities. The costumes were awesome!!!

Grade 2 Spelling Words:

1. add
2. ask
3. came
4. name
5. ride
6. bone
7. save
8. kite
9. cute
10. mine
11. skin
12. pumpkin

Our word family of the week is the -in family. For example words such as pin, sin, skin, pumpkin, chin and twin. Please practice this word family with your children this week.

The following sight words will be taught tomorrow. Grade 1's will learn blue and yellow
Grade 2's will learn leaf, leaves and colour. They will also practice how to make words plural.

A reminder that tomorrow and Wednesday have an early dismissal of 12:30. I will start my parent teacher interviews at 1:00 so please be on time to pick up your child.

A reminder that Wednesday November 2nd photo retakes will take place in the morning. If you requested photo retakes, please do not wear green or white on Wednesday as it interferes with the screen that the photographers use. Thanks!

Have a safe and fun Halloween night tonight!!!

Mrs. G

Reminders:

• Halloween is on Monday. On October 31st, students are welcome to wear a costume from 1:00pm - 2:30pm during our theme activities. Students need to be able to change into their costume independently at 1:00pm, or parents may drop by to help their child change. Costume accessories and masks should be left at home, as the students will need their hands free to participate in afternoon activities. Costumes must be school appropriate, therefore violence and gory costumes are not permitted. Parents are welcome to join us for the afternoon.
• Reminder that parent teacher interviews will happen on November 1st and 2nd. Students will be dismissed at 12:30pm on each of these dates. I have posted a schedule for interviews outside my classroom. Please sign up for a 15 minute time slot if you would like to meet with me.
• Photo retakes will take place on Wednesday, November 2 in the morning.
• Monday is Library day. Please return all library books!
• If you are able to send a small pencil case to school with your child that would be great. Many students are losing their pencils and erasers as they are falling out of desks. A pencil case is a great way to keep things organized.

Thanks so much and have a restful weekend!!!

Mrs. G

Thursday October 27, 2011

Reminders:

• Grade 2's have their spelling quiz tomorrow.
• Halloween is on Monday. On October 31st, students are welcome to wear a costume from 1:00pm - 2:30pm during our theme activities. Students need to be able to change into their costume independently at 1:00pm, or parents may drop by to help their child change. Costume accessories and masks should be left at home, as the students will need their hands free to participate in afternoon activities. Costumes must be school appropriate, therefore violence and gory costumes are not permitted. Parents are welcome to join us for the afternoon.
• Reminder that parent teacher interviews will happen on November 1st and 2nd. Students will be dismissed at 12:30pm on each of these dates. I have posted a schedule for interviews outside my classroom. Please sign up for a 15 minute time slot if you would like to meet with me.
• Photo retakes will take place on Wednesday, November 2 in the morning.
  
• This Friday is popcorn day sponsored by our very generous PAC. Popcorn will be sold at lunch for $1.00 a bag. There is a limit of one bag per student.

Grade 1's will be learning a new sight word tomorrow. That word is red. Please practice this new word with your child.

Thanks and have a great day!!!

Mrs. G

Monday October 24, 2011

Reminder that Monday October 24th the students will be attending the first performance, "Wells and Woodland" comedy show as part of our Young People's Concert Series. We will be travelling by bus to the sagebrush theatre and return to school by lunch time.

Monday is library day... Please remember to bring your library books.

Reminder that the sign up for Parent-Teacher interviews is up outside the classroom. Please sign up for a time if you wish to meet with me on November 1 or 2. Reminder that on both those days students will be dismissed at 12:30 pm.

Grade 2 Spelling words this week:

1. up
2. it
3. him
4. I
5. for
6. or
7. four
8. we
9. man
10. men
11. crop
12. stop

The word family of the week is the -op family. Words such as pop, lop, top, hop, stop, flop, etc.

Grade 1's will be bringing home a worksheet today with all of the sight words learned to date. Please go over this sheet with your child and practice the words with them. The new sight word learned today is -the

Grade 2's new sight words are any, many

The libraries across BC are promoting D.E.A.R. today which is short for Drop Everything and Read. We will be taking 15 minutes today to D.E.A.R. We have also decorated our door for the D.E.A.R. library contest. Last week we read a book called Uno's Garden and the students decorated the door to represent this book. The top of the door is all forest and animals. Eventually, the forest becomes a city without plants and animals. The middle section of our door is representative of the city. The bottom portion of the door is a balance between city and nature. This is the main message in the book. The students loved this book! Please come and check out our beautiful door if you get a chance. We will leave it up for the next week.

Have a great day,

Mrs. Galloway

Wednesday October 19, 2011

Here are a few important items to note this week:

Friday is a non-instructional day for students.

A permission slip for the Young People's Concert series was sent home last week. Please send the form back to school no later than Thursday. On Friday, photo proofs were sent home with your child and they are due no later than Oct 24th if you are interested in ordering photos..

Halloween is approaching quickly. On October 31st, students are welcome to wear a costume from 1:00pm - 2:30pm during our theme activities. Students need to be able to change into their costume independently at 1:00pm, or parents may drop by to help their child change. Costume accessories and masks should be left at home, as the students will need their hands free to participate in afternoon activities. Costumes must be school appropriate, therefore violence and gory costumes are not permitted. Parents are welcome to join us for the afternoon.

Parent teacher interviews will happen on November 1st and 2nd. Students will be dismissed at 12:30pm on each of these dates. I have posted a schedule for interviews outside my classroom. Please sign up for a 15 minute time slot if you would like to meet with me.

I will be sending a sheet home tomorrow that will indicate when your child's special helper day is. On your child's special helper day, he/she will bring in one item for show and tell as part of his/her speaking and listening mark. I will send the criteria home as well.

Have a great day!
Mrs. Galloway

Monday, October 17, 2011

I hope everyone had a restful weekend!

I will be putting a sign up sheet outside of the classroom tomorrow with 15 minute slots for parent-teacher interviews on Tuesday, Nov. 1 and Wednesday, Nov. 2. Please sign up for one 15 minute time slot if you wish to meet with me.

Grade 2 Spelling words this week:

1. his
2. is
3. an
4. and
   
5. can
6. all
   
7. call
8. land
9. hand
10. small
11. spot
12. forgot

The word family we learned this week is the -ot family. We brainstormed words such as spot, lot, pot, forgot, knot, plot. Please practice this word family this week

Grade 2 sight words today are: wish, would
Grade 1 sight words today are: yes, no

Grade 2's also reviewed the short i sound and reviewed digraphs. Digraphs are letters that go together to make a new sound (unlike blends where the two or more usual sounds are blended together and the sounds stay intact). The digraphs we reviewed are /sh/, /ch/, /th/, and /wh/.

On behalf of Ms. Clarke, Mrs. McGarry and myself, we would like to take a moment to make all parents aware of the expectations of pick up and drop off in our hallway. We request that students enter the school quietly and independently at 8:20 am and not before. We ask that parents please wait outside of the school until the 2:30 pm bell rings at the end of the day. We are finding it very distracting and noisy when parents wait in the hallway at the end of the day. As the cooler weather approaches our expectation will remain the same. It is a good idea to establish a drop off and pick up point outside the school. Students are expected to enter and exit the school using their assigned door even if they are meeting siblings from another class. The hallways get very congested if this rule is not followed. Thank you for supporting our respect and responsibility goals.

Thanks so much,
Mrs. Galloway

Thursday October 13, 2011

Reminders:

• Young People's concert permission forms went home today. Please sign and return to school as soon as possible.
• Spelling quiz tomorrow for the grade 2 students.
• Gym tomorrow - wear proper footwear.

New sight words learned today:
Grade 1 - play, my
Grade 2 - child, children

I would like to apologize for the home reading books that went home and the pages were out of order. I have been having some issues printing off the books and some of them came out the wrong way. I number of books have been ordered for our classroom but have not yet arrived. Your child may be bringing home a book that he/she has already read while I fix the problem. Keep in mind though that any reading is useful, even if it is something that they've already read. Thank you for your patience.

Have a great evening,

Mrs. G

Tuesday October 11, 2011

Grade 2 Spelling Words for the Week

1. as
2. has
3. fox
4. box
5. mix
6. egg
7. jam
8. pet
9. nap
10. big
11. plan
12. scan

We have been learning several sight words in class. These are words that don't always follow a rule and are words that should be recognized quickly and easily while reading. Students have a list of sight words in their home reading bags.

So far the Grade 1's have learned the following words:

a, am, I, like and to

The Grade 2's have learned the following words:

best, come, came, has, if let, man, manners, may, myself, please, say, and thank

Please practice these words with your child on a regular basis.

We are also learning word families. Most of the words are new to the grade 1's. The grade 2's are using blending sounds to make the words more challenging.

So far we have learned the -at family. Words like cat, hat, bat, chat, splat etc.
We have also learned the -ap family. Words like cap, nap, map, trap, flap etc.

This week we will be learning the -an family. Words like can, fan, span, scan etc.

Have a great day!!!
Mrs. Galloway

Welcome to my blog for the 2011/12 school year. You can access this blog through the Aberdeen Elementary home page quickly and easily. In lieu of regular newsletters, I will be posting on the blog on a weekly and often daily basis.

I will be posting sight word and spelling lists on the blog as well as important classroom information including special helper for the day and reminders.

Looking forward to a great week!

Mrs. Galloway