2014_12_19 Friday

From Elise's teacher: Today we talked about all the things we are going to do over the holiday break. We worked on sight words big,in. We also found the missing vowels in between CVC words. Elise played on the kindle while we did the sight words. We had fun with playdoh. We played with Frozen themed matching cards yesterday and today. They played in pairs and took turns. We made a snowflake with tape and blue paint. We watched Frozen for 30 mins with Ms. Ann's class! :)

How are you feeling today and why are you feeling that way? 

Elise- I am happy because I'm with my friends.

From Elise's reading club: Hello! On Monday, X and X worked on words can, it. X Elise and X completed the booklet Come See My... X also worked on coloring sight words Christmas tree sheet. On Tuesday, X and X worked on see, it. X Elise and X read a winter booklet. On Wednesday X and X worked in words for, in. X X and Elise completed the booklet Ready For Christmas. We all played sight word bingo. We all did some round robin reading with 3 Curious George Curious About Phonics books. On Thursday, X  and X worked on the word big. It was X's birthday! X completed the booklet Snow Falling. We enjoyed our last day of reading club of the semester by doing sight words flash cards outside on the playground. Then we took turns on the kindle. I read BOB books with X . 

2014_12_18 Thursday

Well, Elise stayed home from school today. She seemed a lot worse last night and this early morning than she did by late morning. I'm not sure if I got snowed. But, especially after the TV went off at 9:30, she suddenly felt a lot better. hmmm.

E: Mom, please don't kiss me on the lips.
M: Oh, honey, why not?
E: Because I don't want anyone in the world to get sick germs from me.
awwww.

2014_12_17 Wednesday

From Elise's teacher: Today we discussed Hanukkah - discussed latkes, gelt, dreidels, story of how Hanukkah came about. We talked about how it is the first day today. We painted a menorah with our hands. We made the Star of David with Popsicle sticks by putting 2 triangles together. I read books The Hanukkah Mice and This is the dreidel. French teacher will bring work tomorrow and they will bring home!:)

I read X'sbook Spin the dreidel. She had a dreidel with it so we had a chance to talk about the game! I read Polar express from X. I read X's Curious George Christmas countdown. X brought Pete the cat saves Christmas.
Tell me something you learned about Hanukkah today: 
Elise- you play a game with a dreidel and you spin it and land on a letter like nun.

2014_12_16 Tuesday

From Elise's teacher: Today we reviewed what the holiday Kwanzaa is about. We made a kinara and learned what the candles signify. We played a dice game to put Santa together on his sleigh. We played with the category cards to put things in certain categories. They had Spanish today.  I read X's book 'Twas the night before Christmas and X's book The Angel and the Lamb. I read X's book Gingerbread Baby. We had music time at the end of day and listened to winter songs. 

What did you like doing today? 
Elise- I like when we danced around for music time.

2014_12_15 Monday

From Elise's teacher: Today we made snowmen that had lots of different shapes. We kept him warm with mittens and a scarf. We worked on sight words see, it. Review at home. We will keep adding to the list and do flash cards as we learn more of them. We also sorted different categories using cards and picture chips. 

I read the book Why Mosquitoes Buzz in Peoples' Ears-- it is a West African tale. We made predictions. We discussed the pattern in the book. We listened to Spin Dreidel Spin for music and danced in a circle. 

What do you remember or like from the story?
Elise- I remembered that the mosquito got slapped by the woman.

Bring in a favorite holiday book this week! Elise brought in Jingle and Bell's Christmas Star and I read it to the class. 

2014_12_12 Friday

Jonathan went to the Fox Theater to see The Nutcracker with his class. Despite some logistic idiocracies, he reported back that he "really loved the show" (never get him to call it a ballet b/c that's for girls -- hmmm!). I think it's so cool that he liked it regardless.

2014_12_11 Thursday

From Elise's teacher: Today we made mosaic tile art with different materials. They had Italian today. I did pattern cards with each student. We went over AB, ABB, AAB, ABC patterns. X played a phonics game on the kindle. I read the book Colors of Us and we discussed how people can be different shades of color/brown like the kids in the story. We came up with words like they did in the story such as cinnamon, honey, caramel, chocolate, peach. We also went over sight words flash cards together as a class. Most recognized I, a, at, up, can, me, on, go. 

What is your favorite wintertime activity? Elise- building a snowman and having a snowball fight with my brother 

From reading club: On Monday, X, X, and I played the roll the dice game with sight words: up, I , at, is, me. X, Elise, and X worked on a color words/sight words coloring sheet. X and X also worked on matching numbers to their number words.  We all went over sight words. X and I went over letter sounds. On Tuesday, X, X, and Elise played the roll the dice game with some of our difficult words such as jump, make, find. We all worked on a coloring reindeer sheet with sight words. X and X also worked on a beginning sounds wkst. On Wednesday X and X made color word cards. Cut out and practice please! They also worked on beginning and ending sounds of CVC words. X, X, and Elise made read What Color Is it? booklet. We went over flash cards.  On Thursday, Elise and X worked on recognizing sight words. They also read BOB books to me. X and X worked on sight word like. X and I also worked on color words. X played a phonics game on the kindle and learned some letter sounds. 

2014_12_10 Wednesday

Jonathan slept from about 5pm last night until about 8am today! insane. And, he stayed home today to recover from strep. We did a tiny bit of TV this morning, but then it was back up to bed and entertaining himself (books, legos, ??). I gave him the Barf Bell, which ended up being more like a maid service, so I may need to rethink that. By this evening, he seems completely better again, thankfully.

From Elise's teacher: Today we made art-kabobs with pipe cleaners and beads. They had to put the beads and noodles through the pipe cleaners. We pretended to add our favorite foods to them. Then they had a BBQ with a partner. I read  The Twelve Days of Christmas. They had French. We drew 3 pictures for letter Ll in our folders. We drew a lamp, lollipop, lizard. We practiced counting objects 11-13. We practiced making patterns. We practiced our song one last time!:) 

What is your favorite language to learn and tell me a word you know in that language? 
Elise my fav language is Spanish the word is roja it means red 
We went to Elise's winter pageant tonight too. pix/video? to follow. Her teacher gave me a nice poinsettia.

We decorated our tree too!

2014_12_09 Tuesday

Jonathan's been feeling off for the past few days; he says that his tummy hurts and that his throat hurts when he talks. (I know a very easy solution for the latter.) This morning as we were rushing around to catch the bus, he turned to me and said: "Mom, I don't feel good. I really think I might have ebola." We talked a little about how safe we are (and that people with ebola actually come here to get better; whew, did that come in handy!!), but I ran out of time. So, I alerted the school nurse and his teacher to be considerate of that fear. ;o) Well, he got sent home around 1pm for a fever, and we stopped by CVS to rule out strep, but the nurse ruled in strep. Jonathan has to stay home for 24hrs, so he'll miss the last day of his science club; he's pretty bummed about that.

And, a few days ago, Elise had a doozy. "You know, when boys get their fingers painted, it's called a manicure." I couldn't resist asking what it's called when girls do: "a ladycure, of course."

Elise had a complete, satanic episode this morning. I asked her to get dressed; she refused. I told her that I would pick an outfit or she could; she refused. Then, I stuffed her into jeans and a sweater; she did not really appreciate that. Then, I had to rush to get dressed myself b/c I had a conference to attend this morning. When I went back to her room, she was hiding in the closet, naked. OOOOH, was I furious. I jammed her back into the clothes that I chose (she kept yelling that she didn't like those), and we proceeded to breakfast. How do you like those consequences?! I explained that I hope that tomorrow she gets up and selects what she'd like to wear so that we don't repeat this nonsense. She was fine afterward. When I dropped her off at school, she said that she was only going to be respectful of her teacher and babysitter. Hopefully by the time she gets home, she will have reset herself.

From Elise's teacher: Today we talked about poinsettias and made one. We heard a story of where the plant came from in Mexico. We also made stockings. I read the book How My Parents learned to Eat. I had a pair of chopsticks and we practiced picking up an erase with them! They had Spanish today. We practicing writing Ll in our journals as well as numbers 1-10. We made patterns with buttons and pattern cards. 
Tell me something you learned about poinsettias today: 
Elise- they come in different colors 

2014_12_08 Monday

From Elise's teacher: Today we talked about ways people eat food all around the world whether with chopsticks or on the floor. I read Come and Eat! and we discussed people from Tibet, Nigeria, Japan, Chinese, America and what foods they eat. We focused a little more on Japanese foods. We talked about what they eat such as sushi, rice bowls, fish, other seafood. We drew a picture in our journals of how our family eats.  We worked on the letter of the week Ll. We made a Christmas tree by painting it green with forks! Then we added glitter ornaments. They had Mandarin today. 

What type of new food do you want to try from our book or something else we talked about today?

Elise- I would like to try sushi with rice and shrimp 

2014_12_05 Friday

Today is St. Nicholaus!!!

From Elise's teacher: Today we completed some different crafts. We all made a snowman craft. We worked in centers practicing writing and counting numbers. X played a phonics game on the kindle. Some students worked on a sight word worksheet. They had German today. We practiced for the pageant. I also read the story The Sandwich Swap and we made predictions throughout the story. We also made real life connections by talking about a time we have had a problem with a friend and how we solved the problem just like how the girls solved the problem in the book. I also read Everybody Bakes Bread which is about different cultures baking different types of breads.

And also Jennifer (Elise's mom) came by to talk about their family's tradition of leaving shoes for St. Nicholas to come and give treats to good boys and girls. I talked about what it means to be a good person and to do nice things for people. We talked about things we shouldn't do like steal or say bad words. They enjoyed taking their shoes off and receiving some goodies! Thank you for coming!!

Tell me something about the St. Nicholas story you just heard:
Elise - St Nicholas walks with his friend down the street and St Nicholas gives candy to the good kids and his friend gives bad stuff to the bad kids

From Reading Club: Hello! X will be joining us from now on! :) And also X will be with us for a while! :) both are in Ms X's class. I will send this email weekly with what we did that week in reading club. On Monday, since we had a large group we did many different activities where we either worked independently or in pairs. I went around and
checked their work and also worked one-on-one with all the students. We read She Will Play booklet. We worked on sounds and read BOB books. X played a game on the kindle. On Tuesday, we worked on consonant blends. X and X and I worked on letter sounds. We worked on learning our color words. On Wednesday, X and Elise read and made Things I Like. X and X worked on sight words up, I,a. We all went over flash cards. On Thursday, X and Elise played a roll the dice game with sight words. X and X worked on the sight word go. We read BOB books and played on the kindle.  We went over flash cards.

2014_12_04 Thursday

From Elise's teacher: Today we made a holiday chain where each student's decorated links by drawing holiday pictures. We put it all together to create a chain. We worked on some addition problems. We completed a K is for King craft. I read Celebrations of Light and we talked about different holidays and how light is apart of most holidays. We practiced for our pageant. 

Why do we celebrate different holidays?  Why is light important to many holidays? 

Elise- Light helps you see in the dark. 

2014_12_03 Wednesday

From Elise's teacher: Today we talked more about traditions and also about holidays from around the world. I read the book Traditional Celebrations. We learned about Chinese New Year, Running with the Bulls, New Year's Eve, Chu Suk. We played with gumball mats where they counted out chips in the machines and wrote the numbers --1-20. We worked on our letter folders for K. We drew key, koala, kite. They had French today. We worked on sequencing events. 

What is a tradition your family has? 
Elise- I help my family put the decorations in be Christmas tree

2014_12_02 Tuesday

From Elise teacher: Today we talked about family traditions. We talked about the traditions that people who celebrate Kwanzaa partake in. I read the book Kwanzaa Kids which explained the holiday. We learned what a kinara is and the colors for Kwanzaa. We learned how many days Kwanzaa. For art we each made a drawing about something important that signifies our families on a small square. Then I put the squares together to make a quilt.  

Show and tell shares:
Elise- for my show and tell I brought keys because keys starts with k.

2014_12_01 Monday

From Elise's teacher: Hello and welcome back! Hope everyone enjoyed the holiday! :) Today we talked about the new month and all the festivities that will happen. We talked about different holidays. We made an invitation to invite you all to our winter pageant that is next week. We are having fun practicing and can't wait for you guys to see our show! We worked on color words and counting today also. Letter of the week is Kk. We came up with words that start with K. 

Who are you going to invite to the pageant? 
Elise-I'm going to invite my mommy and daddy and my brother