March 29, 2018 Newsletter

Dear Parents,

We have been very busy preparing our projects that will be displayed at our Kindergarten Museum on Tuesday, April 10th.  We hope you are able to visit our museum from 8:30-9:15am that day to see some of the children’s amazing artwork!  We have completed most of our Impressionist projects this week.  We finished painting water lilies, decorated flower pots with mosaic designs, and made a landscape paintings.  We even drew and painted Indian elephants.  We also started learning a little about Egypt and will complete some fun Egyptian art projects next week.

We attended a Chick Show presented by Ms. P. from the Burlington Science Center.  She taught us some really neat facts about chicks and their development in the egg.  She also taught us about the life cycle of a chicken and what we can expect when the eggs arrive in our classroom on Monday!  The students are very excited to be able to watch chicks hatch in our very own classroom!

We are still learning about all the different continents.  Students have been writing facts they learn in their continent books.  These will probably go home next week after we have learned about all seven continents. 

We are looking forward to our field trip to Legoland this Thursday, April 5th.  More information will go home the day before the trip but students will need a disposable lunch, snack, and drink.  Chaperones should be at the school by 9am.

I have enjoyed the first few conferences I have had with some of you and I am looking forward to the rest that are coming up over the next couple of weeks.  Please check in with me if you need a reminder about the date or time of your conference.  We’ve already got some artwork on display so you will be able to get a little sneak peek before the actual museum!

Have a great long weekend.  There is no school tomorrow (Friday).

Melanie Duncan

PS...We will be going to the library on Wednesday.  Please have your child return his/her book.  Please be sure to return all class books too.  Thanks!

Also, let us know when you would like us to send all your child’s snow gear home (snowpants, boots, etc.).  I’m sure you are as excited as we are to put all that stuff away!

March 23, 2018 Newsletter

Dear Parents,

We have been busy working on our art projects for our museum on Tuesday, April 10.  We hope you are able to come to it!  We finished our Picasso pictures and started learning about Impressionist painting.  We even started our own impressions of some famous impressionist paintings, including Monet’s “Waterlilies.”  We also made birch trees out of newspaper that we will display in our hall next week.

We made a class book called “It Looked Like Spilt Milk” that has started circulating.  We also made Car Books and Color Flip Flap books.  Both projects required students to use sight words to write whole sentences.  These are all great books for your child to read and reread at home.

We learned about magnets this week.  The students enjoyed exploring the magnets and feeling the push and pull forces between two magnets.  We also enjoyed another video from the Science Center about the eggs we will be receiving in another week.  We learned about “candling” the eggs to determine if the eggs are fertilized or not.  Ms. P. also came into our classroom to feed Maisey, the Cornsnake.  Our students certainly enjoy all the science activities and lessons that we have been participating in!

We started a new topic in math.  We are continuing to work with teen numbers and are talking about groups of tens and ones left over.  The students have been doing very well with this.

We have been doing a lot of work with our sight words in school but I would also encourage you to continue practicing these words with your child at home.  The more he/she sees them and reads them in different contexts, the more familiar the words will become.  I sent a list home of the words your child knows already.

We enjoyed learning more about the countries that our students’ ancestors have come from this week.  We listed the different countries with student names and even looked up many of them on Google Earth to see where they are in relation to where we live.  The students have been learning a lot of neat facts about continents.  We learned a little about Australia but have spent most of the week learning about Africa.  We had a special treat this afternoon.  Mrs. Nambooze, Eshal’s mom, came in to share about her experiences growing up in Uganda.  She brought in some neat artifacts, including artwork, accessories, and clothing to share with our class.  The students enjoyed hearing the stories and asking questions.  Thank you Mrs. Nambooze for visiting our class and sharing with us!

We enjoyed playing board games in the library and free play activities in the gym today to celebrate our whole-school reward for showing acts of kindness during the past few weeks.

Information went home today about our next field trip.  We are going to go to Legoland on April 5th!  This is a brand new field trip for Kindergarten!  We will be learning about forces and motion and will be doing some fun engineering projects!  This field trip is free so you don’t need to send in any money.  Please let me know if you are interested in chaperoning by early next week, if possible.  The number of chaperones for this trip is limited so I may draw names from a hat if necessary.

Have a great weekend!

Melanie Duncan

PS...Students should plan to continue bringing snowpants, boots, hats, mittens, etc., especially if they plan to play in the snow at recess next week.  It looks like it might stick around for a little while!

March 16, 2018 Newsletter

Dear Parents,

It has been a very unusual couple of weeks!  We’ve had four snow days during the past two weeks but we’ve still done quite a bit!  The children continue to create wonderful artifacts for our museum. We have spent a lot of time learning about modern/contemporary art.  We’ve learned about hot and cold colors, painted with kitchen gadgets and marbles, made Kandinsky trees with brightly colored circles, and even made Picasso pictures!  The students have really enjoyed learning about this kind of artwork! 

We will be transitioning to Impressionist paintings during the next couple of weeks and will be learning about some of the famous Impressionist painters.  Students also finished painting their portraits of a friend!  All of our portraits and self-portraits are currently displayed on our back wall.  They look awesome!  We hope you are all able to visit our Kindergarten Museum on Tuesday, April 10th to see all the students’ hard work!  It will be from 8:30-9:15am.

The students finished their All I Am books and brought them home today after reading them to the class.  It's great when they have to think of all the things they are and what they want to be.  We've got very talented children! 

The students have also been very busy writing. They have been working hard in their journals. We talked about different sight words and working on spelling them correctly in their writing. They are doing a great job!  I would continue practicing these sight words at home with your child to help them learn them even better.

We finished our topic in math about teen numbers.  They did a great job counting and writing the numbers.  We quickly reviewed our addition math facts this week.  I would encourage them to keep practicing at home!

We have enjoyed having Maisey, the Cornsnake in our room.  We are looking forward to watching the snake feeding this coming week.  We are also very excited to be the first Kindergarten class to do chick hatching!  Ms. P. from the Burlington Science Center has already visited the farm to get eggs and put them in the incubator.  She will be delivering the eggs to our classroom in a couple of weeks so we can watch the chicks hatch!  She will be giving a presentation soon too that will teach us all sorts of neat things about chick hatching and the life cycle of chickens.

We also started learning about the seven continents.  We will be reading books and writing facts in our continent books during the next couple of weeks.  We are starting with the continent of Africa and have already learned some really neat facts.

Progress reports for grades 1-5 went home on Monday.  Kindergarten won’t have another progress report until the end of the year.  I sent home the appointment card for our parent/teacher conference that will take place either during the end of March or beginning of April. I do feel that it is important for us to meet to discuss your child’s progress before the end of the year.  Please let me know if you need to reschedule.

We are going to the library on Wednesday.  Please return library books and all class books too.

Have a great weekend!

Melanie Duncan

The Harlem Superstars visited Francis Wyman this morning!

Our New Class Pet

Maisey, the Cornsnake arrived this afternoon!  The students wrote persuasive letters to Miss P. from the Burlington Science Center in February trying to persuade her to give us a snake for our class pet.  Students did some research about snakes and wrote letters that included an attention grabber and great reasons why she should give us a snake.  Students also drew and labeled pictures that showed Miss P. all that we would need to help us take care of the snake.  

The students enjoyed learning about snakes and what makes them reptiles, as well as other neat facts such as how snakes use their senses, how they protect themselves, and what we need to do to keep it safe in our classroom.  Miss P. even allowed the students to touch and hold Maisey!  We are looking forward to watching a snake feeding sometime during the next week or so and being able to observe Maisey over the next few weeks!