Week 10

Weekly Greetings!

Last week, a highlight for the class was making a drum with the help of some special visitors to our school. The students glued the frames together and fit the face of the drum during our short week, and they will decorate the face this week before bringing it home. I was able to snap a few pictures the first day, to share below.

This week there a few more special activities planned. The Spirit of the Dance team will be working with the students throughout the school daily, teaching them how to play the fiddle and guitar. We will also have a special school wide Halloween event the last hour of school on Friday. I will be giving my class some extra treats before we go to the gym that day, as I give out the weekly and monthly homework prizes. If students can dress themselves in their costume, they may bring it to put on after lunch if they would like. The Halloween event will be very active relay type games, so they may not want to wear their costume until trick-or-treating later in the evening.

Please remember that there will not be any school on Wednesday due to Parent/Teacher conferences. I am looking forward to visiting with you all then.

Have an awesome week!

Kind Regards,
Julie Brown

Week 9

 Weekly Greetings!

Our class had another full five days last week, as we have continued to press toward the end of the first quarter of school. At the end of this week, we will have completed our 9th week! It will also be a short week, with Thursday and Friday off for students due to teacher in-servicing in Tok.

In Science last week, we discussed characteristic of Spiders and compared them to insects. Each  student made a Spider on a web to hang in our room for Halloween. In addition to reinforcing some of their knowledge, it was a good fine motor activity with cutting, punching holes, and twisting pipe cleaners into 8 legs.

This week we will look at Bats, and discuss the Alaska Brown Bat. Not only will we read non-fiction books about Bats, but also a fiction book called Stellaluna to enrich our regular reading program. More information on this week's concepts in Language Arts can been seen on the attached handout sent home with homework on Monday.

Have an enjoyable week!

Kind Regards,
Julie Brown

Week 8

Weekly Greetings!

Even though we started last week off with a number of students absent, we finished strong and had a new addition to our classroom on Friday. We now have 5 students in each grade level making a total of 15 in our class.

Earlier in the week, I snapped a picture of the Kindergarten working with a handwriting program that helps them to understand that letters are made up of long and short straight lines, in addition to large and small curves. They work out the letters introduced using special wood pieces, and then draw the letters on a small chalk board before using pencils and paper. It is a hands-on way to practice and learn the alphabet.

The whole class has been learning a phonics program which includes music and movement, that is call "Zoo Phonics". All the letters have animal characters, and on Thursday we had an animal hunt to match the special characters to the capital letter cards.

A real highlight on Friday was the time spent doing native dancing in the gym. The teens did a wonderful job leading the group, and everyone fully participated!

This week in reading, we will continue to press on with the concepts listed in the supplemental letter attached to your child's homework sent home on Monday. In Science, we will begin to discuss characteristics of spiders as they seem to mix in well with Halloween activities.

I hope you have an awesome week!

Kind Regards,
Julie Brown

Week 7

Weekly Greetings!

Last week was busy and full of extra events! Not only were there basketball teams and all of our itinerant teachers in the building on Thursday, but our class was active as well all week. As we continue to move deeper into grade level expectations in each group, I am also making time for a few special activities throughout the week. The students do well working in small groups, as you can see from the pictures to follow. In the pictures each group had a set of numbered moose to place in order. The Kindergarten students had the lowest set and the older children had higher numbers.  It took some effort and cooperation to complete the task, and everyone felt successful in the end.

On Thursday, the music teacher did something similar with the whole group as they learned a new song and how notes work in music.

Also on Thursday, the school councilor continued her program using the Chester the cat series. The students love seeing Chester and Mrs. Lundy every other week.

For fun on Friday, I read a classic children's alphabet book with rhythm and rhyme called "Chicka Chicka Boom Boom. Afterward, the class made pretzel letters that they could eat with Nacho cheese after lunch. It was a nice way to finish off our full week.

This week we will continue our normal daily routine. Please read the take home letter explaining the Language Arts concepts addressed through the Treasures materials in reading. The letter is sent home each Monday with your child's homework. There will be Show and Tell this Friday, and I will send a reminder home on Thursday to help the students remember to find something to share.

Stay warm and have a great week!

Kind Regards,
Julie Brown