Hello LEW Families!

Barnes & Noble Book Fair
Thursday, December 11.  
6:30-8:00 @ Har Mar Mall. 

Come join us for a book fair at Barnes & Noble and support GRS! Selected titles and wish lists will be displayed for different classrooms and it will give us all a nice chance to meet together.

Lower elementary students are going to do a little singalong/performance @ 6:30, so please try and make it if you can! 


What we're doing 

Along with daily math practice and spelling .... 

First years are working on their geometry skills and sorting triangles by their sides.  See if they can tell you the difference between equilateral, scalene and isosceles triangles.  They are also putting the finishing touches on their South American biome work. They're creating biome boxes about the amazon rainforest and they're turning out great!  We're also practicing telling time as well as how to mark important dates on a calendar (birthdays are very important of course).  

Second graders are creating a mural of the tropical rainforest and creating a informational key about all of the interesting plants and animals you can find in the rainforest.  They're also writing creative stories about three different types of lines you find in geometry - parallel, convergent, and divergent. See if they can tell you a story about one of these types of lines.  We are also very proud of the second graders because they came up with some goals to have no late work on the board, and many of them accomplished that goal! Now they have more time to do different interest works - some students are writing about sharks, some are researching rocks of South America, and some are interested in doing some Greek Mythology research.  It's wonderful when the reward is more work! Yay lifelong learning!

Third graders are wrapping up their South American biome research. They've made beautiful posters and booklets about the different biomes, the plants and animals you'll find there, as well as some interesting cultures you'll find in this continent.  Last week, we learned about 3 different kinds of samba dancing from Brazil: Samba no pe, Samba Maracatu, and Samba na Roda. See if they can tell you the differences between the three.  Third years are also learning about mathematical hierarchies using a very concrete and attractive math material.  We were able to see what one unit looks like and what it would look like if we were to put a million of those units together.  They're writing riddles about different place values in different hierarchies such as: "I am in the thousands hierarchy. You need 10 hundreds to make me. Who am I?" 

We're gearing up for our South American celebration this Friday, so we can share all of our work with one another and share a nice South American treat from Brazil called "Pao de Queijo" which means, "cheese bread." It's made from tapioca flour, so it's gluten free :)

Big Thanks!

Thank you Heather Thomas, Nicole Paulsen, Susan Sochacki, Paul Brohaugh, and Jennifer Taylor for your continued support in the classroom with sewing, sorting, and reading with the students. I know they look forward to their time with you and Jennifer and I truly appreciate your dedication and hard work.

Thank you for remembering to send your Thursday Folders each week. It's nice to send home all of their work! 

Hope to see you all on Friday at Barnes and Noble @ 6:30!

Only two weeks until the winter break. Can you believe it??

Have a wonderful evening.

Jessy

Winter Weather Guidelines from the GRS handbook

Recess Guidelines Pertaining to Winter Weather

Our hope is that students have access to outdoor recess whenever it is safe to be outside. To that end, the following guidelines will be enforced at Great River School. We ask that all families prepare students to dress accordingly. 

If the temperature is 32 degrees F or below, a coat, hat or hood and gloves or mittens are required. For elementary please include snow pants, hats and snow boots.

When the wind chill is -15 degrees F or below, students will stay inside.

When the wind chill falls between -15 degrees F and 0, recess may be abbreviated at the supervisors' discretion. At all other times,outdoor recess will be held.

For safety reasons, we do not allow snowball throwing at GRS.

Tis the season to be chilly!

Stay warm, all.

Jessy

Happy Thanksgiving Week!

All grades are trying to wrap up late work before the holiday.  We have works out about South American biomes, country study, invertebrate research, clock work, and continued practice with math operations and spelling.  

A few reminders

Book Orders:

Paper orders are due on Wednesday.  Online orders are due on Thursday at midnight.

Lost and Found:

Any items still in the Lost and Found at 9:00am on Wednesday will be donated after school, so lost items should be recovered before then.

Early Pick-Up on Wednesday?

If students are going to be absent on Wednesday or will be picked up early, please let us know.  We will be going Horton Park as usual around 1:00 until the end of the day.  

Happy Holiday to all of you. I sincerely hope it's filled with loads of fun, relaxation, and quality family time.

Respectfully,

Jessy

Greetings!

Sorry for the hiatus - we've been busy in LEW. I'll do my best to put up a new newsletter by each Monday so that you can receive it with the GRS newsletter each Tuesday.  

What we're doing 

First years are using their geometry skills to create pictures with triangles, squares, hexagons, parallelograms, and rhombi! They create the picture, tally up the number of each kind of shape, and share it with a friend so that they can create the picture.  They are also practicing multiplication with the stamp game and are able to compute problems like 2,342x2.  We discussed plant care and each student chose a plant in the classroom to adopt. Ask your child what they have to do to take care of their plant.  Finally, we are now entering our study of South America and the first graders are creating flags of the different countries in this continent.  

Second years are practicing division using the division board and some are doing long division with the test tubes.  We are also practicing calendar work and answering questions about the calendar. For instance, if we start winter break on December 19th and we return to school on January 5th, how many days will our break last? Second graders are also beginning their work on South America, creating their own map and answering questions like, "Which country is the largest? Which country touches an ocean? Which hemisphere is South America in?" There's a lot of work piling up for the second graders, so practicing stamina and finishing our work in a neat and organized way has also been a focus of ours.  

Third years have successfully finished the Fundamental Needs work for the Native Americans. On Friday, they decided to create an exhibit for the class. They called it "The Native American Exhibit!"  We had students put all of their work on display and we learned about how the Inuits survived up in the far north, how the Pueblo pulled up their ladders into their adobe homes when they saw danger approaching, how the Eastern Great Lakes people thrived on the water, and much much more.  They were extremely proud of their work and we're happy with how it all turned out.  Next week, third years will also be switching their focus back to more math work - keeping their + - x / facts up to snuff and they will also be looking at South American biomes.  

Keep a look out for spelling lists in future newsletters for those that are able to do some additional spelling practice at home.  

Cleaning party postposed - keep eyes peeled for another date TDB

Special Thanks 

To David and Meredith Martinez for bringing Puerto Rico to the GRS! The students had a wonderful time learning about the music and culture of Puerto Rico with your family.

If any one is interested in coming in to do a presentation about South America (our next continent study), please let me know. 

The Importance of Community Meetings 

Each day, our community gathers to talk about what's going well in the classroom, to problem solve and to share work and ideas.  Meetings incorporate peace education, collaboration, and grace and courtesy lessons - all big themes in a Montessori classroom.  Because the topics we discuss affect the entire classroom, we expect everyone to attend these meetings which last about 15 minutes.  They are a part of the curriculum just like math and language lessons.  Ask your child what topics we've discussed together or what they have done to contribute. 

The snow is looking fluffy and inviting right now. Enjoy your weekend!

Jessy 

Thank you all for such wonderful conferences for the past two days. I feel very grateful to have had time to reflect and converse with each of you.  

For your enjoyment - some photos from our Halloween celebration last Thursday:)

Greetings from LEW!

A successful journey to the Bell Museum!

We successfully took public transit and we made it to the Bell for tours of bird and mammal dioramas and got to touch and feel all sorts of interesting specimens in the Discovery Room.

Thank you SO much to the following chaperones that helped us on our journey:

Amy Goetzman

Ruthann Ryberg

Susan Sochacki 

Heather Thomas

Carolyn Williamsen

What we're doing

First years are classifying and describing the 5 different vertebrates.  They're exploring how each is covered, how they move and how they give birth. The students are creating elaborate pop up books to go with the research.  First graders are also expanding on their study of the bead chains. Some are creating the Tower of Squares which is a huge work that involves a lot of concentration and multiplication. They are very proud of this work.  This week we'll also be learning more about the adjective and it's function along with their spelling and cursive practice. 

Second years are finishing up their study of the porifera - the first of many invertebrates they will be exploring.  We begin with the simplest invertebrates and the porifera was one of the first animals to be made of more than one single cell.  Ask your child if they have an idea of what the next invertebrate might be.  Second years are also practicing adding fractions and continuing their work with addition, multiplication and subtraction with the stamp game.  Today we learned about the role of the preposition - prepositions tell us the position of the noun.  They busily went to work on diagraming simple sentences like, "Lay the pencil beside the pen" and they were all able to identify the function of each word. Along with grammar work, the second graders are focusing on tr- blends in spelling as well as practicing their cursive.  

Third years are finishing up the study of different leaf shapes and moving in to large cultural work.  To wrap up our study of North America, the third graders are each choosing a native american culture to explore.  We just learned about the Fundamental Needs of humans today and we'll be applying that to our research.  This lesson is the essence of Montessori - it allows to apply all that we learn to life and the world around us  - it teaches us that we all have basic needs (i.e. food, shelter, clothing, etc.) we just fulfill them in different ways.  After the students complete all of their research and write about at least four needs and how their tribe fulfilled them, they can then choose to extend their study and recreate clothing, shelter, or food based on how their tribe would have fulfilled that need.  Students are also working diligently on the checkerboard, learning how to exchange and regroup in long multiplication. Some students are ready for double digit divisors on the test tube division! Exciting material.  Third years are also focusing on all of the ways we can spell the sound /ai/ - so far we've reviewed that ai, ei, ay, and a_e can all spell that sound, and we're not even finished yet! 

Coming soon

Conferences November 3rd & 4th.  Look out for an email to choose a time to come in.

Thanks 

Thanks to all of you for getting your Thursday folders in each week. We can tell that a lot of reading is happening and we're loving to see what kind of books your child is interested in.  

Another big thank you to Susan Sochacki and Amy Goetzman for organizing monthly cleaning parties and to all of you for signing up to help out. Our classroom is forever grateful. 

Stay warm and cozy.

Jessy

Hello LEW families!

What we're doing

First graders are exploring the difference between vertebrates and invertebrates. They have created books, posters and riddles. They're also continuing their work with golden bead and stamp game addition.  Last week, the students had the chance to gather apple, pumpkin, corn, milkweed seeds from the garden to create a booklet and we will hang on to some of the seeds to grow in the Spring. We have learned about the article and how it introduces the noun and we are continuing our cursive and spelling practice (-all word family).  First graders have also been sharing their N.A. works about Puerto Rico, Iguanadons and T-Rexes and interest projects on global warming. They are truly power house group of learners :)

Second graders read the book Bugs by Nancy Winslow Parker which is a great informational text about a variety of different invertebrates that also incorporates fun rhymes. They are creating fun riddles and trading cards about different invertebrates they liked from the book.  Very soon, the students will be exploring different types of invertebrates, starting with the most simple, the porifera! Second years are also practicing how to edit their work and use capital letters appropriately.  In math, they are using the stamp game to do subtraction with and without borrowing.  We are also practicing clock work and telling time. They are also continuing their practice their cursive and spelling (-ang words). 

Third graders are using the checkerboard to do big multiplication and the beloved test tubes to do long division problems.  They explored the BC/AD or BCE/CE timeline and practiced placing significant events on the timeline from all the way back to 10,000 BCE.  We matched dates about when the Renaissance began, when Cleopatra reigned, when they believe the first wheel was built, when the computer was invented, when the Middle ages began, and much much more.  Some students are practicing how to use the timeline and some wish to create their own timeline about the Egyptians or even a timeline of dogs!  Also, third graders are also learning how to use a reading material called SRA created by McGraw Hill to help them practice reading comprehension - it's a material that helps our third graders prepare for the MCAs in the Spring, but it is a material that functions well in a Montessori classroom since it allows the students to go at their own pace.  Third years are also exploring different leaf shapes and their etymologies - for example, leaves that are shaped like spoons are identified as having a spatulate-shaped leaf - spatulate reminds of the word, "spatula" which means "spoon."  They will be gathering, sorting and preserving different leaf shapes this week. If anyone has an extra wax paper, the third graders would love some :) 

MEA 

No School Thursday and Friday 

Coming soon!

Information about monthly cleaning parties! Woohoo!

Bell Museum field trip Tuesday, October 21.

Big Thanks!

Thanks to all of you for showing overwhelming interest in volunteering in our classroom. With your support we now have a reading buddy program, cooking classes, clean laundry, healthy snacks and plans to meet up and help clean up the classroom.   

Have a great weekend!

Jessy

Hello LEW families!

What we're doing

First years are continuing their spelling and cursive work. They're also learning how to add with exchanges using our golden bead place value material.  Some first years are creating maps of North America and others are studying North American animals both alive and extinct.  Some fantastic models have been made.  First years are also entering the world of grammar and have started making lists as tall as me and filling them with nouns they see around them. Ask your first grader what the symbol for the noun is.

Second years have finished up studying the parts of a leaf and their multiplication facts.  They are studying the verb and now know how to write a type of shape poem called a diamante.  Some second years are drawing maps of North America that include a key of where you can find specific rocks and minerals.  Some have written research projects on the giant ape, "Gigantopithecus," or better known as "Big Foot," from years ago when North America was still young.  They are also continuing their spelling and cursive work. 

Third years are producing a lot of North American animal research. We have wooly mammoths, lynx, snowy owls, foxes, chipmunks, and they've also been mentoring the younger students that can't quite read yet so that they can also enjoy doing North America research.  Third grade students have also finished up the six roles of the adjective - see if they can remember all six! We're also getting into some great math - dynamic subtraction, multiplication analysis, checkerboard multiplication, and some students are extremely eager to start long division. 

Bell Museum Date Change - Tuesday, October 21

LEW is now going to the Bell Museum on Tuesday, October 21. We will be taking public transit from outside GRS to the Bell Museum on the UofM campus.  It's about a 25 minute bus ride.  Once we get there, we will get a guided tour of the museum and the students will get to get up close and personal to different North American animal specimens in the discovery room. 

Note: you will not need to fill out a permission slip form since you already signed a form at the beginning of the year.  Please feel free to let me know if you have any concerns.

At least one more chaperone would be nice. Please let me know if you're interested. 

Thursday Folders

So sorry for late Thursday Folders. Hope that did not confuse anyone.  

And thank you to all of you that have been sending in Thursday Folders by Tuesday of each week:)

Reading Buddy Volunteer Opportunity

Love to read? We are looking for one more volunteer to come in and read with our beginning reader students for about an hour on Mondays or Tuesdays.  If you're interested or know of anyone that would be interested, please let me know.  

Cooking with the Kids

The students loved Tuesday Treats last year!  So to keep up the tradition, we're looking for an adult volunteer to cook with our students once a week to make a special snack for the class. The students love the hands-on cooking experience, so we would all be very grateful to anyone that would be willing to come in and work with the students. 

Wishing you all a fantastic rest of your evening. Thank you for all of the support and help you've already provided.

Jessy

Third Grade Rocks and Minerals Exhibition 

Land School Information Friday, September 26 - 7:45 AM

Hello families!

Below you will find information about the Land School trip next Friday, September 26.

Departure/Arrival Times

The Land School is about an hour and fifteen minutes away in Wisconsin, so in order to have a full day at the school we ask everyone to arrive at GRS at 7:45. We will be back at GRS by 4:30. The students will be missing the school bus that day, so they will need to be picked up. Sorry if this inconveniences any of you. These times just help us get as much out of our day at the Land School as possible.  

Have your child bring:

- Packed lunch with small snack. (we will also be bringing additional snacks just in case)

- Closed-toe shoes that can get dirty

- Clothing that can get dirty

- Jacket

- Sunscreen applied before arrive at school 

What we'll be doing:

Students will get the chance to harvest fruits and vegetables on the farm, go on hikes, draw nature sketches, play bird calling games, meet the animals on the land, climb up the treehouse, and much, much more.  

Chaperones

If you are interested in chaperoning, please send me your contact information - i.e. a cell phone number that you can be reached at while we visit the Land School.  

Feel free to contact me if you have any questions.

Happy Friday!

Calling all rocks and minerals!

Third graders are doing an in depth study of rocks and minerals and we need more specimens and classification guides. If you're willing to share, our young scientists would truly appreciate it. Here are some puzzling questions to explore with your third grader:
- What's the difference between a rock and a mineral?
- What's the difference between a stone and a rock?
- What are some ways that we use different rocks and/or minerals?

Chaperones needed for Land School Trip 9/26

We're looking for 4 chaperones to join us on our trip to the Land School on September 26th. If you're interested, please email me a preferred cell phone # that you can be reached at during the field trip.

Happy Friday!

To start...

Peanut and Tree Nut Allergies
We have a new first grade child starting on Monday and she has a severe peanut and tree nut allergy.  Thanks to many of you already for being mindful of allergies when packing your lunch. All of the students have met her and are aware of her allergies.  We're going to be keeping peanuts and tree nuts out of our snack menu and if you could please help us keep the peanut/tree nut exposure to a minimum, we would really appreciate it.  If you do send peanuts or tree nuts to school, could you please have a conversation with your child to help us raise awareness, we would appreciate that as well.

Building a fort at recess:)

What we're working on 
We ended the week with a Bang! We told the Montessori Great Lessons - The Story of the Universe and Pangaea. The students drew pictures of volcanoes, the solar system, created models of Pangaea "All the Earth" and Panthalassa "The largest ocean in the Earth's history," and we did a experiment with our model volcano after the students shared their knowledge about the parts of a volcano. All the students are practicing their cursive - some are just practicing letters, others are writing stories.  First graders are sewing pillows with all of the world's continents as well as finishing up their study of living and nonliving things.  They are also studying compound words and what the symbols: > < = mean in math.  Second graders are finishing up their study of volcanoes and practicing multiplication with exchanges using the stamp game.  Third graders are finishing up their decanomial work - a multiplication work that contains 10 squares... They are also studying the 6 roles of the adjective. So far, they already know that adjectives describe nouns (i.e. funny, happy, green, big) but adjectives can count, too (i.e. 3 pencils, many dogs, a few tables). See if your third grader can figure out other roles of the adjective...

Horton Park on Wednesdays 
Unfortunately, the weather hasn't been on our side the past couple of Wednesdays, so we haven't been able to go on our weekly trip to Horton Park.  This coming Wednesday looks beautiful, so let's keep our fingers crossed. Each Wednesday we walk with buddies for about 7 blocks to Horton Park on Hamline and Minnehaha.  It's a nice, large, green space to play organized games like ultimate frisbee and soccer or to just run around and create your own game.  It works best if the students have good running shoes and appropriate clothing on those days.  Once we get the hang of the weekly schedule, I'm hoping that the students will remind themselves to dress appropriately on those days.  We're looking forward to our first trip!

Big Thanks!
A big, BIG thanks to Michael Winikoff and Ursula Hargens for volunteering to purchase such delicious snacks for us this month.  The children love preparing and serving the food together and they do both so well.

And many thanks to Jennifer and Jonathan Taylor for taking care of our laundry. We use those wash cloths a lot, so it's so nice to have them handy. Your son is getting pretty strong from carrying that big bag of wash cloths each week!

Thanks to all of you for sending your children to school ready to learn after a good night's sleep and for being so consistent and patient with us during drop off and pick up.

As always, feel free to contact me if you ever have any comments, questions, or concerns.

Fondly,

Jessy

September 6, 2014

Hello dear families!

It has been a wonderful first week.  We feel so fortunate to be in our second year together and we've already caught many of the students that were with us last year helping the newcomers find their way around the classroom, teaching each other works they've mastered, creating classroom laws (the students voted on that name), and taking on classroom jobs.  It truly feels like a warm and welcoming classroom. 

What we're working on

We started the year off with a lot of practical life lessons. Practical life is a part of the Montessori curriculum that allows the students to practice practical life skills such as coordination, control of movement (gross and fine), a sense of order and practicing independence.  Some practical life activities include: sorting, sewing, cooking, cleaning, finger knitting, line activities, puzzles, and orientation games. If you'd like more information about practical life activities, please let me know. These practical life activities also set the tone for how to work in a Montessori classroom and guide us to be socially responsible for how our environment looks, feels and sounds like. In addition to the practical life activities, we're beginning our curriculum with a study and review of the continents of the world. Some students are creating maps, some are answering puzzling questions such as "Which oceans touch South America?" and some students are locating major mountains around the world. We're also getting back into the habit of practicing our math skills daily as well as our cursive handwriting.  

Coming soon!

Elementary newsletter 

This will be a weekly website reminder that includes a link to all of our classroom newsletters! That way, the school-wide news and our classroom news will all be in the same place. Also, you'll be able to see what other elementary classrooms are up to at GRS. 

Land School Trip

Later this month, the lower elementary level will be taking our first Land School trip of the year. More information to follow.Here's a link to the Land School's blog if you're interested: 

http://lakecountrylandschool.blogspot.com/

That's all for now. Please feel free to email me if you have any further questions, comments or concerns.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!