News from Santa's Workshop for December 7th to December 11th

Well, it's official!  Teaching first grade at this time of year can be the craziest, most enjoyable and the most rewarding time!  I love their energy and innocence.  I think it keeps me young but, I have to admit, I'm ready for a long, winter's nap.  This week we have spent a lot of our time talking about traditions around the world.  Here are some questions that you can ask your child about their learning from the past couple of weeks.

What country was your favorite country?  Why?
Which tradition was your favorite to learn about?
Why isn't your mission file at home?:)
Can you show me the Double Bump?
Can you write or tell me three doubles facts?
Can you tell me a near double fact?
What is something that you've learned about reindeer?

Related Arts Schedule Next Week

Monday - Music
Tuesday - Library (remember book-in-a-bag)
Wednesday - P.E. (remember tennis shoes)
Thursday - Art
Friday - Music

Upcoming Events:
Thursday - Students get to plan the day.  More information to come next week to let you know what they've planned.  I made need your help:).

Friday - Students can bring/wear their PJs to school.  We will be watching Polar Express.  They can also bring a healthy/special snack from home to enjoy while watching the movie.  We are a nut-free zone so refrain from sending anything with nuts of any kind.  Your child can also bring something to snuggle with while enjoying the movie.

We were dressing up like the Star Boys and St. Lucia and we liked to make the hats.  St. Lucia is celebrated by having the oldest girl in the family put on white dress with a red belt.  She wears a wreath with candles that are lit because the real St. Lucia walked through a cave where it was dark.  She was feeding people who were hiding there because they wanted to worship a different way.

We are studying about dragons together.  We are thinking flexibly and persevering and we are collaborating.  The guy in the glasses is new.  We like him because he is funny.

We made elf hats to pretend we were elves.  Flash was our school elf.  On the first day, we tried to find Flash and we found him behind a bookcase.  Flash went to a different country everyday.  One of them was Sweden.  In Sweden, when it gets cold they make huge ice hotels.  

We did a Top Secret mission and now we can reveal it now that the mission is done.  It was called the Hot Cocoa Disaster Mission.  Santa was drinking hot cocoa while he was looking through his files about Christmas but his cocoa spilled on the laptop and ruined the files.  Mrs. Claus told him many times he shouldn't drink his hot cocoa with his laptop.  We had to save Christmas and 23 little first graders just saved Christmas for the WHOLE WORLD!!!

News from the Elves of Camp Buckaroo

Thank you so much for my remembering my birthday in the way that y'all did this morning!  The cards and gifts touched my heart and the lemon bundtlet was absolutely delicious!!  The class gift will be put to great use this weekend.  I'm spoiled because the most precious gift that you've already given me is your child and I thank you for that!

Here is a message from Miss Clark and Mrs. Hendricks in the library:

Are you looking for a fun way to be involved at SCE?  The library is looking for parent volunteers to help in the afternoons to check out 1st and 2nd grade students.  If you are interested in volunteering, contact Casey Hendricks hendricks_casey@dublinschools.netor Beth Clark clark_beth@dublinschools.net.

Upcoming Events:

December 17th - The students get to plan the day!!!!  This is a reward for earning three 5's in P.E.

December 18th @ 3:45 - Winter Break begins

Related Arts schedule:

Monday - Art

Tuesday - Music

Wednesday - Library (remember book-in-a-bag)

Thursday - P.E.  (remember tennis shoes)

Friday - Art

These are the presents we gave to Mrs. McNeal for her birthday.  It will be Mrs. McNeal's birthday tomorrow.  She thanked us when we gave her her presents.  We all gave her hugs (smile:).

At our program we pretended to be Pilgrims, turkeys and Wampanoags.  The girl is saying "thank you for coming to our program.  We are glad you're here."  

He is saying stuff about what we learned from the Pilgrims.  He said, "The Pilgrims left because King James didn't let them pray the way that they wanted to."  

She is saying something about what we learned about the Pilgrims and the Wampanoag.  

He was telling facts about the Pilgrims.

He was telling facts about the Pilgrims too.  

We wrote about the Wampanoag and we drew a picture of their home.  We made hats that look like Wampanoag hats and when you flip it around it looks like a turkey hat.  He is sharing his work with Mrs. McNeal.

Our principal, Mrs. Rinefierd, came to our program and saw our Wampanoag work.  We were sharing our work to the principal. 

He was sharing what he wrote when the principal was here.

All of us!!

We are playing the dreidel game.  They were playing this game to learn about the miracle when they fought against King Antiochus.  On the dreidel there are symbols and it means "A miracle happened here."

This elf is Flash and we had to find him when the teacher told us about him.  This was our first time trying to find him and we were trying to persevere when looking for him and think flexibly.  The rest of the days we have found him in the bed that another student made during Tinkering Tuesdays.  The candles are for when we were learning about Hanukkah.  We like Flash and his house!!  

This is our new friend!  The new friend is the one with the shirt that doesn't say Danger.  We were playing a Doubles game.