Wednesday, August 24, 2011

2011 Welcome

What a great start to the 2011-2012 school year!  We spent the day learning the classroom procedures and expectations.  Everyone followed directions and was eager to participate.  The day went by so fast!

Hopefully, everyone has seen the discipline plan and the homework policy.  These are new this school year, and I will be discussing them further at Back to School Night on September 8.  Please sign and return just the bottom half of the second page as soon as possible.  If you have any questions, please let me know.

For the rest of the week, we will continue to perfect the classroom procedures and set the stage for a successful school year. 

I will be updating the blog by Monday of each week.  On the weeks that we don't have school on Monday, I will have the blog updated by the next school day of the that week.

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

New Year Welcome!

Welcome back everyone!  You have reached the blog that I talked about in the newsletter I sent home.  I hope that you will check back frequently to stay updated on the class happenings.  I am also going to work on an e-mail group so that I can send notifications when I have posted updates.

Today was a pretty good first day back.  The students seem to get along really well.  We covered a lot of procedures, and we'll finish with the last few tomorrow.  Some students even wanted to take books home already! 

I'm really looking forward to meeting everyone on Back to School Night on September 9.  This will be a chance for you to see what being on "Team Cannon" is all about.  That evening is also the book fair in our cafeteria.  Please look for further information with specific times.

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Eventful Day

Wow!  I don't know about everyone else, but I am exhausted after today.  This morning we were joined by Mr. Ingram from NIPSCO.  He demonstrated and explained for us the dangers of not being careful with the electric wires that run outside of our homes.  We also learned the answer to one of life's little mysteries...why don't birds get electrocuted?  Then, in the afternoon, the students performed their songs for the whole school.  They did a wonderful job, but I was really impressed by the evening performance.  Everyone participated and did their personal best.  I'm sure all of their families were so proud of them...I know I was.

This week we worked a lot on synonyms, antonyms, and idioms.  We learned a lot of new words and phrases  that will help make us all (myself included) better readers and writers.  Next week, we are going to practice our presentation speaking by reading a collection of Christmas scripts.  It'll be fun to practice reading with expression! 

On the topic of reading...If you check out the comments section of my last post, a former student made some great recommendations.  I have already purchased the first book in one of the series for the classroom library. 

Have a wonderful and restful weekend!

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Update

I do apologize for not having updated since Miss Ellis started teaching.  Everything has gone very smoothly during her time with us, which is quickly coming to an end.  Her last day of teaching is December 4, and her last day in our classroom is December 10.  We will miss her very much!  She is going to go on to have a wonderful and successful teaching career.

With only two and a half weeks left before break, we are very busy.  The students are preparing for their holiday musical on December 10.  We will be doing an in-school performance and an after school show.  Our first practice yesterday went well.  Everyone participated and showed her or his personal best.  Also, next week is Santa's Secret Shop.  Our class will be visiting on December 8.  If you are interested in volunteering, please remember to send in the slip.  The Holiday Celebration is December 17.  We do have school on December 18, and we will be wrapping up the activities on which we'll have been hard at work.

We will be very busy academically, too.  Next week in geometry we will be focusing on symmetry and congruency.  We'll be improving our reading using synonyms, antonyms, homographs, and idioms.  After working on that, we will be doing holiday Readers Theaters, which we'll perform on Dec. 18.  The next several weeks are going to be filled with lots of fun learning opportunities.

Monday, October 5, 2009

Busy, Busy, Busy

There is a lot going on at Kyle School this week!  Tomorrow, we will be having a presentation on fire safety given by the Portage firefighters.  Also, the fire safety posters are due on October 6.  Miss Ellis and I will then choose the 3 neatest and most informative posters to be given to the Fire Department.  Also, this week we have Grandparents' Day.  Grandparents are invited to join us on Thursday, October 8, for a musical presentation followed by a class slide show and visiting time.  October 8 is also the day that the Challenge Ed permission slips are due.

In class, we will be finishing up our guided reading unit on Realistic Fiction.  Right now, we are working on projects in class.  If we are unable to finish, I will assign one project to be completed at home.  We will be having a quiz over the books on Friday.  The class is working with Miss Ellis on division in math.  They are working on both division facts and long division.  So far, students are grasping the concept.  For extra help, students can use flashcards or one of the math practice sites on this page.  In science, we are finishing learning about land formation.  There will be a quiz this week.  Students are also working on their personal narrative stories in writing.

Miss Ellis will be teaching all subjects starting next week.  The students have adjusted to the transition well, and Miss Ellis has developed meaningful and engaging lessons.  She will be teaching through December 2.  I'm very pleased with her rapport with the students and her level of commitment to the students' learning.

One last thing... the following link will take you to a trailer for The Lightning Thief movie.  The movie is based on the first book in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series by Rick Riordan.  http://www.percyjacksonthemovie.com/