1.  There are many NEW class books visiting homes! Please look over your child’s work and note the amount of detail you see. The more current the book, the more detail you will see. They have worked hard! Please send it back the next day for the next family to see!  October is Fire Safety month. The Sterling Fire Department came to talk to us about fire safety on Monday. We made fire hats to go along with their visit.  We started talking about nocturnal animals this week and will finish next week. We did a brainstorm of all the various animals that we know or think are nocturnal. We researched to find out if our guesses were correct.  Your children learned about bats, owls, foxes, and other animals. Each person made their own bat puppet to go along with our Little Brown Bat song. Mrs. Knipe also told a true story of Mr. Knipe’s little bat friend that we found while siding a house. We saw pictures!  We read stories and facts about owls. Your children made owl puppets to take home. They decided if they wanted to make snowy owls or barn owls. Ask them what they made.  In 4 th Grade Buddies: We met with our buddies this week to finish our Scarecrow Glyphs that we started last week.  In Fundations: This week, we learned the letters d and s. Your children found words that began with each of these letters in a “book hunt.” We used these words in our brainstorm of words that began with d and s and we practiced them on the whiteboard.  In Math Workshop: We worked on story problems involving numbers 0-10 and counting, ordering, and matching numerals and dot cards 1-10.  In Skill Groups: We started new skill groups this week, but will finish up next week. Your children are reading a new story called Halloween I see… The new sight word being introduced is see. We will practice this information throughout the year. At other tables, your children are creating a page for the number 5 and Letter Mm class book and working on “Pumpkin Patch” math problems. The final group worked on the computer.  New Centers started last week! This time our centers are: 1. Pumpkin Picking (children walk around the room with a clipboard trying to find all the sight words) 2. Pumpkin Memory Game (children practice matching up lowercase alphabet letters) 3. Jack-O-Lantern Faces (children create their own Jack-o-Lantern using various pattern block shapes and record their desgins) 4. Chicka Chicka Boom Boom (children pick letters out of a bag and use Bingo Dobbers to record it on paper) 5. Floam 6. Blocks 7. Puppet Show (children use some puppets to put on a show with their partner(s)) 8. Computers and 9. Your choice of what to do. Current Events School Update Date: Oct. 23 rd, 2015 Pumpkins Needed!!! Please send a small-medium sized pumpkin to school by Monday. We will need them for 4 th grade buddies ON Monday. Thank you!

2.  This week’s home-play is due back by Wednesday, October 28 th. Children can pass it in completed anytime before that. This week, your child is practicing his/her pencil pinch as they write their name, letters d, s, and a letter of their choosing using the Fundation lines. Please be sure to use pencil! The second portion of the home-play is from our Math curriculum. The pages asks your child to draw enough objects to make 10 and draw missing stairs. All of which your children have done this week in school. You may assist your child, if needed, but please let them try to complete on their own. Thank you!  We have been practicing some sight words. Encourage your children to find these words anywhere they go: go, no, boy, girl, a, I, the, see, have, it, is, and by. Home Play  We will be looking for parents interested in volunteering in the classroom and as parent chaperones. If you are interested, please see Mrs. Wiggins in the main office to fill out a CORI form. All volunteers and chaperones need to be CORI checked prior to coming in.  Please keep in mind that I do something called Mystery Readers in my class. Any person that is not in the school system that is interested in being a reader must have a CORI on file. In the beginning of the year, CORIs take several weeks to be processed. Mystery Readers are one the children’s favorite activities.  Thank you to Abby’s Pepere, Mr. Duchesneau, for helping us during Game Day Friday.  We would like to thank our Mystery Readers this week. We had Kiley’s sister, Alyssa, and Jessie’s Grandpa, Mr. Rocca.  Thank you to Mrs. Dalton and Mrs. Kruger for helping out in Library! Thank You’s/Help Wanted