We are Thankful for So Much

Long Ago and Today: We have just finished up our November Social Studies unit. We compared and contrasted times long ago with today. We learned about the Pilgrims and the Indians and the struggles they faced during that time. We had fun and learned a lot during this unit. We also decided we have much to be thankful for; our lives are much easier than in times long ago.

Thankful Quilt: During November, we also worked on making a Thankful Quilt. This amazing quilt is hanging outside our classroom. We used our writing skills to write about what we are thankful for. We also used our math skills to design our very own quilt blocks. Then we worked together as a team to "sew" our quilt together. This was a big project that we are proud of.

Penny Drive for Holiday Baskets: The school has just completed a penny drive to raise money for Holiday Baskets to help many families within our school. Because of your generosity, we were able to raise over $1100! Thank you so much for all of your support!

Mark Your Calendars: There are several important dates coming up.
December 7th - Holiday Music Program - 6:30-7:30pm. This is an evening for the whole
school to come together to celebrate the Holiday season. Each grade level will
have songs to sing. Plus, there will be trees decorated with ornaments made
by the children. You will be able to remove your child's ornament to take
home (donations for the ornaments will gladly be accepted).
December 9th - November's Tiger Pride Assembly - 2:30pm
December 21-January 1 - Winter Holiday Break
January 6th - December Tiger Pride Assembly - 2:30pm

Morning Times - Mrs. Bishop has asked us to remind parents that the earliest students are able to enter the building in the morning is 8:15 (unless they are eating breakfast, 8:05). Thank you.

Recess - Since we are beginning to see some winter weather, please remember to send your child to school in a coat appropriate for the temperature/wind chill at around noon. We go to recess after lunch, and it hasn't usually hit the high temperature of the day by this point. We will go outside if the temperature is 32 degrees or above (wind chill of at least 25 degrees). We want the children to be able to enjoy recess. Thanks.

Economics Unit - We will be beginning our Economic unit after Thanksgiving break. In this unit, we will be learning about needs/wants, goods/services, scarcity/demand, and producers/consumers. The students will get paid each day for coming to work/school; and they will be able to earn bonuses for extra effort/behavior (along with fines enforced for late work or problems with behavior). At the end of the month, we will finish up our economics unit with a class store. The children will be able to spend the money they have earned on goods and services. This is always a fun way to learn economic terms and practice identifying and counting coins.

Spelling Update - There is a slight change to the way we will be doing spelling for the rest of the school year. We will still have a list of spelling words that will be introduced with our Word Preview paper (and the list sent home), but this will not necessarily be a weekly list with the test always being on Friday. The 1st grade teachers have decided in order to teach these words more thoroughly, we need more time for most of the list of words. From now on, we will begin a new list with the Word Preview, then spend as many days as we feel needed to do word work activities for the words in the list, and then give the written test. As parents, you can help us by just continuing to have your child practice the same list of words until they come home with a new list. Here is the next list of words (we will begin it on Monday): want, was, some, said, do, doing.

Apple Awards

Here are the winners of the Apple Awards mentioned in the next entry. These are the awards earned each month and recognized at the Tiger Pride Assembly.

The Apples for Academics went to: Ashlin and R.J.
The Apples for Improvement went to: Kaylee and Blaine
The Apples for Teamwork went to: Taylor and Oscar
The Apples for Character (Responsiblity) went to: Hailey and Quentin

Congratulations to all of the students who earned an Apple Award for October!! You worked hard for this. Everyone else, keep working hard!


One other news item, Mrs. Bishop has asked for us to remind parents to use the parking lot if you are going to be getting out of your car or parking for a minute or two; but use the parent drop off lane if you are just letting your child out of the car (in the morning) or in the car (in the afternoon). This will help with the traffic flow. Thanks for you help.

New Calendar Dates

We had a wonderful Fall Party on October 26th. Mrs. Bishop is working hard to blend 4 elementary school building traditions together, but at the same time establish new WOHE traditions. She asked the teachers if we would like to try a new version of the classroom parties. With this version, we all celebrated together. Kindergarten and first grade all joined together to rotate through games and craft activities in the commons area. The children all seemed to have a great time. I would like to thank all the parents who sent in items and/or came to our party. I would like to give a big thank you to Amanda Givens who organized our part of the party. Be watching for news of our Winter Party which will be here before we know it.

We also had a great turn out for Parent-Teacher Conferences. Thank you so much for bringing your child and allowing me to share with you all the great things your child is doing. What a great way to show your child his/her education is important!

Another new activity at WOHE is the monthly awards/recognition assembly called The Tiger Pride assembly. We are now on a roll with these assemblies. Plan on each month on the first Wednesday to join us at 2:30 for this assembly. We have several monthly awards we will give out each month along with anything special for that month. One of those awards is the "Apple". There are four different apple categories in which children can earn an apple: academics, improvement, character, and teamwork. For the month of October, I awarded 8 children an apple award. Please check the above blog entry to see who earned the first apple awards (sorry, I am writing this entry at home and I am afraid I might not remember correctly, so I will add to this tomorrow when I get to school :)). Parents are definitely welcome to come to our Tiger Pride assemblies. We love to celebrate the successes of our students!

Upcoming Dates/Events:
Thursday, November 12 - Picture retakes. If you missed the first picture day and would like to
have retakes, let me know so I can send the form home.
November 13 - H1N1 vaccinations (you MUST call the office to set up an appointment)
November 25-29 Thanksgiving Vacation (Enjoy your family)
December 2 - Tiger Pride Assembly at 2:30
December 7 - WOHE's first Holiday Program (be watching for more details, but mark your
calendar for an evening of songs and child made ornaments to purchase. Each class
will be a part of this enjoyable evening.)