Thank You!

I know I haven't posted in a long time! Assessments, report cards, planning, and working both jobs have taken up a lot of time this month. I will post some pictures from the zoo, community helpers week, and our Halloween party soon, but I just wanted to take a moment to say thank you to my parent volunteers who helped with the party. The kids loved it! I got my parent volunteer list from the PTO. If you did not hear from Barbara Johns about the party then your name is not on it. Please email me if you would like to help with other classroom parties! lwebster@access.k12.wv.us Thank you all so much!!!

Pictures

If you have any pictures throughout the year, could you please email them to me? We need to start compiling pictures for the yearbook! You can send them to lwebster@access.k12.wv.us. Thanks!

Fall Festival

It’s time to start thinking about the fall festival on November 2^nd! Some of you may already know that each classroom will create a basket that will be raffled off.  Every year, each class fills a basket related around a certain theme and it is raffled off at the Fall Festival by people buying tickets and placing them in a bowl in front of the basket they want.  If their ticket is drawn, they win the basket!  It’s fun!  Our basket’s theme will be family night. We are asking you to donate an item to the basket. Items may include; board games, movie theater gift certificates, DVDs, popcorn, restaurant gift cards, etc. If you donate DVD’s please make them only G and PG rated. 

Wow!

I am so proud of my students for all of their hard work to put our museum and presentations together! I am also very proud to say that we had 30 parents/ guardians in the classroom. That is amazing! They did such a great job, didn't they? 
I wanted to do my first PBL early in the year because I wanted the students to understand that questioning is very important. I also wanted them to understand that we are all students and teachers in our classroom. They were always amazed when they would ask me a question about their animal and I would tell them I didn't know the answer. Sometimes they would laugh if one of their classmates were talking about an animal  and I would raise my hand to ask a question about it. We would all go to the carpet and look on Google and in our animal books to see if we could find the answer. One time a student even asked me if I was joking that I didn't know. I didn't want to do a lot of talking on Friday, because I wanted them to have full ownership of their projects. Thank you all for coming! It was so nice to see so much support.
On that note, hopefully your child showed you the note, but we ARE going to the zoo on Friday this week! We'll be going to Hovatters' in Preston Co. We will leave the school around 9:45. Cost is $4.50 for students and regular price for any parent or guardian that would like to meet us there.  If you are meeting us there, please, please still send you child to school at the regular time. I don't want them to miss circle time.  Also, I would like the students to stay with the class while we are there. We will walk around the zoo as a group. Even if they are with you, I would still be responsible for them during a school function. I don't want some students all the way on the opposite side of the zoo with their parents while we are on the other side. I don't mind you walking with us or even next to you child, just please do not take them away from the class. 

Also, the students DO NOT have school tomorrow. Let me know if you have any questions or concerns about the zoo!

Red Folders

Wow! It's been a while since I've updated. Sorry! We've been super busy. I wanted to clear up some confusion about the red folders that go back and forth from home to school. We do not use the "return to school" and "keep at home" pockets. The students keep their red folders in their mailboxes all day. At the end of the day they take all papers that are inside their mailboxes and slide them into their folders. It is their responsibility to pack and unpack. I don't want to make it even more confusing and time consuming for them to have to use the correct side of the folder. Does that make sense? 
On that note, the students came home with an invitation to our presentations next Friday at 10:00 am. Please send them back with an option marked so we can plan accordingly. Thank you! 

Museum Of Wildlife Biology

The students have all begun their animal research now and we all seem very excited about it. I'm learning just as much as the students! Did you know that a giraffe drinks 10 gallons of water a day?! We have a lot to work on, but I was thinking about maybe opening our Museum of Wildlife Biology to parents at the end of next week or the beginning of the week after that. Some students are working in teams and others have decided to research an animal of their own. All of the students will be presenting their animal to the class and I want to parents to come too! We will be working on invitations for parents probably some time this week, so watch out for them!

Thunder

Thunder the eagle came to visit us today! She is a 20 year old Bald Eagle that has been in captivity for 19 years due to the fact that she was shot when she was a year old. The visit was part of the reward that the students earned for the summer reading challenge, but how great is it that she was here during the beginning of our animal research?!