Acts of Kindness

Principal Fitzgibbon spoke last week at the building dedication ceremony.

Have a good time tonight!

Acts of Kindness
As part of our study of the A2STEAM community we have been learning about and practicing acts of kindness in class.  Compliments, helpful actions, greetings--I have challenged students to complete acts of kindness both at school and at home.  In the photo below you can see some of the actions that we have been recognizing in class.  At home I've been encouraging students to do things like help set the table, get ready for bed independently, or play patiently with a younger sibling.  Ask your students what acts of kindness they have done today.  You can also ask them about the book Kindness is Cooler Ms. Ruler, you might even see if you can find that book at the Ann Arbor Public Library.

Seesaw Learning Portfolio
As I wrote last week A2STEAM has been using an app called Seesaw in the primary grades to create a digital portfolio of some of the work students do here at school.  A flyer showing you how to access your child’s work went home last week and again today.  When you access your child’s portfolio you will see photos of work they have done at school.  All of the photos and videos are taken by students so some things end up slightly blurry.  Some of the first items you will see reflect our current study of all the people at STEAM.  Items tagged with blue were created in Room K-3.  You will also see work tagged yellow from students' time with Mrs. Reader in the Media Center, as well as items tagged pink from Sr. Steuer’s Spanish class.

Conferences
I look forward to seeing you next week.  You can review your times here.

Curriculum Overview
STEAM Project - Last week the students and I created photos and video clips demonstrating how to be safe and responsible in the classroom.  On Friday, Officer Hickey visited our class to talk about the importance of being safe in and out of school.  This week all three K classes will be coming together to present what we learned about the different adults here at STEAM.

Reading - This week students will be identifying the characters and setting of fiction books.  We've also had some great discussions around the problems that characters face in a fiction book, how they build and build and are resolved as the book ends.  Ask your children about Curious George Rides a Bike, the problems that George got into, and how things were able to work out okay in the end. 

Writing - Students have been practicing putting spaces in between the words they write.  This week we are also study ending punctuation.

Math - This week we will study and practice all the different ways to break apart ten (i.e. 5 + 5 = 10, 4 + 6 = 10, 3 + 7 = 10, 2 + 8 = 10, 1 + 9 = 10)

Word Study - This week we will finish our study of hearing and counting syllables in words. We will also begin practicing hearing the first sound in words.

Some of the acts of kindness we have experienced in class.