DECEMBER 17TH

Our Baby Jesus Party was another success! Thank you for sending gifts to honor Baby Jesus through gifts for needy families! The kids all worked hard at making their cards for the residents at the nursing home. These gifts will make older people and young children happy! They also benefit our children by helping them feel good about doing nice things for others.

Not getting outside to play and being excited about Christmas has these kids SOOOO wired! Whew! I am exhausted by the end of the day! Two more days!

May all of you and your families have a safe, wonderful Christmas and New Year! God's blesssings!

See you in 2009!

Dec. 10

We made it to Court Manor today after all. Thanks to Mrs. Rasmussen, Mr. Brown, and Sara for driving! We had a major scramble to get booster seats! I guess I "assumed"parents would send booster seats, and I didn't send a reminder. Thanks, Ashley, for bringing yours, and to Mrs. Rueckert from borrowing some for us, and to my husband for going home and bringing two of my granddaughers' booster seats!
It was fun to watch the kids help the residents play bingo. They each got a treat from the nursing home, and we even got to sing Happy Birthday to one of the residents. She enjoyed having the kids sing to her.

I think doing these service projects are valuable for our kids. They receive pleasure from helping others. I hope helping others will stay with them as they grow up.

CHRISTMAS PROGRAM TOMORROW NIGHT - KIDS NEED TO BE HERE AROUND 6:00 BUT NO LATER THAN 6:10. Please follow this as every year we seem to have some kids running in at 6:28 and if everyone else is ready, it holds them up, and the program doesn't start on time. Thanks!

Dec. 9 Pictures

Plans are to go to Court Manor tomorrow. We didn't get enough drivers, so instead of canceling we are trying to work out where someone can watch the office and Sara can drop students off and then come back and pick them up.

The pictures are from 1. Court Manor 2. Very Important Pupil 3. December quilt squares for North Country Night

Have a great evening!

Dec. 8

We went to Church today for the feast of the Immaculate Conception. Tomorrow we'll learn about Juan Diego and see the story on video. Friday is the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, but we'll also talk about Saint Lucy whose feast day is Saturday, the 13th. We continue to work on our Advent Wreaths, calendars, and cactus pictures. Students also have a manger they are working on. When they do something nice for someone they can add straw and hope to have it filled for Baby Jesus by Christmas. This same idea is used to color flowers on their Christmas cactus.

I still need permission slips for Court Manor and drivers for 5 kids. Also, the gift exchange slips as well as the Christmas Eve liturgy slips. Please send them in tomorrow. Thanks!

We will not be having spelling words to study as we will be trying out the new lessons this week. The test will be a cloze story word test. This means students will have a paper with blanks in the story. We read the story aloud including the test words, and the kids will fill them in. This spelling program, if I understand it correctly, has an expectation of words kids should already know. Various skills are practiced throughout the week which builds on the skills.

Our reading skills this week include words with AI, and AY as well as compound words. We've practiced several of these today. We'll be reading the story " A Trip to the Firehouse". If you'd like your children to do the spelling pages that go with the story, you may do so. They will not be required this week. These would be pages 167-169.

Remember to start getting gifts for our Baby Jesus Party which is a week from Wednesday! They are unwrapped, and the list was sent home earlier.

We will have liturgy on Wednesday this week as usual.

Remember to have your child here no later than 6:10 on Thursday for the Christmas program.

December 2

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! I think the kids were ready to come back and see their friends.

Here's planning ahead:

• Baby Jesus Party on Dec. 17th at 1:30 A note will be sent home soon!
• We WILL have a classroom party on the 19th. I will send a note about that also.
• Christmas program at 6:30 Dec. 11th
• 4th Wiseman on Dec. 19th about 9:15

This week we will be learning how to write friendly letters. Then we will write to some of the other soldiers that are on our bulletin board in the hallway! The spelling words for this week are the ones for the Reading-Writing Workshop for Theme 3.

Speaking of Spelling - Next week or the week after, we will be trying out a new spelling plan to see if we like it. It is different because the kids will not have a list to study from. This plan has kids use the words in various ways, and there are only five words. The test is a dictation test where the kids will figure out the words that will fit in the sentences. I haven't had a chance to study it yet, but we will try it soon. We have been looking for a new spelling plan for a few years now.

REMEMBER THE PARADE THIS SATURDAY! OUR SCHOOL WILL BE REPRESENTED FOR THE FIRST TIME IN QUITE A FEW YEARS! HOORAY!

Keep warm!