Author: David Calverley

Cornell VillagE
Mrs. Horsley
Grade 1/2

Wonderful Ones and Terrific Twos
October Newsletter

Mrs. Horsley

October 2009

From the Teacher’s Desk...

Welcome Miss P!
We wish a warm welcome to Miss. P, our co-op student from Markham District High School. Miss. P will be working and learning in our class all year.

FIELD TRIPS
Grade Two
Skating
Students are required to wear approved helmets, gloves/mittens and snowpants each week.
Grade One skating will begin in January.
Grade One
Hospital Trip
We are visiting the Markham Stouffville Hospital. We will be dividing into groups and going on the trip over four weeks. The dates are;
Thursday November 19
Thursday November 26
Thursday December 3
Thursday December 10
If you can volunteer and join us on any of these days, please let me know.
Thank you to ALL of our parent volunteers. We couldn’t do it without you!

Star Students
Congratulations to our September Stars of the Week
Saranija and
Aidan.
These three students were experts at following rules and listening. Great Work!
Student of the Month
Each month there is a Good News Assembly where one student is given a Character Award. In September our student of the month was Mark. He was given this award for respecting himself, students and Mrs. Horsley. He is kind and caring. Mark is a great listener, he waits his turn and he follows our class rules. Congratulations Mark. You are a respectful student.
Our character matters goal for October is
RESPONSIBILITY.

Homework, Agenda, and Communication News

The children are doing a great job at completing their agendas each day, getting them signed by a parent and completing their homework. The agendas can serve as an excellent communication area for both teacher and parent. Please write a note in the agenda if you have any questions or concerns. You can also call the school to set up a meeting at any time.
Common homework assignments for both grades are:
Monday-Thursday…
Books to Share Reading (please complete the chart in the duotang)
Friday…
Books to Share Reading, Song & Poem Books (please complete the chart in the duotang), and Home Journals.
Spelling
In October we are starting our spelling program.
The spelling program consists of one word family and five sight words. The sight words are frequently read, written and commonly misspelled words.
Students will work with the words at school and are encouraged to practice reading and writing them at home as well. There will be a mini quiz on the words at the end of each week.

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Awards and Birthday Celebrations

“A child educated only at school is an uneducated child.” - George Santayana

School Subject Overview

With the diagnostic testing complete we are free to move toward our reading/language groups. We will begin our guided reading groups as well as our literacy groups. These programs will see students moving up in reading levels and improving their reading comprehension and sight words.
In math we are leaving graphing behind and continuing our study of sorting. Students should be able to recognize that items can be sorted by different sorting rules (colour, shape, size, and texture).
In Science we continue to work on our ‘Bodyworks’ unit. I hope that all parents got the note sent home about sending a baby photo and a current photo to school for our class book. These pictures will be photocopied and returned to you.

Notes of Interest

We are looking forward to our school trip to the Safety Village on October 19th. Thank-you to all the parents who volunteered to accompany us on our first class trip.
Scholastic orders for October should be coming to you soon, these orders are a great way to encourage your child’s reading.
I would like to wish all our Grade 1 families a happy Yom Kippur and Thanksgiving, as well as a safe and exciting Halloween. (A notice about our school Halloween festivities will be sent home closer to the time.)

Wonderful Ones and Terrific Twos
October Newsletter