May 31, 2019 Newsletter

Dear Parents,

We had a busy and exciting week in Room 115!  Blades the Bear is the Bruins’ mascot.  He visited our school today and led a pep rally to get everyone excited for the Stanley Cup Finals game this weekend.  The students all got Bruins towels and got to cheer for their team.  Our school is supposed to be on the 6pm NBC news tonight!

The students did a lot of writing this week.  They have been working on their narrative pieces and did more journal writing too.  They also started writing about special days we’ve had all year.  Each student published one of their stories this week!  They have been illustrating these books and will bring them home to share with their families when they finish!

Students continued working on our 3D map of the area in Boston we will visit next week on our field trip.  They painted the area that includes Beacon Hill and the Public Garden and made buildings that can be found in Boston.  They have also started making trees, stop signs, playgrounds, and other things we will see in the Public Garden area...even the statues of all the ducklings!  I want to say a special thank you to the parents who have helped with this project so far!  I will be sure to post pictures of the completed map when it is finished.

More information about our Boston trip will be going home on Monday.  We will be going to Boston on Tuesday.  Students will need a completely disposable snack, lunch, and drink (please no lunch boxes or refillable water bottles).  They will also need comfortable walking shoes and sunscreen (please apply sunscreen at home before coming to school).  We are fortunate to have quite a few chaperones coming with us.  Chaperones will be riding on the bus with us.

The students have been enjoying our final topic in math.  We measured lots of classroom objects to compare lengths; we compared our own heights by getting in order from shortest to tallest; we learned about capacity by pouring water and dry macaroni into different containers; and we used a balance scale to compare weights of various objects.

We will be doing a special experiment with melting ice next week.  In preparation for this experiment, we will read a book called “Making Juice Pops.”  If you would like to try making juice pops this weekend, here are the steps:
Place small paper cups on a tray and fill them with juice.
Put the cups of juice in the freezer for one hour.
Place a craft/popsicle stick (or plastic spoon) in the center of each cup and put them back in the freezer.
Freeze for five hours and then remove from the freezer.  Hold the stick and twist the cup off the solid juice pop.
Enjoy the juice pop!  See what happens if the juice pop sits out of the freezer for a while!

We also started an experiment with flowers to see what plants need to survive.  We have six plants that we will be watching over the next couple of weeks.  One is in the sun and one is not in the sun.  One has water and one doesn’t have water.  One has soil and one doesn’t have soil.  By the end, we will be able to tell exactly what plants need to survive!  We also planted our lettuce plants in our Community Garden.  It is looking great!

The Distance Learning Assignment is due this Thursday, June 6th.  Students are supposed to draw a picture of their favorite thing to do in the summer and write a sentence to go with it.  These can be returned anytime before the 6th.

Have a great weekend!

Melanie Duncan

Dates to remember:   June 3-7 School Spirit Week (see pink flyer in students’ folders)
         June 4 - Boston Swan Boat Field Trip
                                 June 5 - Final Used Bookstore - Bring $0.25 or a book to trade
                                               (optional)  *Parents are welcome to shop too!
                                 June 6 - Distance Learning Assignment is due
                                 June 13 - Cleaning Day (10:10-10:55am)
                                 June 17 - Field Day
         June 18 - Walk to Simonds Park
         June 20 - Last Day of School (half day dismissal)

May 24, 2019 Newsletter

Dear Parents,

We’ve had a busy week in Room 115!  We’ve started learning about Boston in preparation for our field trip to the Swan Boats in a couple of weeks on Tuesday, June 4th!  We read “Make Way for Ducklings” by Robert McCloskey, which is what our field trip will be based on.  We will be following the route of Mr. and Mrs. Mallard as we walk past the State House, through Louisburg Square, down Mt. Vernon Street, across Charles Street to enter the Public Garden where we will see the statues of Mrs. Mallard and her eight ducklings and ride on the Swan Boats!  We will end our trip with a picnic lunch on the Boston Common.  Chaperones will be riding on the bus with us.  Please send in the $3 for students and $3.50 for chaperones if you haven’t already.  More information about what students will need will go home the day before the trip. 

The students started painting our map of Boston and have started making some of the buildings that are in Boston.  We don’t need any more boxes from home.  Thank you, though, for sending some in!  I will be sure to post pictures once our map is done in a couple of more weeks.

The students are still writing narrative stories and have been conferencing with teachers to work on specific skills.  They have all also chosen one of their stories to “publish!”  I will be tying up their stories so they can illustrate them and read them to the class before bringing them home to share with all of you!

The Very Hungry Kindergartner books are being finished up and will go home as soon as they are done.  The students enjoyed writing about their favorite foods and showing how they have grown all year!

We finished another topic in math this week and will be starting a topic on measurement next week.  This is always a fun one for students.  The students enjoyed more hands on math activities this week as we explored 2D and 3D shapes and got to make shapes out of elastics, blocks, clay, paper, etc.

We finished our Changes in Nature walks and pictures.  We observed many changes that have taken place around our school.  We also went for a Listening Walk this afternoon.  We made a list of all the things we could hear.  I told students that their homework for this weekend was to do a listening walk around their home or neighborhood so they could report back something they heard!

Our Distance Learning Assignment was posted on Seesaw yesterday.  Students have two weeks to complete the assignment and can turn it in whenever they finish it.  Nothing needs to be submitted online.  Student work can be returned to school in their blue folders.  If you have any questions or need any classroom materials for your child to complete the assignment, please let me know.

The last Francis Wyman Used Bookstore will be Wednesday, June 5th.  Students are welcome to bring either a quarter or a book from home to trade.  Parents are also welcome to attend this Used Bookstore if you would like to stock up on some books for summer reading for your child.  It usually starts around 8:25am and only lasts for about a half an hour.

I hope you all have a wonderful long weekend!  No school on Monday.  Happy Memorial Day weekend!

Melanie

May 17, 2019 Newsletter

Dear Parents,

We’ve had another fun and busy week in Room 115!  We enjoyed releasing our butterflies today.  We managed to find a five minute chunk of time without too much rain to let them go!

We have been learning about the life cycle of a frog this week and made frog puppets that we used to act out the song, “Five Green and Speckled Frogs.”  We also talked about the difference between living and non-living things. 

One of our art projects this week was drawing our self-portraits with crayons, just like we did at the Kindergarten Orientation at the beginning of the year.  We will compare these new self-portraits with those from the beginning of the year.  I’m sure students will be amazed when they see both sets of pictures.  We talked a lot about the progress we have made all year and about how we feel now that we have completed almost a whole year of school.  Your child’s self-portraits will be posted on his/her SeeSaw account next week.  Make sure you check them out!

The students have all finished at least one narrative piece of writing and some have written even more!  We have been conferencing with students a couple of times a week to focus on different writing skills.  Students are doing a much better job with spaces, punctuation, and adding details to their writing and pictures.  Students will get to pick one of their stories for me to “publish!” 

We have almost finished our topic in math on shapes and will be starting a new topic on measurement in another week.  It is always a fun one for students.  It will actually be our final math topic for Kindergarten!  After we finish that one in a couple of weeks, we will start some “Step Up to First Grade” lessons!

We will start preparing for our trip to the Swan Boats in Boston on Tuesday, June 4th.  We will be reading Make Way for Ducklings and the children will be learning a bit about Boston and the walk we will be taking.  We will be creating a three-dimensional map showing the Commons, the Public Gardens and the area around the State House.  If you have any empty food boxes (cereal, mac and cheese, crackers, etc.) that you could donate, we would appreciate them!  They will be used for the buildings on our map.  We could still use large brown paper bags with handles.

Information went home today about our field trip to Boston.  The trip will cost $3 for students and $3.50 for parents.  If you are interested in chaperoning on this trip, please let me know and send in the money along with the money and permission slip for your child ($6.50 total).  Checks can be made payable to Burlington Public Schools.  You can send cash but exact amounts are helpful.

We will be going to the library on Wednesday.  Please be sure your child returns his/her library book by then.

Have a great weekend!

Melanie Duncan

Final Used Bookstore for the Year: Parents Invited!
Hundreds of new titles have been resupplied in the collection. Many popular series. The final bookstore for this year will be on Wednesday, June 5th at 8:25 AM. This is the only used bookstore of the year that parents are invited to join their children. Please come and help your child pick out a pile of books for their summer reading. All books are 25 cents, or you can clean out those bookshelves at home and trade in your children's books (in good condition) for different ones. No adult books or board books please. We also take children's magazines. As always, any donations are appreciated. Send donations to the front office to the attention of Mrs. Murphy.

"Head, Thorax, Abdomen" Song

The students have been practicing the "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes" song as part of our exercise/warm-up time in the morning.  We've added a couple of new verses to help us remember plant parts and needs as well as the parts of an insect.  The students wanted to share the song with all of you!  Enjoy!

"Plants and Insect" version of "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes"

May 10, 2019 Newsletter

Dear Parents,

Where does the time go?!!  I can't believe that it is mid-May with only a little more than a month of school left to go!  We have been learning a lot about nature, including plants, insects, life cycles, and woodland animals. 

In another week or so we will start learning about Boston and some of the places we will see on our next field trip.  Information about the Boston Swan Boats trip will be going home soon.  We are planning to go on Tuesday, June 4th.  If you are interested in chaperoning this trip, please let me know.

We have been learning more about butterflies and other insects this week.  All of our caterpillars have turned into chrysalises and will hopefully turn into butterflies really soon!  We spent time this week drawing and labeling the life cycle of a butterfly and started to do the same for frogs today!  It’s exciting to see some real life cycles right in our own classroom!  We made butterflies to add to our giant flowers and we also made dragonflies to decorate a dragonfly poem.  Spring has definitely sprung in Room 115!

We have been working with shapes in math.  We even went on a shape hunt inside and outside of the school and talked about the shapes that are all around us.  We have almost finished our unit on the position and location of objects.  The concepts have been more of a review for the students so we have been trying to come up with some fun and creative ways to practice them.  We made a pretend minivan earlier today and used position words to describe where everyone was sitting.  Then we “traveled” to the beach, Mrs. Sullivan’s house, and to the ice cream store!  It was fun to see the students using their imaginations while also using great math vocabulary!  We also made ladybug books that described the position and location of a ladybug.  These will go home next week.

We will be starting our last two Kindergarten math topics during the next few weeks and will be doing some Step Up to First Grade Math Lessons after that along with some other fun math activities.  Please continue to work with your child on their subtraction fluency facts to five (5-3=2, 4-1=3, etc.).  I will start testing them soon!  The goal is for students to tell me the answers within three seconds.  I would also encourage you to work with your child on counting to 100 by 1s and 10s and practice recognizing and writing numbers to 20.  Those teen numbers are tricky!  Don’t forget about the sight words too!  I’ve been busy assessing students on all sorts of things this week and will continue into the next week or two.  I’m impressed with how far they have come this year!

We will be visiting the library on Wednesday.  Please be sure to send back your child’s library book by then.

Also, please be sure to send your child to school each day with a sweatshirt/jacket.  We go to recess at 9:30am so it is often pretty chilly, even if it is supposed to get warmer later in the day.

Students planted pumpkin seeds a couple of weeks ago and they have grown quite a bit!  We sent them home in brown paper bags today.  They should be watered every couple of days.  It is safe to plant them in the ground during the next week or so. 

Mrs. Sullivan and I enjoyed the Teacher Appreciation Luncheon on Thursday.  Everything was delicious.  Thank you to those who participated! 

I would like to extend a very Happy Mother’s Day to all the wonderful mothers in Room 115!  We hope the gifts your child gives you will be special and meaningful.  You certainly are special people to your children and to us!

Have a great weekend!

Melanie Duncan

PS… We will be making a 3D Map of Boston in our classroom in a couple of weeks and will be using cardboard boxes and other recycled materials.  If you have any empty cereal boxes, tissue boxes, cardboard juice/milk cartons, mac and cheese boxes, etc. feel free to send them in!  Thanks!

Important dates: 
May 27 - Memorial Day (No School)
        June 4 - Swan Boats Field Trip
June 17 - Field Day
June 18 - Field Day Rain Date
Simonds Park Field Trip
June 19 - Simonds Park Rain Date
June 20 - Last Day of School (Half-day dismissal)

May 3, 2019 Newsletter

Dear Parents,

We have had a very busy week here in Room 115!  The students have been working hard and learning lots!  We have been learning a lot about nature.  So far we have learned about trees, flowers, and seeds.  We also just started a unit on insects and life cycles.  We are excited to be able to observe the life cycle of a butterfly right in our own classroom!  The Burlington Science Center has given us several caterpillars that have been busy eating and growing.  We also have a luna moth cocoon that we are anxiously keeping an eye on!  The students are learning about all the different body parts of insects and are even learning how to label their drawings.  You’ll have to ask them to sing the “Head, Thorax, Abdomen” Song that we have been practicing this week!

The students have been working hard in their Busy Spider books.  They will finish these next week and will bring them home to share with their families.  They are great books to re-read over and over again!

We have been doing butterfly symmetry at the art table.  The students also made giant flowers based on Eric Carle’s book called “The Tiny Seed.”  They labeled the parts and measured how tall their flowers were with non-standard units such as markers, cubes, and color tiles.  They also did a writing project where they wrote five sentences describing each part of their flowers.

Our last Scholastic Book Club order for the year went home last Friday.  It is full of great books for summer reading!  If you are interested in ordering, the due date is this Monday, May 6th.

The Francis Wyman Used Bookstore is this Wednesday, May 8th.  Students are welcome to bring either a quarter or a book from home to trade.  This is optional.

Have a great weekend!

Melanie Duncan

PS… Due to a scheduling change, our class will be going to the library on Thursday instead of Wednesday (just for this week).