Friday News for the Week of November 13-21

Hi everyone! We had a great last week and 2 days. I didn’t write a Friday newsletter for last Friday because I wanted to include this week too!

Today was Harvest Festival and Pie Day!

The students enjoyed a fun morning of Thanksgiving crafts, games and songs. Here are some pictures:

This week, my brother was in town from Nagano, Japan! We enjoyed a fun weekend of climbing Katuudake and eating at Blue Seal. Do we look alike?

OCSI collected 20 boxes for Operation Christmas Child! Thank you for sending in items for the boxes! 

Last Week:

Reading: We talked about Mental Image - also called imagination or visualizing - it is very important for students to start to develop their mental image while reading. We read several poems and books where I didn’t show them the picture to try to practice making a picture in their heads. They did great! On Monday we read a poem called My Neighbor’s Dog is Purple. I stopped reading before the last line and had the students draw a picture of what they thought it looked like. Then I showed them the last line - it wasn’t a dog it was a crocodile! The students had to draw a new picture.

Math: This week was tough. We learned several new strategies for adding higher numbers. Some were tough, some were easy. The goal is to get the students able to use some mental math to figure out these problems. Way to work hard everyone!

Bible: We learned about the last plague that sent on the Israelites. It was the death of all the firstborn sons. But the people who put the blood of the lamb on the door frame were saved from this plague. It’s so amazing to see how later, through the death of Jesus, God’s son, by his blood shed for us, we can all be saved. He is the lamb of God. We also learned the story of God continuing to do a miracle by parting the Red Sea for the Israelites to walk through.

Spelling: We did a spelling game!

Next Week:

Spelling Words: puff, well, miss, will, back, pick, sock, duck, hand, went, fast, jump, long, hang, wink, ring, talk, fall, tall, your

Bible Memory Verse: “The Lord is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.” Exodus 15:2a

NO SCHOOL until November 27th! Have a wonderful Thanksgiving break!!

Upcoming Events:

• 11/22-24: Thanksgiving Holiday - no school
• 12/6: 12:30 dismissal for students, Christmas Program
• 12/15: 12:30 dismissal for students - Christmas PARTY!
• 12/16 - 1/3: Christmas vacation

Homework Checklist

Oops! I forgot to attach the Homework Checklist on Friday!

If you'll notice - it's a little weird for this week!

The week starts on Tuesday 11/14 and continues back to Monday 11/20. I consider that to be a whole week of school (it just works in my brain like that)

Friday will be No Homework as usual then homework on Monday. No Homework on 11/21 as that starts Thanksgiving break.

Thanks!

Friday news for the week of Nov6-10

Happy Friday!

I’m excited to see some of you tonight at Blue Seal!

We had a fantastic week in 1st grade.

Reading: Making Predictions - A prediction is a guess that readers make about what’s going to happen in the story. My first graders did great guessing what would happen next in the story. This week we read some fun books by Peggy Rathmann (Ruby the Copycat and Officer Buckle and Gloria). On Friday I read Doctor DeSoto to the students and stopped halfway. We wrote down a prediction in our notebooks about what they thought would happen. Then we read the rest of the story and checked to see if our guess was correct. The great thing about predictions is that even if you are wrong, it’s ok!

Writing: This week we looked at the illustration for teaching books which can include arrows, words, and zoomed in pictures. We also learned that we can write twin sentences like this. “To go to Iejima, you have to ride on a ferry. A ferry is a boat that carries people.” I’m excited to see all the teaching books the students are writing.

Math: We jumped into Chapter 3 with additions strategies to 20. We learned that we can count on - 23+4, starting with the bigger number 23, then counting on 24, 25, 26, 27. We also learned we can count on a number line and use doubles and near doubles. I hope the students can master all these ways, as well as, find one way they like to use the best and use it! (I apologize if the near doubles lesson was difficult! Doubles +1 and Doubles -1 is hard for some of the students to understand!)

Bible: We learned that the Israelites were living in Egypt a long time. The Pharaoh who knew Joseph died and a new Pharaoh came to power. Joseph and his brothers all died but their family was growing very big in Egypt. The new Pharaoh gave a command to kill the Israelite babies because he thought they were becoming too many. One mom hid her son for 3 months and finally placed him in a basket and put him in the river. The Pharaoh’s daughter, the princess, found him and decided to keep him. She names the baby Moses and he grew up in the palace. I think we all can relate to Moses. He was a foreigner growing up in a land that is not his own. He was confused, was he an Egyption or an Israelite? Eventually he did something bad and had to run away from Egypt to Midian. There he became a Shepherd. One day, while he was watching his sheep, God appeared to him in a bush that was not burning up! God said, “GO BACK TO EGYPT and SAVE MY PEOPLE!” Wow! I wish God spoke that clearly to me! Moses went back to Egypt and with God’s power did some amazing things to show Pharaoh he meant business!

We are working hard practicing for the Christmas Program:

Mrs. Roe came to read to our class this week!

Walkathon - TOMORROW! Please arrive to school by 8:30. Go to the cafeteria and pick up some water. Go to the new entrance of the school (back entrance). I will be standing by the Yunta Ichiba Farmer’s market, so make sure you say hi as you walk by!

当日の朝は８時半頃に到着してください。カフェテリアにてウォーターボトルをもらってください。今年はビブやチェックポイントのスタンプシートはありません。スタート・ゴールはフィールド側の新しい出入り口です。９時にスタートします。

DON'T FORGET! NO SCHOOL ON MONDAY!!!

Next Week:

Spelling Words: ball call fall hall mall tall talk walk your do

Bible Memory Verse: “Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. His love endures forever.” Psalm 118:1

Ongoing Events:

Change Wars - There's a fundraiser going on for a Saipan mission trip for High School students. If you have any loose change lying around your house and you don't know what to do with it, feel free to send it in for this cause!

Book Order

Our new Scholastic Book Club is up and running! Go to http://world-schools.scholastic.co.uk/okinawa-christian-school-intl to browse the latest books and order online. Please place your order online by December 1st, 2017.

Upcoming Events:

• 11/13: OCSI holiday
• 11/22-24: Thanksgiving Holiday - no school
• 12/6: 12:30 dismissal for students, Christmas Program
• 12/15: 12:30 dismissal for students - Christmas PARTY!
• 12/16 - 1/3: Christmas vacation

Friday News for the Week of Oct 30-Nov3

Happy Friday!

Thank you for a wonderful conference day! I enjoyed talking to each and every one of you that stopped by today. I’m excited for 2nd quarter and how much more we can celebrate your child’s growth!

This Week:

Reading: Asking Questions - Good readers ask questions while they are reading. “Why is this happening?” “What is that?” etc. This week we probably asked about 100 questions while reading some Clifford stories! I wish I counted! On Friday the students picked a book they had been reading and asked 4 questions based on that book. They are on their way to grow up to be great readers!

Writing: We started a new unit on Nonfiction Chapter Books. We started by figuring out how to write a teaching book. The students are now the teachers and get to write and teach everyone else about something they know. Students wrote books about ballet, legos, drawing, and so much more! I’m excited to see how they’ll develop as writers in this unit.

Math: We finished up chapter 2 with Subtraction to 10. We did a timed subtraction test to see how fast they can do it. We’ll do it again in a few weeks to see if they have improved. They also all rocked their math test! Good job everyone!

Bible: We finished up the incredible story of Joseph. After Joseph became a leader in the land, he helped Egypt save the food for the 7 years of famine. But guess who didn’t have food and was hungry - you got it, Joseph’s family back in Canaan. Jacob sent his sons to Egypt to get some grain. The brothers not knowing that it was Joseph, bowed down to him to ask for food. Joseph wanted to test them to see if they had changed so he told them to bring back the youngest brother, Benjamin to Egypt. The brothers obeyed and finally all the family was reunited together. My favorite part of this story is when Joseph says to the brothers, “You meant to harm me, but God meant it for good.” Even when my life is not going well, I was reminded that I need to trust God because he is working everything for good. :)

Science: We started learning about animal habitats. Since we learned about where we live on the world, it’s fun to start learning where animals live!

On Thursday, we visited Mrs. Fox’s 1.2 class to read our finished stories!

Next Week:

Spelling Words: long   king   ring   long   sung   sink   wink   bunk   on   but

Bible Memory Verse: ““Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.” Proverbs 3:5-6

1.1 Ice Cream Party! - stay tuned for a Jupiter email about the 1.1 Ice Cream Party! Nov 10th :)

Don’t forget about the Walkathon and Holiday Market on Nov 11th!

Upcoming Events:

• 11/11: Walkathon and Holiday Market - Check Walkathon facebook page for more information!
• 11/13: OCSI holiday
• 11/22-24: Thanksgiving Holiday - no school
• 12/6: 12:30 dismissal for students, Christmas Program
• 12/15: 12:30 dismissal for students - Christmas PARTY!
• 12/16 - 1/3: Christmas vacation