Saint Ann School News

April 19, 2010

Dear Family,

We survived our return from Easter break. It helped to teach that the Easter season lasts for 50 days by having an Easter party the day we returned!

We have been enjoying Beatrix Potter characters that come alive in her books and stay in our imaginations to enjoy and “revisit.” Her books may inspire some first grade authors to write stories about cute little animals!!

I hope you enjoyed hearing your child read from the Open Court reader he/she brought home last week. The children seemed excited to share the stories with you. I am encouraging them to pay more attention to verbs, adjectives and nouns. Your child should be able to find the verbs (action words) in the sentence, as well as the nouns and adjectives (descriptive words).

This week we will continue our unit on telling time by reviewing time on the hour and half-hour. I will also introduce elapsed time and word problems involving time…a giant step up in difficulty! At the end of the week, we will work on reading a calendar. If you have an extra calendar, encourage your child to use it to mark or write in school or family activities. The actual use of a calendar is the best way for your child to understand and learn days, dates and months. A pack of stickers to put on a specific date greatly increases the desire to use a calendar!

Our last science unit of the year focuses on solids, liquids and gases. It is a fun unit in which to do experiments. I look forward to having fun with these young scientists! We began with solids last week and will work on exploring liquids this week.

We will be reviewing maps. At this age, north, south, east and west can get confusing in a story problem unless we review often. I do not want them to think that a Compass Rose is a spring flower!

We are remembering that a Catholic learner participates in Christian service projects. Our project of providing food for the Saint Vincent de Paul Food Pantry for members of our community is an important part of our Catholic school learning. Please encourage your child to work to earn pennies to bring to school for our Penny Friday collection. We will have one more field trip to buy groceries near the end of May. Thank you for your help with this project.

Please mark your calendar for a “treat” for you for this school year. We will celebrate with an AUTHORS’ TEA on Friday, April 30, at 11:30 IN THE PARISH CENTER. Grandparents, siblings, etc. are also invited. You will find an invitation in your Monday Envelope.

We continue to read Bible stories about the numerous appearances by Jesus to the Apostles after his rising from the dead. Enjoy these next weeks of our Easter season, remembering that Easter does not end until Pentecost, which is celebrated 50 days after Easter. So…Happy Easter!!

Respectfully,
Christine Simolon