Science

The kids are enjoying our study of the planets.  They have been researching a specific planet using either the lap top computers or the computer lab.  Mrs. Bender's group has made their solar system using different type of seeds to represent the planet's size.  (Mrs. Hartsock's class will do this on Tuesday!)  The kids were amazed at the size of Jupiter and Saturn compared to the other planets.

Ask the kids what sentence they need to remember!  (There is a clever sentence that helps us remember the order of the planets.)

Web sites we have enjoyed:
solarsystem.nasa.gov  (Has fun space games and you can check your weight on another planet.)
www.enchantedlearning.com
www.zoomastromony.com

We are also beginning to work on our travel brochure for our planet.  Thank you to Mrs. Casper for helping us in the computer lab today!

Literacy Week Activities

Check out the fun events scheduled for next week!  


Monday, February 28--Staff Reading Relay
KE staff will take turns reading with Preschool-5th grade classrooms at designated times throughout the day.

Tuesday, March 1--Community Reader Day
Mid-Prairie community members will come "guest-read" to each classroom.  
KE Family Literacy Night-- free meal at 5:30; speaker and activities at 6:30 

Wednesday, March 2--Hats off to Reading Day
Students and staff will wear their favorite hat to school!

Thursday, March 3--Stop, Drop, and Read
Throughout the day we will announce to stop, drop, and read.  Be sure to take your books with you wherever you go today so you are ready to read.  Students can bring favorite books from home to read if they wish!

Friday, March 4--Read and Feed Day
Students will read and feed their brain with literature and popcorn today.

Friday Stations

We look forward to stations each Friday afternoon!  This week Mrs. Bender's class did a special project in the computer lab, while Mrs. Hartsock's class created leprechauns, caught up on math and language assignments, worked on writing projects, and reinforced math and spelling skills on the laptops.

Language Skills

This week's spelling words all contained the -ought or -aught spelling patterns, which are quite "tricky." We continued our study of pronouns, and students practiced selecting the correct pronoun to use depending on whether it is a subject or object pronoun.

Students also began a new writing project about finding lucky clover to correlate with St. Patrick's Day.  For this project, students are learning to edit their own work.  To help with the editing process, students read their stories with a buddy and discussed the good parts of each piece of writing, as well as what the author could change to make it better.  We'll be publishing these stories next week.

Sharing stories with a buddy:

Reading

This week (or last week - depending on which reading group students are in), we read the story Yunmi and Halmoni's Trip in our anthology. We discussed what it would be like to visit a different country, as this is something most students have not done yet.  Ask your child to explain to you about the trip Yunmi took with her grandmother.  A skill that we worked on with this story was making inferences, or figuring out why certain things might have taken place in the story, although the author doesn't come right out and say tell us.  

Here students work on completing an inference chart:

Party Time Fundraiser

Students brought home Partytime Fundraiser packet materials Wednesday,

February 23 after our all school assembly showcasing many of their fine

frozen food, desserts, candies, gardening and novelty products. 

Sales will continue through Tuesday, March 15!  All proceeds will benefit the Kalona

Elementary Playground Project to complete the safe surfacing for the final

phase of this ongoing project since Fall 2006.  

All products will be delivered to the KE gym on Tuesday, April 19 from 3-6p.m. just in time for

Easter!  

Thank you for supporting the Kalona Elementary Playground Project

to provide a safe play environment for your children!

Old Math Books

This week the old math books were sent home with the kids.  Please don't throw them away!  On the nights we don't have homework, you can use the old math books as review - many of the math boxes did not get corrected in class, and several of the math boxes did not get completed that could also be used for review.

A peek at our week

We've been learning a lot in Chinese class with Mr. O'Brian!  Today students were able to hold a "conversation" in Chinese between puppets.

Below are visual prompts for some of the Chinese classroom commands/phrases that we have learned in Chinese.  Ask your child to tell you (in Chinese!) what they are.

In Science students are researching the questions that they have brainstormed about the planet they are studying for our space unit.  They love using laptops to research on the internet!

We love to use our Smart boards for instruction and small group activities.  Here some of the kids from 3H review facts about presidents during stations.

In honor of Presidents Day, students read about George Washington and Abraham Lincoln.  Then they sorted and classified facts about each president with a cut and paste activity.

We also use laptops in our classrooms to reinforce math, reading, and spelling skills using games and activities online.  Check out the links to websites we use in class in the sidebar at the right of our blog.

Social Studies

We've started our new unit, Communities Over Time this week.  We've already had interesting discussions about how our own community has changed over time.  We'll look back at the history of our country, and how people and places have changed in the coming weeks.  Both 3H and 3B are reading Laura Ingalls Wilder books during milk and literature block to correlate with this social studies unit, and to prepare for our Laura Ingalls Wilder day in April.

Language Skills

Our spelling words this week focused on the "oo" sounds (like in took and in spook). This week's grammar focus was pronouns. Students practiced identifying pronouns and  replacing nouns with pronouns in sentences.

Students also had the opportunity to do some "free" writing by typing a story on a topic of their choice in the lab.  They did a great job remembering to use complete sentences, capital letters, and punctuation.  Mrs. Hartsock is conferencing with each student to edit their story and help them identify elements of writing that they need to work on.

KCTC A Paper Contest begins!

It's time for the KCTC  A Paper Contest!

Each week KE students will have the opportunity to win Kalona Kash by submitting their A papers into a drawing.  2 winners will be selected every Friday.  In May, all A papers will be eligible for the grand prize drawing, in which prizes include a Radio Shack gift card and and ice cream party at Yotty's.

Remember, a teacher must sign each paper that is entered into the drawing. We ask that students take their papers home in Friday folders so that parents can see them, then "A" papers can be submitted to the KE office or to KCTC for the drawing.  Remember to make sure that your child's full name, phone number, and address, as well as their school is clearly marked on each paper that he/she submits.

Generally, Mrs. H. will try to sign papers that qualify as "A" papers as she grades them, so most language and social studies papers will be signed when returned to students.  Mrs. B requests that students bring papers to her to sign if they wish to submit them to the contest.  Remember, we may determine that papers that were completed as a class do not qualify as "A" papers, although the paper may be completed correctly.

Good luck!

Fun Night Garden Theme Baskets

It's hard to believe, but KE Fun Night will be here before we know it!  This year Fun Night will be held on Saturday, April 2 at Mid-Prairie Middle School from 5 - 8 pm. You may remember that in the past, each KE classroom has compiled a "theme" basket to be sold by silent auction.  These baskets have been a great fundraiser for our school.

This year third grades will be collecting items for Garden Theme baskets;  plants, gloves, seeds, decorative lawn/garden items would all be great contributions.  We'd love it if each family could sent an item to fill our baskets. There's still plenty of time (we'll need to complete our baskets by March 30), but we thought we'd give you a heads up. :)

Many thanks for your help in filing our baskets with garden goodies!

Mark your calendar: Family Literacy Night at KE

Plan to attend the 2nd annual KE Literacy Night!  On Tuesday, March 1 KE families are invited to join us for a complimentary meal (served from 5:30 - 6:15 in the gym). After the meal, children will get to participate in literacy activities (there will be something for all ages: infant - 5th grade!) while adults will have the opportunity to hear this year's guest speaker, Bob Kirschbaum.  All children will also receive a free book to take home.

Look for more information about this exciting event (as well as other literacy activities that will be held at school that week) in your child's Friday folder soon.

Chinese Club

You're invited . . .

to Chinese Club!


KE students have recently began learning Chinese with Mr.O'Brian.  On Thursday, February 24, KE students and their families are invited to join WT and WE students and families (who have been learning Chinese for the past 2 years) at Wellman Elementary from 6:30 - 7:30 for Chinese club.  You'll have the opportunity to meet Mr. O'Brian, learn some Chinese words, create Chinese crafts, and more!


Click here to view the invitation.


PS - Also, mark your calendars now for Summer Language Camp!


M-P elementary students are invited to participate in a 4-day morning language camp on June 27 – 30. Two days will be Spanish and two will be Chinese.   Registration forms will be sent home to parents in report cards April 5.  

Messy Mud

Though we LOVE the warmer weather this week, the melting snow on our playground has turned much of the play area into a muddy mess.  While much of the snow has melted, it is still helpful for students to wear boots to school so that when we come in from recess, we can change into clean/dry shoes.

Also, due to unpredictable and changing weather, please be sure your child brings a coat to school for recess.  On warmer days many children are not wearing coats - but it is not quite that warm yet. :)  It's always a good idea to send at least a light jacket or a sweatshirt.  Thanks!

Snow make up days

The school board has announced that both (2) snow make up days will be added to the end of the school year.  Currently (assuming there are no more snow days),  our last school day is Wed, June 1st.

Math and Science

*In math we continue to work on our geometry unit.  We learned about polygons, identifying their base, edges, vertices and sides.  We colored coded our shapes to help us keep the vocabulary straight.  Keep working on those multiplication facts.  Chapter 6 will be done this next week and then we will be back to multiplication.

*In science we continue to watch the different phases of the moon.  Our web site we used was www.enchantedlearning.com - look under Astronomy for the moon and the planets.  Next week we will start researching planets.

This 'N That

• We're celebrating Valentine's Day in our classrooms on Monday!  Students are invited to bring a drink for themselves, and a snack to share for our party.

• If you know in advance that your child will be absent (or leaving school early) for an appointment, it is very helpful for us to be notified. We can then be sure that your child is ready to go when you arrive to pick him/her up, and have make up work taken care of in advance.

• Please note that spring picture day is on Feb. 18 (Friday)

• Don't forget to collect those box tops for the KE playground!  A Box top bouquet sheet was sent home in Friday folders on which to attach box tops as you collect them, if you wish.



Finally - a few pictures from the week . . .

Reading

Students read biographies this week in our anthology.  We learned about the basic format of a biography (sequential, include important accomplishments).  For guided reading, students selected a biography of a famous person to read and record facts about that person's life.

Language Skills

Spelling words this week are words in which the base word "changed the y to an i" and a suffix was added (puppies, candies, cried).  We also learned about jargon, or special meanings words can have in certain situations, and reviewed simple and compound sentences.

Our writing project this week involved writing about ourselves - autobiographies, since we've been reading biographies in reading this week.  It was difficult for students to write a narrative biography, so we turned our autobiographies into poems that students published by typing the poems in the lab.

Social Studies

We wrapped up our study of landforms this week, and played Jeopardy to review for the unit test next week.

Next up - Communities Over Time - we'll study how communities change and the history of the US

What a week!

February has definitely blown in with bang!  We hope everyone stayed warm during the Blizzard of 2011!  :)

We'll be back next week with updates from our classroom studies (hopefully we'll have a little more class time next week!), but wanted to post a few announcements/reminders:

(psst - be sure to scroll down and read all of the new posts from this week!)

Mark your calendars!  We have some special third grade events coming up that we thought you might like to know about in advance:

Donuts for Dads – March 25 - Students can bring Dad (or another special friend like a grandpa or uncle) to spend the afternoon in third grade!  We'll dine on donuts, and dads will get to participate in our Friday stations.

Laura Ingalls Wilder Day – April 29 - To culminate our unit on how our country was settled, we will learn about pioneer life.  We'll bake, cook, make crafts, and more!  We will need several volunteers to help with this fun all day event.

Mother’s Day Tea – May 6th - Moms (or other special friend such as a grandma or aunt) get to spend the afternoon with us on this date.  We'll sip our tea, do a craft, and rotate through stations with moms.

 Valentine's Day is quickly approaching!  We'll celebrate on Valentine's Day (Monday, Feb. 14) in our classrooms with a valentine exchange, games, and refreshments.  Students made "holders" for our valentines at school, so no need to worry about decorating a box at home.  

We request that each student bring valentines for every classmate (see your child's teacher if you are in need of valentines).  

Students may bring a drink for themselves and a snack to share for our party.

Making our valentine holders

Third Grade Fun Night Baskets

It's hard to believe, but KE Fun Night will be here before we know it!  You may remember that in the past, each KE classroom has compiled a "theme" basket to be sold by silent auction.  These baskets have been a great fundraiser for our school.

This year third grades will be collecting items for Garden Theme baskets;  plants, gloves, seeds, decorative lawn/garden items would all be great contributions.  We'd love it if each family could sent an item to fill our baskets. There's still plenty of time (we'll need to complete our baskets by March 30), but we thought we'd give you a heads up. :)

Request from the Playground Committee

February 2011

Dear KES families,

We want to ask you to help KES earn money for the Kalona Elementary

Playground Project by saving Box Tops for us.  We have participated in the

General Mills Box Tops For Education Program for many years, but are

increasing our awareness and asking for your further support.  We can earn

money by submitting Box Tops from participating products!  The participating

products are listed on the back of this letter.  Hang it on the refrigerator

so you always know what products have Box Tops.  We are not asking you to

buy anything you wouldn’t usually buy; we are only asking you to save the

Box Tops from the participating products you already use. Box Tops look like

the one in the upper right hand corner of this letter.  Most of them are

pink, but some can be black or blue.

Here is what you can do to help:

* FIRST- Look at the list on the back of this letter, a lot of these

products you may already have in your house.

* SECOND – Cut the Box Tops off of the products.  The Box Tops have an

expiration date, so be careful when you cut it to save the expiration date.

* THIRD – Drop off or send with your child(ren) to school and deposit them

into the Box Tops Box located in the main hallway at KES.

* FOURTH – Keep saving Box Tops for the Kalona Elementary Playground Project

all year long.  Even though a deadline passes, we will keep collecting for

our next submission.

Another way you can help the Kalona Elementary Playground Project is to join

the Box Top Booster Club at the Box Top website. This is an online way for

you to help KES earn “Bonus” BoxTops. Go to

http://www.boxtops4education.com. Look for The Power of 1 and follow the

instructions.  To select our school you will need the zip code, it is 52247,

then select Kalona Elementary School in Kalona. Once you are registered, you

have access to special coupons for participating Box Top Products, recipes

and online contests that will award winning Booster Club Members prizes and

Bonus Box Tops to the school.  There are usually one or two contests each

month. Our school will get Bonus Box Tops when you sign up to help support

us.

We want to say Thank You for helping us collect and earn Box Tops cash for

the Kalona Elementary Playground Project.  We have a goal of $1000 to finish

this school year.   With your help, we are working very hard to reach our

goal.

These are just some of the products that have Box Tops

       

Thanks for your help!!

The Kalona Elementary Playground Project Committee

Jan Knebel

Kerri Bell

Jessica & Kurt Jones

Joe & Julie Sojka

Jamey Errthum

Chinese at KE

We're excited to begin our Chinese program at KE! Through a federal grant, Chinese will be taught to grades 1-5 twice each week.  Welcome to Mr. O'Brien, our new Chinese teacher.  Today was our first Chinese lesson, and we learned to speak and follow several directions (wave hello, raise your hand, stand up).