October Dates and More About Writing

October is going to be a busy month. Please mark the following dates on your calendar.

Oct. 3 - Open House 5:00 - 6:30
This is a come and go event. We will have some student work on display and the kids will enjoy telling you about everything we do.

Oct. 11 - We will walk to Fletcher's after lunch to see the Pumpkin Patch. They have a short program for the kids.

Oct. 19 - Field Trip to Elgin Pumpkin Patch. This is an all day field trip. We've done this one before and it is so much fun. Parents are welcome to go. I will send a permission slip for this one soon. It will cost $7 per child. $5 for parents and younger siblings.

Oct. 31 - We are bringing back the community helper parade! We haven't done this the last couple of years and we miss it. The kids can dress up to show us what they want to be when they grow up. We will also have our Fall class party on this day.

I am so excited about how the kids are coming along with their writing. I see improvement every day. I hope you are talking to your child about what they are writing. I want to show you the example below because it is very typical of what you may be seeing your child do.
This student wrote "I like my octopus". You can see in the bottom right hand corner where he wrote "I lke". There is an M for "my" on the left side and in the top left corner there is an O for octopus. When he read this to the class, he was able to point to the letters that represented what he was saying. He was very intentional about the letters he put down. This is very appropriate for a beginning Kindergarten student. The author has to read it to you but when they do, it makes sense. Remember, I don't tell the kids how to spell words. I tell them to write what they hear.

We work on letter sounds every day. You can help at home by asking your child to tell you what sounds the letters make. If you have some ABC flash cards, you could go through those at night to reinforce what we do at school.