Our First Husky Assembly!

 

We are the Huskies!

     Mr. Davini and Ms. McCloskey held our first PBIS assembly on Friday.  The students learned some PBIS expectations for behavior, and found out some of the great incentives we have to be respectful, responsible, and ready this year.  Thanks to Mrs. Meyer and the PBIS Universal team for organizing these incentives for us.

This year, we will be giving out three different tickets for various things.

Yellow tickets:  Students will get one for being on time to school, and will be placed in a weekly raffle!

Blue tickets:  Students will earn these for individual good choices, and will collect and save them to spend in the Husky Store!

Pink Tickets:  These Husky Paws are given to an entire class for being ready, respectful or responsible.   Each class can earn rewards for collecting them, but we will also be counting them for the school as well!

     It's going to be a great year!  Stay tuned for more PBIS news.  

Anchor Charts

     Our classrooms are always filled with new learning, so we need a way to help our students remember what our learning goals are.  One way to help our students is to create anchor charts about what we are learning.  Anchor charts are posters that we create with our students while we teach them new skills or strategies.  We then hang them on the wall, so that they have something to look at when they are working independently.  It helps the students be able to practice the new skills all by themselves.

     This week, I walked around the building and took pictures of some of our current anchor charts.  This will give you a glimpse of what the students at Hiawatha are currently working on.  There are some charts for math, writing, and reading included.

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B6nSB6nXSloXV0lrckxIcXBJb00&usp=sharing

     Your children are learning some great things.  Thanks for getting them to school on time and ready to learn!

Parent University Resources

     Thank you so much for coming to our Literacy Night for Parent University!  We hope you had a nice time reading with your child, working on character traits, and seeing some of the projects that some kindergarten, first grade, and accelerated learning are working on!

     As promised, here are some resources to help you while you read with your child at home.  As we discussed today, there are incredible benefits to reading for 20 minutes at home each night.  Here is the graphic that we showed:

     The Common Core standards have set some new expectations for our students.  The standards combine reading, writing, speaking, listening, and language skills to really challenge the students and help them go deeper than ever before.  We shared a tip sheet for parents to help incorporate the Common Core at home.  The best thing that you can is talk more with your child at home about everything...  Reading, writing, cleaning their room, choosing a type of cereal at the store... Everything!      The more that our children use language and vocabulary to express themselves, the more they will be able to do the same things with books in the classroom.  Here are some more suggestions about incorporating the Common Core.

English Common Core Tips
Spanish Common Core Tips

     Finally, our reading teachers compiled some resources to give you idea about what you can do at home with their child while reading.  Take a moment to read them and get some new strategies to practice while reading at home.

Reading at Home Handouts

     Thanks for coming and reading with your child!

Winter Books for a Snowy Day

     Here we are, in 2014, and it occurred to me that I never posted about the Polar Express happenings at Hiawatha the week before break.  A bunch of grade levels used the classic children's book by Chris Van Allsburg to ring in the holiday season.  They did a variety of different things using the text, including reading aloud, visualizing images, close reading excerpts, and discussing some important themes.  They also had a little fun with the book, including turning 1izfa into the Polar Express for the day!

     I was reminded of this today as all the winter storm warnings came rolling in.  I thought to myself that the Polar Express might be the perfect way to travel in Chicago over the next few days.  That, or we should all just stay home and read some great books with our families.  Here are some suggestions!

    If you are looking for a book to read that has to do with snow, I would highly suggest the book Snowflakes Fall by Patricia MacLachlan and Steven Kellogg.  It is a book that is about snowflakes, but it really a tribute to the children of Sandy Hook.  

"A Snowflake.

A Child.
No two the same--all beautiful."

The book has the most beautiful illustrations, including the final page where there's a line of snow angels that begins to fly.  The kids listening the the story have no idea the touching significance that the authors really intended.  Just beautiful.  

     If I am talking about great winter books, another favorite (also by Steven Kellogg) is The Missing Mitten Mystery.  It is about a little girl who loses a mitten while building a snowman.  It is, in fact, the 5th mitten that she has lost.  Once again, the illustrations are amazing, and the story is very relevant to our young students who love winter fun.

     Because of our 1:1 program, many families have their devices at home with them.  Try myON!  A few nights ago, I was reading to my kids with the fairy tales that we found on myON.  The kids really liked listening to the books with me (my kids are only 5 and 3, so we listened to them read aloud) and we talked about the books as we listened.  On a side note, I quickly learned that my kids are very trusting and that they did indeed think that the sky was falling.  Login and see if your family finds a book to discuss together.  

Here is a link to login:

http://www.myon.com/

**If your child doesn't know their login, please ask their teacher when they return to school in a few days.  It is a great resource to use at home!

     We will see you in a few days!  Stay warm until we see you on Tuesday!  

      

     

     

Keeping Our Stamina Up!

     How are we keeping our young readers engaged in reading during the holiday season?  That is a great question!  Jingle bells are ringing, and our little ones notice every flake of snow that falls from the sky.  Winter is here, and they know it!  Keeping them focussed on books can be a challenge during the month of December.  But, we have a few tricks up our sleeves!

     The students in KWEDA got some new places to read this week.  Laundry baskets!  As silly as it seems, the kids LOVE sitting in these new spots.  It is amazing what a new location can do to motivate a reader!

     There are some great books being read around the building, too.  From read alouds, to shared reading, to the books they are checking out from the library, great books are everywhere.  Kindergarten is working on various versions of the Gingerbread Man.  3rd grade is reading The Polar Express and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.   5th grade is reading The Birchbark House.  The kids can't help but focus when reading great titles like those!

     Finally, a little challenge never hurts.  We are having a Character Trait Challenge for the whole school, sponsored by the 1st and 2nd grade Accelerated Learning students.  Classes can win a Wii party by completing a google form about helpful characters, or by collecting Coins for Character for the City of Berwyn.  

Our Character Trait Challenge Video

Our Helpful Character Trait Google Form

    We have a lot of reading left to do in the next few weeks!  Let's enjoy the season with some great books!

Halloween Book Characters

     How do Hiawatha teachers celebrate Halloween?  With a good book!  :)
  
     We had quite a few literacy themed Halloween costumes this year!  The 5th grade team all dressed up as Macbeth and the 3 witches, which happens to be their current read aloud.  Mrs. Hayes was the tree in Chicka Chicka Book Boom.  Miss Falls and Miss Izzi went with Piggie and Gerald today.  Some of the 3rd grade teachers chose book character detectives, like Nate the Great and Cam Jansen, while one chose to represent Harry Potter.  We even had a student dressed as Harry Potter reading one of the Harry Potter book today.  I am not even sure which of the Potter series it was, because he wouldn't even look up from his book when I took his picture.  Talk about engagement!!!

     I hope you had a nice, safe Halloween.  Perhaps you can end this cold and rainy night reading a Halloween book as a family! 

Cool Tools

     This year, as part of our PBIS Program, we are having the students teach the Cool Tools each week.  We started with 5th grade, and they have had the opportunity to make signs and create presentations for  all the classrooms at Hiawatha.  They went into the classrooms in small groups or teams and helped model the positive behaviors that we should have at Hiawatha.  

  

     What they don't even realize is, that while they are teaching the Cool Tools, they are also becoming better readers and writers!  Writing their posters and scripts, rereading their writing, practicing speaking out loud to whole groups...  Reading, Writing, Speaking and Listening.  Literacy is abundant in these activities!  

     5th grade, you are doing a great job as role models and student leaders!  We can't wait to see what the rest of the grades do during their weeks.  :)