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Hopes, Dreams, & Wonderings

So much to write!

Full of wonder
Full of wonder
Thinking deeply
Thinking deeply
Writing questions
Writing questions

imageOne student's hopes & dreams

From Mrs. Woods:

As I pause to reflect on our first full week in fifth grade, I feel grateful to be spending this school year with such inquisitive and passionate children. We began our week framing our hopes and dreams.  The language of hopes and dreams (as opposed to “goals”) is powerful and intentional, for focusing on what we hope and what we dream opens ourselves up to many possibilities.

 

I believe a child’s innate curiosity is essential for learning.  Watching fifth graders think and wonder and write as many questions as they could, while sitting  in the garden, was one of my favorite moments of the week.  I anticipate their wonderings will catapult our studies into exciting and meaningful directions.

 

 

This week’s mirror message:

 

 

We are off to an exciting start in Kindergarten! We are continuing to learn and practice our daily routines including unpacking, signing in, washing our hands, and choosing a morning center. The children have enjoyed remembering the hand motion patterns in our Morning Meeting greetings, making mathematical discoveries in our daily Calendar Math activities (“How many more days of school until we get to make a bundle of ten straws?”) and our music and movement activities including Hickity Pickity Bumble Bee, Tootie Ta, and more! We’ve also spent time getting to know one another through various activities such as the game Me Too!  The children enjoyed building together in the block center, as well as creating different sculptures with our ( now glittery!) playdough. In the beading center, the children explored pattern and measurement skills.  We discovered what happens when you mix glue, salt, and food coloring and created salt paintings. We also picked garlic and mint in our beautiful JCDSRI garden! We read stories about Kindergarten, made various self-to-text connections, and discussed what we hope to learn about this year. The children are excited to learn about letters, reading, math, peace, Hebrew, pipes, songs, rainbows, and more! We discovered the different ways in which we get to school in the morning (walking, driving, and riding a bicycle), played some rhyming games, learned a special alphabet song to help with letter and sound identification, and started learning about the Hebrew letter shin. Additionally, we started making our classroom Shulchan Shalom (Peace Table).  Next week, we’ll even go on a letter and sight word scavenger hunt! We’re going to have such an amazing year of fun and learning!

Salt Paintings

Beading

Squigs

Animal sorting

Playdough

Rhyming game

Hopes for Kindergarten

Making our Shulchan Shalom (Peace Table)

Illustrating the various ways in which we get to school

question4

Making the Hebrew letter “Shin” with our bodies

shin 1 shin 2

Exploring the garden

garlic

mint

Cooking in the Dramatic Play area

dramatic play 1

Reading in the loft

loft

Tomer’s post about how things are so far

This year has been fantastic so far.  In the Fifth Grade we went to the garden on the very first day of school and planted a few rows of spinach. This was exciting because we saw the garden after the whole summer and got a taste of what it would be like later in the year.  This week we also made the job wheel, one job (which I think is cool) is the gardener.  The gardener does the very hard job of watering the plants that we have in the garden.  This year has truly been an awesome year so far.

Weekly Update

First Stop: Video News

Each week we will have a few different newscasters telling about some things we did that week in school.  Enjoy!

Student Blogger (Each Friday a different student writes about one thing they really enjoyed or learned that week in school.)

“We had a aosume reses today” – Atticus

Student Book Reviewer (Each Friday a student will review a book he is reading or a book we are reading together in class)

“Our class read a book about a kid that wonted to save a dragon, but he had every day supplies.  I liked the book.” – Yasha

Now, onto some teacher-presented news…

We had our first design lab this week.  Kids were introduced to our new building and prototyping materials, and were asked to choose a material to build one thing to show something they did this summer.  They really let their creative juices flow as they built pools out of legos, flowers out of pattern blocks, and camp cabins out of Lincoln Logs.

We had the great pleasure of spending our first morning in the garden with the help of our garden teacher, Mrs. Woods.  We observed the growth of some of the plants that students planted last year when they were in first grade.  We picked and tasted some yummy kale, and we picked a patty pan squash, that we will later cook and eat.  These kids are weeding machines!  They really know how to dig in and get their hands dirty.  Soon, we will plant some fall seeds!

Students also got the chance to practice their writing skills by writing a story about their summer vacations.  Kids really had some fabulous experiences this summer, and it was wonderful for them to share their stories with the whole class.

Reminder:  Please send in your parent interviews. 

Also, homework is starting this week with Reading Minutes.  Please look out for your child’s homework folder and help him/her develop a homework routine at home.

 

The Class of 2015’s First Week

From Mrs. Woods:

We begin the school year by creating our class culture.  How will we interact and learn together this year?  Setting the tone for our class kehilla is (hopefully) evident in all that we’ve done this week.  Fifth graders are encouraged to be inquisitive, to be creative, and to find meaning in all that they do.  JCDSRI’s mission statement permeates the work that we do.

Students have already exerted leadership by planning and facilitating the first all-school Wednesday afternoon assembly.  They were quite impressive and led a creative and engaging community-building activity.

Most mornings will begin with a Responsive Classroom morning meeting in the classroom.  This helps build community and set the tone for the day.  Curious to know more?  Click here: https://www.responsiveclassroom.org/principles-and-practices-responsive-classroom

At Morning Meeting on the first day

With Rabbi Gouze, fifth graders read, thought about, and commented on different texts about learning.  Each student then chose one that spoke to him or her personally.

 Commenting on texts

In the garden we tasted our tomatoes that were planted last spring, and we planted spinach seeds.

We captured feelings to help plan for the assembly.

We took time to experience a new classroom material.  Kinetic sand, the class gift from last year’s graduating class, was mesmerizing.  How might play be thoughtfully used in the fifth grade classroom this year?  Students reflected in writing what they thought about and how they felt after 10 minutes of quiet time exploring.  Many reported a sense of calm.  Some wrote about what they thought about.
Using a technique known as “synectics,” students made unpredictable connections to the notion of community.
We created a list of dispositions necessary in the math classroom.  Fifth graders discussed why stick-with-it-ness is essential to having the right “mathitude,” or math attitude.  We also cheered for math to help with our mindsets.  Thank you to parents for helping our data collection.  To date there is not one singular definition for math, and we appreciate you expanding our thinking.
This week, the mirror in our room asked students a provocative question with the intention of making it clear that infusing joy is essential to our education. 
Our first week in fifth grade felt joyful to me. I wonder how students felt.

 

 

 

Summer Reading Program 2014

Welcome Back Everyone!

Students have been happily sharing their summer “reads“ during library classes and writing brief book reviews to post on Amazon. Although the summer reading assignments were optional, I was delighted that some student did the assignments. We had a great time listening to their presentations. A 3rd grader created a very entertaining newspaper about a non-fictional book. There were summaries, sales talks, art work and videos! Thank you for all your efforts and keep reading!

The summer reading program material is posted on the website: community page and the library blog www.jcdsri.com. The blog contains more booklists and other resources. In addition, check out booklists, summer activities, kid-friendly summer recipes and more on our Pinterest site http://www.pinterest.com/jcdsri/.

Visit the PJ Library website https://www.pjlibrary.org/ for great Jewish books for kids and sign up for preschool Hebrew books at http://www.pjlibrary.org/about-pj-library/sifriyat-pijama-bamerica.aspx

Dear JCDS Families,

Welcome to our summer celebration of books, the JCDSRI Summer Reading Program! The intent of our summer reading program is to promote reading skills. Research studies have demonstrated that students who participate in a summer reading program are more likely to read at their grade level or above than nonparticipating students and those reading above grade level are more likely to retain those skills into the next school year. (Evaluation and Training Institute). While an increase in reading promotes reading abilities and other skills, we want our students to experience the joys that reading brings through marvelous characters and adventures. Books introduce us to friends we will have for life. Reading is FUN!
We are asking students to read at least five books from our booklists. Hopefully, they will read many books.

Each student in incoming grades 1-5 receives a summer reading program folder containing:

(1.) A suggested booklist of various levels and interests.

(2.) An individualized guided reading booklist with books at your child’s current reading level is included in folder for incoming grades 2-4

(3) Book assignments-optional

The lists are sent to the following public libraries: Rochambeau, Cranston,  East Providence, Johnston, Lincoln, Pawtucket  and the following bookstores: Books on the Square and Barnes and Noble in Warwick.

The summer reading program is coordinated by Karolyn White, librarian. kwhite@jcdsri.com

 We wish you a happy, healthy summer and wonderful reading adventures!

SUMMER READING BOOKLISTS BY GRADES: (click link)

http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs182/1101781664576/archive/1117680282108.html

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