100th Day of School!!!!

Monday is the 100th day of school. Wow, it is amazing we have already been in school 100 days. Take this time to reflect on how much growth your child has made!!! On Monday we will be doing a lot of fun activities , such as counting 100 objects, jumping for 100 seconds, reading as a class 100 books, and so much more!!!!! I sent home a letter yesterday with a bag for your child to collect 100 things. Small items are great and I will have extra in case someone forgets!!!

Penguin Unit: Last week we learned all about two different types of Penguins: Emperor and Macaroni. With Mrs. Guzman's class we studied where both penguins habitat, diet, predators, and interesting facts. The kids worked with a partner to record their learning. We had a Penguin party celebration where the students pretended they were carrying the babies at their feet. We also made mini penguins on the ice, ate baby goldfish, and practiced drawing penguins. It was fun unit for the students to learn some new interesting facts. Ask your child what their favorite part was!

Readers Workshop This week in readers we talked about ending sounds –ed and –ing, trying to see that if we sound out the words, we repeat them to ourselves to see if they make sense and then if they don’t, change the word to a word we know, instead of guessing. We also practiced whole class tricky word strategies, such as look at the picture, say the first sound, stretch it out. Please ask your reader about this!

Writers Workshop This week for writers, we brainstormed ideas for persuasive writing topics and tried to look outside the box for ideas that not only benefit us as humans, but the greater good. For example, we finished reading The predators and talked about reasons why the Lorax was so passionate about saving the trees. We also wrote about whether or not the boy from the story Hey Little Ant, should squish the ant. The kids practiced writing who the letter was to, stating their opinion, and giving reasons why. They also learned how to end their letters. Ask your child what their reasons were.

Valentine's Day!

Thank you to all the families who came to help with the valentines day party! It was so nice to have everyone there helping the kids and get to see them so excited to pass out sweet cards to their friends. Also a big THANK YOU to Aly for taking those really cute pictures! I hope everyone enjoyed them.
Student of the Week:

Sumayah! This week Sumayah has really pushed herself as a mathematician. She worked very hard on some difficult problem solving problems. She didn’t give up or just guess, but really spent the time to figure them out. She also worked so hard on sight words and blends to move up a reading level!! Sumayah is a warm welcoming friend to everyone. Way to go Sumayah!

Black History Month

This year our amazing equity team has reached out to our community to bring in some influential African American community members to speak to our school during every Monday morning assembly, for the month of February. Our first guest speaker was Reggie Jones, a former NFL player who helped the New Orleans Saints to their 2009 Superbowl victory. Reggie spoke to the school about the importance of effort, leadership, integrity, and encouraged students to push themselves to always strive for excellence. Additionally, the K-1 classes will be helping Leschi celebrate Black History Month by performing songs by influential African American artists. Each class has taken on a decade to feature. Our class will be highlighting the 60’s and has chosen to perform “Can’t Hurry Love” by The Supremes. We will be filming all of the performances and showing the video during black history night on Feb. 27th.

Music! We welcomed Ms. Davis to our school this week! She is the new music teacher who will be coming to Leschi every other week to teach music to all the K-3 classes. She has already made a huge impression on our students and they are very excited to proceed with her. Ask your student about their new music teacher!

Celebrating the Seahawks!!!!!!!!!

Readers Workshop This week in readers we focused on visualizing. Ms. Ooton taught the students the importance of visualizing what is happening as we read. Being able to visualize helps us to remember important details about the story and it’s characters. Ms. Ooton read a very descriptive book, Cloudy with a chance of Meatballs. As the students listened to the story, they drew out what they imagined was happening! It was wonderful to see their creative and listening skills come to life!

Writers Workshop

In writers workshop last week we continued to practice using transition words to enhance our writing. We also used our writers checklist to go back through our writing and see what we could add. Student's then set two goals for their writing. We divided into groups to work on those goals. Students then got to use special editing pens to add more to their opinion writing. Some goals students came up with were: work on getting the readers attention, use transition words, add more details, and spelling. This was a great task for students to have to self-reflect on their own writing and think about how they could make it even better. Ask you child what their goals were.
In writers workshop this week we are about to embark on a new unit, persuasive writing!!!! TO help get us ready to be persuasive writers we have read several persuasive text, such as The Lorax, Hey little Ant, and Don’t let the Pigeon drive the bus! Next week we are going to start writing our own persuasive letters and brainstorming things that matter to us, that we hope to change.

Student of the Week:

Kaz has been an excellent role model this week in class. We started a new system in class, Complement Captains. Which are given out to students showing the Leschi Motto of being respectful, responsible, and safe. IN turn they get to give out a complement to someone following that same Motto. This week Kaz has not only been a complement captain, but also received a complement. Way to be a great leader in our class KAZ!!!!!
Rosa has been working so hard last week!! She received her math binder and has been working in it none stop! She has pushed herself as a mathematician, learning new facts, operations, and problem solving skills. She also did a great job this week adding many more details to her writing and really worked on editing her piece! Way to go Rosa!!!!!!!!!