Last Day of School

Friday was our last day of school. We celebrated with a BFG Party and made snozzcumbers and frobscottle. Most of the students tried the snozcumbers, and several actually liked the concoction! Everyone enjoyed the frobscottle. Thank you to Mrs. Felli who organized the party. She did a wonderful job, and we are very grateful!

I hope everyone has a great summer break, and I will see you next fall!

Bubbles

We had fun with bubbles as a reward for raising the most money for the PFO Walk-a-Thon. Students played outside and made lots of different sized bubbles. It was a perfect day to celebrate.

Second Grade Visitation

Ms. Dorsel will be the second grade teacher next year. I know many of you are familiar with her already, and I'm sure she is looking forward to meeting the rest of you. Today the students visited her classroom and learned a little about what next year will entail. I know they are excited to be moving on, and yet sad to leave first grade behind. I will miss them too!

Castle Coin Store

Students were excited today to visit the MEC store and spend their castle coins. They have worked hard to earn them by following the Mary Castle Expectations this grading period. A lot of students bought posters, jewelry, mini footballs, and books. Raffle tickets could also be purchased for a chance to win a guitar, a bicycle, basketballs, and other prizes.

Puppet Shows

Today students used the box of puppets I have to make their own puppet shows. We had stories about friends, a family eating breakfast, and lots of animal shows. They were very excited to use their imagination and perform for their friends.

Congratulations to our class. We raised the most money for the walk-a-thon and will have a special surprise next week from the PFO!

Please be sure to empty your child's backpack every evening for the next week. Lots of projects and materials will be coming home, and I would like the children not to be overwhelmed with items each night.

Busy Time of Year

It's the end of the year, and boy have we been busy. The students did get to participate in Field Day on Wednesday, even though it rained. Our parent volunteers were still able to run some of the stations inside the school. A big thank you to Mr. Beattie who organized the event!

I was pleased to see many of you at our volunteer breakfast Wednesday morning. I hope you know how much you are appreciated for the time and work you do. I know the students love having you here to work with them in the mornings with reading. Thank you for your dedication.

This week we have been busy doing final assessments. DRA's are finally done and can be recorded on report cards, which will come home on next Friday the 23rd. Next week we will be working on cleaning up the room, and also doing some really fun activities in class.

Mrs. Felli is hard at work organizing the end of the year party. I hope to see many of you there. I think the students will enjoy the activities I have picked out to go along with our Read Aloud book, The BFG.

See you soon!

Teacher Appreciation Thank You

Thank you to everyone for my lovely gifts. I have four vases of flowers in my room and am overwhelmed by your generosity. The students were so excited to bring all my treats last week. I enjoying being the superstar for the week, and appreciate all of your gifts.

The food that parents made for each day last week was truly amazing. We teachers ate very well for lunch and breakfast. I wish the school lunch was that good!

Walk-a-Thon

Today was our walk-a-Thon. The students had a great time even though it was a yucky day. We were able to eat outside and withstand the wind and sprinkles.

To pattern one of our books...
Fortunately we were second in line to walk.
Unfortunately we missed a turn while on our walk.
Fortunately we still made it back to the finish line.
Unfortunately it started to rain.
Fortunately we made it back inside quickly. And fortunatley we still had fun!

Spelling This Week

This will be our last week for individualized spelling lists. The students picked out their own words this week, and I was pleased with their choices for the most part. Although the ones who chose "Triskaidekaphobia", which is the fear of the number 13, kinda threw me for a loop!

Next week we will only have dictation sentences, and no spelling the last week of school.

Courtyard

We worked really hard on making our courtyard beautiful today. Everyone had a chance to help plant flowers and spread mulch. Thank you to Mrs. Felli who helped as well, and also ran to the store to get more mulch when we ran out. She also donated flowers to the class as well. I hope you take the time to come see our efforts this Thursday on Art and Ed Night.

Thank you to all who gave me such lovely flowers this morning. My room is full of beautiful blooms.

Tessellations

In math we have been studying patterns and artwork. Students have learned how to make their own tessellations. The word 'tessera' in latin means a small stone cube. They were used to make up 'tessellata' - the mosaic pictures forming floors and tilings in Roman buildings. One artist we have learned about who used tessellations in his work was M. C. Escher. Our class is working on basic tessellations beginning with a simple square. The artwork they have created is beautiful.