Book Fair

There is another "buy" night for our Book Fair on Tuesday, January 26th from 6 - 8PM. Did you know the Boxtops for Education coupons (found on many food products) are worth 10 cents each @ the Book Fair? In other words, 10 Boxtop coupons equals $1.00. If you have Boxtop coupons @ home, you may want to use them or mix them w/money to pay for the books your child would like to purchase at the Book Fair. Also, please note the CATS Carnival is coming in February. Your family will be able to redeem Boxtops for Education when you attend the Carnival.

Teddy Bear Clinic

Clarion Hospital is holding a special event for the Keystone Elementary Kindergarten children on Thursday, February 18th. This event, "Teddy Bear" Clinic, was designed to ease children's anxieties about going to the hospital. The nurses who conduct the clinic create a fun, non-threatening environment to help the kids feel more comfortable around nurses and stethoscopes!
The Teddy Bear Clinic consists of 4 stations. The first station is a children's video about going to the hospital. While visiting station 2, the children will see a puppet show about safety presented by the emergency medical service staff. At station 3, the children will make get well cards for hospital patients & learn how to call for help from the 911 emergency dispatchers. Finally, station 4 will be the actually "Teddy Bear" Clinic. For this station, your child will need to bring a small stuffed bear (or other stuffed animal) - please make sure this item will easily fit inside their backpack. At this station, nurses will help your child take their Bear's heartbeat, blood pressure, height & weight. The goal is to make your child more comfortable with these instruments. The children will also be invited, but not pressured, to have their heartbeats, blood pressures, heights & weights measured, too.
Sooooooom on February 18th, please send your child to school with a teddy bear for the Teddy Bear Clinic. If you have any questions about this special event, please feel free to contact Karen Hazlett @ her office (226 - 1321).

QuietTime Materials

Your child will be bringing his/her QuietTime cloth materials home this weekend (not plastic mats) to be laundered. Please wash the items & return them to school on Tuesday. We repeat this process about once a month, so follow the same procedure each time.

Vocabulary Words to Practice

This is a list of words we have used on our CircleTime Chart throughout the “K” school year. For a fun & challenging activity, make flash cards & practice these words with your child, but please don't add these words to the word card rings. Keep practicing them as well as the flash cards in your child's folder throughout the school year (and Summer), so your child will remember these words when they pop up next year in 1st Grade! :)

WORDS WE’VE "LEARNED" IN K1

a - and - Art - August - Boys - cloudy - cold - Computer - days - December -

foggy - Friday - go - good - Girls - Gym - Hello - Helper - Hi - hot - is - it - kids - Library

- listen - look - Monday - Morning - Mrs. Finotti - Music - November - October - Our - rainy - September - Special - sunny - the - Thursday - to - today - Tuesday - we - weather - Wednesday - windy - 2009 & 2010

January

We are off to a great start since coming back from the long, long Christmas vacation! Our second grading period ends on the 20th with report cards following on the 27st. We are almost halfway through our Kindergarten school year!!! The K1 Kids "lost" their yellow cards last week - be sure to ask your child what this means.

We will also be starting a new incentive program soon at the begnning of the 2nd semester. Each day, your child will earn a "ticket" if he/she doesn't flip any cards. At the end of the day (or the next morning -time permitting), we'll draw 1 ticket & the winner picks something special to do for the next day. I won't be telling them about this program until 1/22, but anytime after that you can ask your child to tell you about the special "things"!!

Also, coming up in February, we'll be starting a 10 week program titled "2 Good 4 Drugs" presented by the Clarion County Drug & Alcohol Administration. Additionally, in early February, we'll celebrate our 100th Day of School ............. more info about these activities will follow.

Finally, academic skill areas to focus attention on at home for the upcoming 3rd grading period include: reciting the full names (first, middle, & last), saying the alphabet in sequence as well as their phone number, counting outloud to 50, identifing ordinal numbers first to fifth place, & visually recognizing numbers 0 - 20, naming ABC letters & sounds taught to date (Aa, Nn, Dd, Ss, Mm, Ii, Tt, Cc, Oo, Ff, Rr, Pp, Ll, & Uu upper/lower case) as well as all the colored sight word cards (the - a - my - that - and - I - is - said - & the following words not yet on their rings..... we - are - you - have) attached to your child's folder. Please continue reading the take-home books over & over & over!! I ask the children to read them 3 times to someone at home, but it shouldn't end there. If they struggle with reading, they need more practice & should read their book more than just 3 times. I strongly suggest you save the books & read over a couple of them each evening to help your child review what they know. Be sure to "track" each word with a finger & remember.......... practice makes perfect!!!

Motor skills (Large & Small) to practice include: walking on a balance beam, hopping, galloping, & bounce/catch a ball 5 times. zipping, buttoning & more improved coloring & cutting skills.

Lastly, remember the upcoming Book Fair from 1/20 - 27 & the scheduled Act 80 Day on 1/18 - NO SCHOOL for kids on that day.

Storynory

Thanks again to Mrs. Wit for finding....... Storynory.
Storynory is a collection of FREE audio books for kids. There is a mixture of new stories, fairy tales, and specially adapted myths and histories. Each week, since November 2005, a new audio story has come out. Search stories by newest additions, original stories, fairy tales, classic authors, educational, or junior stories. The stories can be subscribed to as a podcast in iTunes, through their iPhone/iPod touch app, via email, or RSS feed. Story Nory also offers the text to accompany the audio so that kids can read along. Check out: http://storynory.com/

Pat Yourselves On the Back

Now here's something to get excited about.................
every student in K1 returned their Library book today!!! Yippee Skippy, not one person forgot their book @ home. I can't even remember the last time we had a perfect "return" day. I'm pretty sure we just may have made Mrs. Colantonio's day! :)
Parent's please note this on your calendars - due to the Act 80 Day on January 18th, our Library visits on Day 4 will now move to Wednesday afternoons unless we miss a day of school due to bad weather or a scheduled day off.

Happy New Year

Best Wishes for a great 2010!! Now that our Christmas Break has ended & school is back in session, you may be hearing......... Mrs. Finotti is missing. I didn't tell the children, but just before Christmas break I had surgery on my left hand. I spent my vacation sporting stitches, a cast, & trying to do everything one-handed. Ugh - that's not so much fun!!!
Yesterday, the stitches came out & the cast is no more, but for another month or so I'll be stuck wearing a brace of sorts on my left hand. I'm looking forward to returning to school on Monday & can't wait to see my kiddos once again!
I would like to extend a big thanks to Ms. Jaime Weeter for all the work she's done during my absence; I truly appreciate knowing I left my students in capable hands.