Tuesday, December 17, 2013

Week of Dec. 16th

Merry Christmas parents,
    This will be short since I know you all have a lot to do.  Your kids will have 2 more assignments due before Christmas.  One of them is the final draft of their Book Review (due Wed.).  The other one is a letter to Santa that I have instructed them NOT to show you until it is completed.  Their rough draft is due tomorrow.  I will check it and then they should be able to get a final draft done by Friday.  Everything else will be done in class.  If they have Redos to turn in I need them by Friday.

Christmas Party
This Friday @ 2pm
(Also don't forget casual for cause on Friday.  Bring $1 to support CCLSU

Science
Please check out our science page to see what we've been up to.

Thank you for all of your help and support this semester.  I hope you all  have a very Merry Christmas with your families!
Love,
Miss Besel





Sunday, December 8, 2013

Week of Dec. 9th

         Snow in Missouri is a new experience for me and I must say that starting off with a snow day was not what I expected.  Hopefully you all got to enjoy some required time inside with your kiddos on Friday.  I'm trying to get a little jump start on the week here with an early blog post.

Tomorrow we will catch up from Friday on:
Memory
Spelling
Santa's Workshop

Thanksgiving Projects
The video links for all the projects will be up on the Social Studies page.

Handwriting
My goal is to have all the kids writing their homework in cursive at the start of 3rd quarter.  This means that we are skipping a few pages in their books so we can review capital letters.  If you have the chance to write things in cursive at home, please do.  This might help them panic a bit less when they have to do everything in cursive.

Advent
Service at Concordia at 7pm on Mon. 12/16 (Please have your child seated with me in our class section 5-10 minutes early.)

Book It!!
I sent home the December calendar last week.  I had about 10 kids earn their pizza certificate for November.  Remember they need to read at least 20 min. a night 5 days out of each week.

Kirk Care
We need to have all the donated items for Kirk Care by this Wed. 12/11.  If our campus reaches 1,000 items by Wednesday the kids will earn a casual day for Fri. 12/20.

       I'm sure that I am probably missing something in this blog post because it's Christmas time and there is always so much.  Don't worry though, I will put things up as soon as I find out about them.  In the meantime, enjoy you're last 2 weeks of school and crazy schedules before Christmas gets here.
       I've been talking with the kids about how Advent is the time to prepare for Jesus.  It sometimes seems that there is so much shopping, cooking, giving, driving, whining, and fussing going on that we can forget to (or sometimes not even have time to) look at Jesus.  I am guilty of it too.  Fortunately for you and me, your kiddos are great at remembering.  After a crazy day at school we always pray.  There are days when I am in a rush and tempted to say the Lord's Prayer myself to speed them along.  Of course they all HATE when they don't get to pray out loud, so I give in and let us be late.  It's in those moments that someone, without fail, prays "Dear Jesus, thank you for dying for all of us," or "Thanks for my teacher and mom and dad," or "Thanks for a good day and please help us have a good night too with our families."  These are such simple things for them to be saying and yet I didn't want to take the time to let them say it.  So...if you took the time to read all of this, I challenge you to listen, read, talk to, and pray with your kids this Christmas.  They will mess up and a lot of times be the cause of all your crazy days.  But they will also be the ones that God uses to help you see HIM day in and day out.  God's grace and love just pour out of them.  This is a reflection of His Christmas gift, a baby sent to love the world, die for it, and then save it.  So simple and cute, yet used in such a gigantic way. Taking the time to focus on this part of Christmas is very hard. However, when you get the chance to, it makes that batch of cookies seem so unimportant compared to reading the Christmas story one more time with your kid (even though they know it by heart).  Happy Advent!


Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Week of Dec. 2nd

Hi Parents,
I apologize that this is so late this week.  I don't know how Monday and Tuesday came and went and it's already Wednesday.  Only 2.5 weeks left till Christmas...holy cow that was fast!  I am trying to keep up with the new things you learn at a school for each season.  This is what I know about Christmas so far:

Santa's Workshop
Our class is signed up to go shop on Friday morning (12/6)
I think somehow we missed getting the envelopes for you to send money in so...
      If you don't have an official one, just mark clearly on the outside of a plain envelope how much your child       should spend on each family member.

Advent Service
The all school Advent service will be Monday 12/16 at 7pm.  Please have your child seated in our class section about 10 minutes prior to the beginning of the service.  (They have been practicing songs with Mrs. Killian in music class.)

Teacher Bake Sale
There is a bake sale after the Advent Service full of yummy things made by the teachers.  The money raised helps the teachers fund their trip to the national LEA conference.

Wednesday Pick-UP
Inside pick up during Advent

Kirk Care
CCLS is participating in Kirk Care again this year.  We will be collecting non-perishable food items and personal toiletry items until Wed. 12/11.  If our campus collects 1,000 items the kids will get a casual day on Fri. 12/20.

Our class will be in charge of counting the items for the whole school and updating the graph each day.

Raging Readers
Due back to me by this Friday.