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Junior Kindergarten Fairy Tales
During the month of February, the JuniorKindergarten was very busy discussing variousFairy Tales and Nursery Rhymes. The childrenwere given the opportunity tobake, graph, compare, and createprojects surrounding the variousfairy tales and nursery rhymesthat we were reading anddiscussing. Please take the timeto review and recite the nurseryrhymes and retell the fairy talesthey have learned.In addition, two new centers were introducedin our classroom. Our Dramatic Play Area has
been turned into a doctor’s office, where the
children are enjoying role playing the doctor,the nurse, and the patient. We have also createda classroom Post Office. Look for letters beingsent home, as your child will be visiting our postoffice to mail letters to family and friends!The month of March finds us starting a newunit about the Five Senses. We will be exploringall five senses, starting with sight and hearing,and then moving into tasting, touching andsmelling. Fe
el free during your child’s show
-and-tell days to bring things that deal with oneof our five senses. We will be conducting avariety of science experiments, where childrenwill have the opportunity to observe anddiscover how they use their senses and how onesense is dependant on the other.Ms. Yiota, Ms. Alex, and Ms. KorinnaJunior Kindergarten Teachers
Kindergarteners Cooking
As we give out a weekly newsletter, wethought it valuable to enrich parents on thevalidity of cooking in our curriculum. Enjoy thearticle:Measure, Pour, Mix, and Create!
Children’s literature lends itself to
fabulous opportunities for incorporatingcooking in the classroom. There are so manytitles that lend themselves to thematic units aswell as phonetic activities.The cooking Center is very easy to set-up.You need to have access to an oven, or evenbetter, have one in your classroom.The children can benefit even more if theyexperience what transpires during cookingtime. Some of the supplies found at this centerinclude pots, pans, utensils, and measuringcups.At the cooking center, children exploreconcepts in math, science, reading andwriting.Emergent reading skills are practiced byreading through recipes. Children practicereading by using step by step recipe cardswhile they are also learning vocabulary words.Fine motor skills are exercised by pouring,chopping and peeling. They learn aboutnutrition, hygiene and where products comefrom. They observe scientific changes asliquids become solids. Students are then
encouraged to “write” (from scribble to
random lettering to inventive spelling)according to their developmental level, whatthey learned at this center. Math skills arepracticed as they count, learn aboutfractions, and create andinterpret graphs.Children are encouraged tobe risk-takers and try newfoods they may have originally avoided eatingby appearance. The ever-loved Dr. Seussstory Green Eggs and Ham was read to thechildren before they ventured in trying theirown green eggs! Students helped cook greeneggs and then were encouraged to try thisstrange-looking version of scrambled eggs
(with green food coloring)…Some even asked
for seconds!Another very popular old tale was StoneSoup. Children learned where there is a will,there is a way. A delicious soup was createdby adding simple ingredients. Childrenwashed, peeled and chopped the vegetables.The final product was a delicious vegetablesoup. There are various versions of this storyand if you read more than one, children cancompare and contrast.Finally, incorporating cooking in theclassroom promotes creativity andindependence.
 
2Ms. Cathy, Ms. Anna and Ms. LaceyKindergarten Teachers
First Grade Special Rules
Not only is our grade cool, but we follow ourvery special rules. Look for them in this song
and you will see just how we expect to be…
Our School Rules!(Adapted from the first verse of Woody
Guthrie’s This Land is Your Land)
 This school is your school, thisschool is my school
From Mrs. Kou’s room, to Ms.Birbil’s room,
From the North-South playgrounds to the Rain-bow ce-enterThis school was made for you and me!This school is your school, this school is myschool
Let’s be Responsible, let’s be Respect
-ful
Let’s Co
-operate to keep us a-all SafeThis school was made for you and me!This school is your school, this school is myschoolSing with us
– 
and
– 
you will know the rulesThat will keep us working, happily in har-mon-yThis school was made for you and me!Ms. Kou, Ms.Birbil, Ms. LamprouFirst Grade Teachers
Healthy Habits in Second Grade
Throughout our unit of study about Nutritionand Healthy Habits, second graders participatedin a number of activities to helpunderstand what is needed forgood health and wellness.Second graders went toSklavenitis Supermarket to seehow they provide choices fornutritious meals with dairy products,meats, grains, fruit and vegetables from Greeceand other parts of the world.At school our researchers applied data collectedabout various foods to create life size models of nutritious meals for their Nutrition Exhibition.As a culminating activity, the second gradersin Mantahodapolis shared a musicaldramatization to show what they had learnedabout making healthy food choices.We had the pleasure of working with IBTheatre Arts students, Teddy Baos and PetrosAngelou, who directed and motivated secondgraders to perform!Children learn in many ways. This unit of study offered students the opportunity to showwhat they had learned through songs,movement, designing, writing, speaking aswell as planning, and working closely withclassmates to accomplish various tasks. Westrive to help each other be well-balanced-toeat right, feel right and have a good time as wework and play with others.Cheers to a healthy mind, body and soul!OutsideSklavenitiswith storemanager, Mr.Markou!Ms. Hodapp and Ms. MantarakisSecond Grade Teachers
Third Graders Travelling to Space
Greetings from third grade! We have beenvery busy lately. In Science, students havebeen learning about Space with a focus on theSun, Earth and Moon. Students have beenconducting explorations, reading andresearching to learn more as we have exploredthe unit of study. Students alsocreated projects about a space topic of theirchoice. Projects were on display in the atrium,hopefully everyone had a chance tocheck out their beautiful creations andsee all of their hard work. Studentsalso went on a field trip to theplanetarium to learn more about space.We are working on writing research
 
3reports also regarding space. Students havebeen learning research skills using books,internet and encyclopedias. They haveresearched a topic relating to space and havewritten papers on their chosen topic.
In addition to studying Charlotte’s Web, we
have started literature circles comprised of groups mixed with students from both classes.In literature circles, students read a variety of novels as a group and discuss different elementsof their book.Looking ahead we will be starting ourinventions unit and also studying biographies aswell. Please mark your calendars for the Thirdgrade Bake Sale coming up on Friday, April 8,2011.Mr. Pilleris and Ms. ErnstThird Grade Teachers
Experiments in Fourth Grade
The clickety-clank of our Simple MachineUnit kept the Fourth graders excited andinvolved in a number of opportunities for hands-on learning and group work. The classes wereengaged in a number of experiments including:lifting ten dictionaries with a finger, shooting acatapult using their body force and a classroomobject, measuring force with a spring scale,experimenting with gears and a number of otherfun activities.Additionally, the Fourth graderssaw how Math and Science areintegrated as we learned and usedthe metric system and they didexercises in order to find the meanand graphing data. By performing theexperiment,
“The Marbelous Marbles” we
incorporated all these skills including groupwork and cooperation among our students.Furthermore, this exciting unit will concludewith our Fourth graders inventing their owndevice using a simple machine which willpresent and try to sell them using their charmand persuasive abilities. We are excited to seewhose machine will persuade the most people towant to buy it. Students learned a lot aboutsimple machines in this Unit and proved onceagain that they are talented and creative.In Writing, students have been consistentlypracticing their craft as writers. They havebeen working on summary writing, book reports, personal responses, poetry, timelines,creative writing and persuasive writing. Wehave continued working on the writing processof brainstorming, mapping, outlining andediting. Our students are constantly using theWriting Center and improving theirgrammatical structure, vocabulary, detailedwriting and expanding their thoughts.Both classes enjoyed their classroom readingand activities that related to the SimpleMachines. Students in Ms.
Papathanasiou’sclass focused on the “Titanic” and
informational books and Ms.
Soteres’ class
focused on Science Fiction with a short story
called “Iron Giant”.
In Social Studies, we have takenan in depth look at Map Skills.More specifically they havestudied the compass rose, scale,key, longitude and latitude using anatlas and globe. We will continue to studymap skills throughout the rest of the year.In Math, long division has been a major focus.At this point we have extended to fractionsand will continue to move along in order tocover all concepts. At home, please continuereviewing the basic multiplication facts asmany of our students have not gained thespeed they need to perform at their best.The next Unit will be Rainforest where ourmajor focus will be the ecosystem, endangeredspecies, plants and environmental awareness .This unit is always of high interest to studentsas it has a direct relationship to their ownbeings and the environment.Lastly, we want to thank all our parents andespecially our room mothers who have shownsuch devotion and dedication to our classthrough parties, communication and our verysuccessful bake sale! You have proven that asuccessful student means a team of parentsand teachers working together.Mrs. Papathanasiou and Mrs. SoteresFourth Grade Teachers
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