Grow Your Dreams Newsletter - November 2009

KIPP NYC

Grow Your Dreams! Volume 1, Issue 1

Special points of interest: Dates to remember Thursday, November 5, 2009 End of first quarter.

October 1, 2009

Volume 1 Issue 2 some more community bonding and fun. We look forward to November 2, 2009 shooting baskets, practicing our yoga breathing, designing new foods in cooking, and discovering new pieces of nature to make art projects. We look forward to seeing every one of our families at our next Saturday School. We also want to thank the parents that came out to our first coffee and conversations. We truly grow as a community when we get together to share great ideas. So many wonderful things came out of that chat: the connections between families, applications for library cards to the public library and a search for good afterschool programs for next year. We hope to see many more parents at coffee and conversation on December 4th. Have a wonderful month and as always keep reading with your child every night.

Friday, November 6, 2009 KIPP NYC DAY: School Closed for Kids: Teachers Report. Thursday, November 12, 2009 Parent Teacher Conferences. Saturday, November 14, 2009: Saturday School : All families must attend. Additional family members are welcome. Tuesday, November 17, 2009 KIPP NYC Half Day. 12:00mpm dismissal Friday, November 20, 2009 KIPP AES Family Feast! 2:00-4:00 pm Monday ,November 23, 2009 to Friday November 27, 2009 Thanksgiving Break! NO SCHOOL!

Inside this issue: Principals Message

1

Around The School

1

In Our Classrooms

2

Sprout Outs!

2

Price Point! A message from Ms. Price

3

Be Nice! Work Hard!

3

Teacher Message of the Month!

3

KIPP NYC

Principals Message

Dear Families, This fall has brought us many wonderful moments. The Class of 2026 is implementing their school rules of Be Nice and Work Hard with less and less reminders. They are sprouting each other out for being good teammates. The children are also starting to internalize our chant that this is OUR school and OUR place. It is a wonderful thing to watch children see a child by themselves during recess and offer to play with them, or to watch another child take a risk by writing the morning message for the class. The class of 2026 is truly beginning to grow their dreams. Throughout the day students are learning, overcoming challenges, smiling and laughing. It’s a beautiful thing. Our school community, however, isn’t just our students; it is our families too. We are looking forward to our school community getting together again on November 14th for

Love, Carolyn and Steve

Around The School Repeating The Call ! Around KIPP AES we’ve been Being Nice and Working Hard, as well as growing and showing what we know! Now it’s your turn! Each of our growing classrooms is looking for parent volunteers to come in weekly and help out with classroom administrative duties. It’s a great way to get to see what your child is experiencing during the day and a major way to help out your child's teachers and become more closely integrated into our classrooms. Please, if your interested, or able to lend a little time, speak with your child's teacher and set times and days for service. It would be great if each class had Parent helpers! You could help as little as one hour a week!

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Room Updates! California Golden Bears

“In the schoolhouse, we have the heart of the whole society.” Henry Golden

By the end of October, the UC Berkeley Golden Bears will be completing their 44th day of Kindergarten! Our word bank has grown from 20 words to 36 words, and our love of reading increases by the minute. We have opened up our creative spirits in math by forming geometric shapes with macaroni noodles, pretzel sticks, and cotton balls. As authors and illustrators, we have explored and written about our school and community and realize as KIPPsters we are leaders of tomorrow! As an extension of our community, we celebrated Latino Heritage Month in our classroom by singing songs in Spanish, having bi-lingual read alouds, making Guacamole together, and learning the history of the Tortilla and enjoying it toasted with butter! Together, the Golden Bears are working on having one more addition to the Berkeley classroom: A Beta Fish as our Class Pet.! Each day, the Golden Bears have an opportunity to SPROUT out a classmate on the ways they are Being Nice and Working Hard. By doing so, they get to place a Goldfish cracker in the fishbowl! Once the fishbowl is FULL, we will welcome our class pet with open arms! UConn Huskies In science the UConn Huskies have been learning about animals. Sprout Out to all the families who completed their animal research project and learned some new fun facts about their child’s favorite animal. Keep the great scientific questions coming! Also, as part of our social studies theme on school, community and family jobs, a special Sprout Out to Mr. Beckford and Mr. Ward for joining us in Husky Country to talk about your jobs! Finally, in the spirit of staying healthy, Sprout Out to the families who have sent in delicious, nutritious snacks so far and for those of

you who sent in more hand sanitizer and Clorox wipes! Thank you - these efforts go a long way! Columbia Lions In the Columbia Lions’ den, we have begun our star student of the day routine. Each day a student is picked randomly to be celebrated. The star student wears a smiley badge and gets interviewed for the class book. In math this month we’ve learned arithmetic sentences and began working on number stories and basic problem solving visualizations. We have been turning things up a notch by building on many of our basic arithmetic and literacy skills. Along those lines, we would love it if you all take a look at our “TakeAway Teddy” display in the hallway when you visit for Parent Teacher Conference Night. We have also built on our knowledge of basic shapes by learning to recognize lines of symmetry. In literacy, we have been learning about fantasy fiction, realistic fiction, and nonfiction works. We’ve been working hard in centers to sharpen our skills while having fun acquiring new ones. Soon we will be great readers, especially with all the focus we’ve been putting on blending word segments and practicing sight words. Michigan Wolverines The Wolverines are working hard at blending the sounds of letters together to make words!! We sort words that begin with the same sound and have even begun writing three-letter words like cat, fan, web, and net! In science, we’re learning about how the different seasons affect animals. Do they adapt? Do they hibernate? Do they change colors? In math, we just learned about symmetry, continue to explore the calendar, and count higher and higher every day. Would you

believe that in writing, some of our stories are getting sooooooo long that we’ll soon be writing in booklets instead o f o n si n g l e p i e ce s o f p a per?? Wow! Next up in social studies will be learning all about our special families. It’s an exciting time in the Wolverines classroom!! Music The month of October has brought about many exciting activities for the musicians at KIPP Academy Elementary. We have continued to sing and move in dynamic and creative ways as we learn about rhythm and keeping the beat. November is going to ring in a unit on genre where we will focus on both popular and classical music. By creating our own listening maps, we will begin to understand the concepts of simple melodic and rhythmic notation. With the holiday show fast upon us, we will begin to focus our attention on rehearsing and performance etiquette for the December 21st presentation. Gym Rolls and throws and catches, oh my! In gym, we’ve been using our arms to catch, throw, aim and roll our way to physical education greatness. In the following unit we will be working on striking objects with both short and long handled instruments. Through a series of PowerPoint presentations, we will become familiar with sports such as volleyball, tennis, water polo, baseball and basketball. With our new-found skills in tow, we will begin to play our own versions of these popular sports.

We’re Sprouting Out!  We would like to thank ALL our UC Berkeley Golden Bear Families for their promptness and commitment to our rotating snack schedule. Our Berkeley Bears enjoy all the healthy snacks and 100% juices you send every day. Because of you, our minds are so sharp! Thank you!  Big Sprout out to Ms. Ramos, Ms. Prince, Ms. Cruz and Ms. Sillah for coming up extra big with classroom snacks!

 Big Sprout out to Ms. Watson for her encouraging words and mid day texts ! Sprout out to Ms. Cruz and Ms. Herrera for the great goodie bags !

Volume 1, Issue 1

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Price Point! A message from Ms. Price November is upon us! This means the holidays are approaching, leaves are turning (or have already turned) and yes, it is getting colder! I’m happy to announce that we have finally found our beautiful Texas Orange color in long sleeve t-shirts! We will be selling them at Saturday School on November 14th. We will also sell them every Friday morning (7:15-7:45 AM) and afternoon ( 4:00-4:20 PM) after November 14th. Thanks so much for your patience! Congratulations to those KIPPsters who have Perfect Attendance and No Tardies for the month of October (Oct 1 to Oct 26) Jaison Beckford Franklin Burgos

Arison Cruz Richard Dixon D’Andrew Gilliam Dekai Gray Shadae Green Andrew Guishard Zayenabu Kenneh Aminata Konate David Lora Moussa Sakho Madison-Dakota

Mathew Ramos Edsel Tawiah Jalen Watson Jamir Watson This is a great accomplishment, and we thank you—our families—who work hard to get our kids here on time and every day. We appreciate your effort!!

A special congratulations to the following KIPPsters who have not had any absences or tardies for the entire year: Diana Betances Nicola Burgess Erwin Castillo Hamza Morou

Be Nice! Work Hard! Smile! Hey friends and families, A few parents have asked me about available computer classes for adults in our community and I was able to find the following resource that I am very excited about: “The Office of Adult and Continuing Education, the largest adult education provider in New York State, offers basic education and vocational education classes to adults. Our day, evening and Saturday classes are all tuition-free and taught by certified teachers.” Aside from computer classes they offer GED classes, English as a Second Language and Career and Technical education. The BX center is located at 3450 E. Tremont Ave. This is the only location where you can register, however, there are several different locations in the BX where you can take the actual computer classes. Their phone number is

718-863-4057 and website is: http:// adultednyc.info/LearningCenters/BxALC/ index.html. Please let me know if you have any questions. Mr. Nuñez

Teacher Tip of the Month: Being strong listeners is a huge skill! One way to have our children become better listeners is to talk to our children ALL the time. Tell him/her about an interesting story you read in the newspaper. Describe a conversation you had at work with a friend. When you go shopping tell him/ her all about the shopping trips you used to take with your parents. Get into the habit of narrating everyday chores. If you are in the kitchen together while you are making dinner, for example, you can say, “I need to measure your two cups of water and then add one cup of rice…” Another way is

to play listening games. For example, you can say, “I’m going to give you a mission. I want you to bring me the following items: a hairbrush from your bedroom, slippers from my room, etc. You can also do this in the supermarket or any other store.

“Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself.” John Dewey