Ms. Williams

March 21, 2008

Happy Spring!

This week we read about the tornado in Atlanta, then talked about spring and had several spring activities. We worked on a couple of secret projects, planted seeds, and finished off the week with dyeing eggs and then an Easter Egg hunt this afternoon. (Check bookbags for a real egg!)

Last month we had a cookie survey with Mrs. Sommer's class. The students tasted three kinds of cookie and then made a model of their favorite to graph. Oreo was the favorite by far.

Have a great weekend, and a Happy Easter, everyone!

   

Recycling Counts!

Our class is spearheading a campaign to recycle paper around our school. We started with a lesson on making something new from the old with our homemade paper. Then we set up bags to collect copier paper in the teacher workrooms and our students collect it for the recycling bin. We also collect the aluminum cans for the bin. Check them out! Have a great weekend, everyone!

 

Conference Week

Hi there!

Conference week begins today with early release every day through next Monday, Jan 28. Please remember to fill out your conference response questionaires and put them in the box in the front lobby.

At your conference you will be recieving information on two upcoming events. The first is the Looking Toward the Future conference Sat. Feb 9th at 12:30 pm at Orange Hill Baptist church in Austell. These conferences provide valuable information on post high school opportunities for our students with disabilities. Also included is information on the waiver programs and how to get started.

The Second event is the Spring 2008 Autism workshop. It is going to be on Sat. Feb 23rd, 8:30 am at Kell High school.  If you ar someone you know has a student with autism, this will be a great workshop to attend. They are also providing childcare, if needed.

This week in News 2 You we are reading about Nike's program for recycling old sneakers. Please visit the website as you have time:  http://www.letmeplay.com/reuseashoe  We will parlay this story into a unit on recycling, use our "please recycle" community sign and talk about all the ways we can help in everyday situations to reduce the volume in our landfills. We will also have a couple of projects we can do right here at school to help such as gathering paper from the copy rooms that often ends up in the trash rather than the recycling bin.

Also, please check out the school system's news site at http://cobbcast.cobbk12.org/ Here you will find information on many things going on throughout the county.

I look forward to meeting with parents this week at conferences! Have a great week!

Welcome Back!

I trust everyone is rested and ready to go forward for the second half of the school year!

We will hit the ground running on Tuesday with refreshers in school rules and routines. We will talk about winter, cold weather, what to wear, and community helpers. We will work on some of skills in the context of a football theme with the SuperBowl coming up, and work on finishing up the Georgia Alternate Assessment.

Reminder: Conference week will be coming up January 22-28. Schedules will be going home this week for your 20 minute conference session, but there is flexibility in the schedule, so please don't hesitate to ask if there is a better time for you.

See you all tomorrow!

December Fun

Wow! Where did November go? We were busy working on GAA, fall themes and Nutrition. Our unit on nutrition culminated in a pot of home, er, school-made soup that would make Campbell's envious. The students got to see and hold and clean the veggies and then get them ready to add to the soup. We talked about foods that are good for you and some that are not so good. Everyone had a nice restful break for Thanksgiving and came back ready to talk about, what else: More Holidays!

We have been working on getting our room and hallway decorated, which means lots of paint, glitter and glue! We have a few students who are not really all that excited about getting their hands messy, so this is a good time to practice and give them the opportunity to see that it cleans right up!

This week's News-2-You paper is about a Secret Santa in Kansas City, who gave away over a million dollars in his lifetime a little at a time. We are also working on collating cards for the army hospitals and have sent one shipment of about 80 cards so far. Thanks to everyone for sending them in!

Weekly Update

Hi Everyone!

Well, we had a busy week, in spite of almost everyone in the class being sick in some way or another. Hopefully it's hit now and we can put it behind us! Just keep those tissues and wipes coming!

Our News-2-You paper this week was about the new Airbus A380. You can look at pictures of it online at www.airbus.com  to further synthesize the text with your student. Mrs. A helped us recreate the airbus on a class poster. We finished the unit off this afternoon by making airplaine snacks. All the recipes are being collected into a book to come home at the end of the year.

We also sent letters to the soldiers overseas. Q100 radio is having a campaign to put a letter in the hand of every service person in the field in time for Thanksgiving.  Our class colored flags and turkeys for them. We put our class address, so we'll see if we get any letters back. www.allthehitsq100.com You can access their website and click on "The Bert Show" for more information.

DISCLAIMER: The links provided are for information only and are not endorsed by the Cobb County School district. Anything we access in class is pre-screened by the Teacher. :0)

Thank youto everyone who sent in Teddy bears for Breast concer patients! The school collected quite a few and will be holding the collection over through next week.

OTHER NEWS: In the interest of providing optimal security for our students, the County  is now requiring that we obtain permission to post pictures for each and every posting if the student can be identified. So... in the interest of paperwork reduction, we will probably pick a couple of special events, get the permission and post photos for the out of town grandparents and other relatives. In the meantime, enjoy seeing our activities! 

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Elephants on Parade!

                          We have been working on a unit about an elephant sanctuary in Southern Tennessee. It was featured in our News-2-You paper and we have expanded it into a two week unit. We have read the story, painted elephants, worked on several interactive activities on the site, and explored the sanctuary's home page which includes a live    "elephant cam."      www.elephants.com

Of course as usual the highlight of the week was our cooking activity. We read the recipe and created "elephant ears" from crescent rolls. Recipes will be sent home at the end of the unit, as one student requested it so he can make them at home.

Next week we will continue our unit with books about elephants, some geography on where to find them and elephant math.

I am including a letter this week from our Room mom, Mrs. Richardson, please see below. Thanks everyone, and have a great weekend!

Dear Mrs. William's class,

We will be having holiday centers throughout the year. To make it easier on everyone I'm asking your child to bring in $20.00 by Oct 10^th. Please put it in an envelope and with my name on it (Faith Richardson) and Mrs. Williams will get it to me. This way you will not have to donate any items for the centers throughout the year. I your room parent will take care of this for you. Volunteers are always welcome!

The centers we will have will be Fall Festival centers Oct, Thanksgiving center, Valentine center, Exceptional Children's week, Spring center, and end of year center. There will be only one party this year and that will be the Holiday party in which you may be asked to donate items as well.

As far as Teacher Appreciation week, I will be sending you information on this event. More details on this in February. If you have any questions please let me know.

Thank you,

Faith Richardson

Weekly Update

Hi Parents,

This week we read thew News-2-You story about Sam Simon who started a dog hotel. He trains dogs to work with the hearing impaired. We worked on our basic skills and talked a lot about dogs and dog training. Today we made the recipe from the newspaper "Dipping Dogs." Please see your child's bookbag  for the story and recipe. Enjoy the photos and have a great weekend!

Fun Friday

Mrs. Williams' class enjoyed making homemade icecream today. You can try it at home! The students used the following recipe: 1C.milk, 2T sugar, and vanilla, chocolate or strawberry flavoring. Place the milk mixture in a quart size zip bag and remove as much air as possible. Place the quart bag inside a gallon size bag and fill with ice and salt. Move bag around until the milk mixture freezes. Eat and enjoy! Have a great Holiday weekend, everyone!

 

Happy Birthday, Classmate!

Mrs. Williams' class celebrated a birthday today! Thanks, Mom for brining in the cupcakes. Everyone enjoyed them! Have a great weekend, everyone!