Yummmm

We recently read A Walk in the Desert and learned about life in the desert. Here is a picture of us trying Prickly Pear Fruit candy from cactus fruit. As you can see, we had mixed feelings regarding the taste of the candy. Shayne's face is priceless. New experiences are the best. I love moments like these! :)

Just a Reminder...

I just wanted to remind you about our readers theatre production of The Strongest One tomorrow afternoon. Lunch is at 11:40. We would love for you to join us for lunch if you are available. The show will follow lunch at 12:20. The kids and I are very eager to see you in our classroom tomorrow! Have a great day!

More Guests...

Above is a picture of my mom and Anah's mom reading to our class. We love having visitors read during storytime. Let me know if you or someone special would like to read a book to our class. We certainly appreciate family and friends taking the time to do so! :) 

Phonics Phones to the Rescue

These are our new, beautiful, and unique only to our class, Phonics Phones. They were made by two parent/grandparent volunteers. Christie's grandfather and Gavin's dad took the time to construct these handy reading tools. They are AWESOME!!!! Below, you will see the kids using them for the first time. As the students whisper read into the phone, they can clearly hear their reading voices. They loved hearing themselves read aloud. Eventually, each student will have two... one for home and one for school.

Did you see the colors? The boys got camo Phonics Phones, and the girls got pink zebra ones. I can't brag on our sweet volunteers enough! We are so lucky to have them as a part of our learning community!

 Above: Caliey and Michael

 Gavin... His daddy was one of our volunteers! Gavin's dad made the CAMO Phonics Phones!

Christie: Her grandfather was our other volunteer. He was responsible for the ZEBRA striped Phonics Phones!

Wax Museum

Each year, the Portland High School sends some talented students our way to perform a wax museum. We watched and waited as each of these interesting characters came to life. What a great treat!

Fab Friday

We had a fabulous guest today. His name is Mr. Ron, and he is our school's head custodian. We invited him to read The Custodian from the Black Lagoon on our very first Fabulous Friday. After working hard, taking tests this morning, Mr. Ron's story was a much needed reward. We sure do appreciate everything he does for our school... and are so thankful he isn't like the custodian from the Black Lagoon. :) 

Fluency Folders

This is a video from last school year. It's a little goofy, but gives you the idea behind how the Fluency Folders work.

 Basically, you will set the timer to count up for the Fry Instant Word List. Record how long it takes your child to read all 100 words. Then you will set the timer for one minute as your child reads the assigned Fluency Passage. This time the counter will count down. He or she will read for one minute, three separate times, trying to improve with fluency and words read per minute each time.

I hope this video is helpful. As always, please let me know if you need ANYTHING. I don't mind sitting down with you to explain the Fluency Folders in greater detail, if they still seem a bit confusing. I hope that you will see what our parents began seeing last year in regards to their child's reading fluency. It made a TREMENDOUS difference. If your child wants extra practice, please encourage it... the more, the better! Remember to make the Fluency Folder fun by turning it into a game/competition. Encourage your child to "beat" his or her previous times! Good luck and thanks for all you do at home to build on what we are learning and practicing each day at school! You're support and encouragement is valued greatly. :)

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"Owl" About Me Sacks

Today, I learned lots of interesting things about each of my students. I learned about their hobbies, interests, and favorites, such as foods, colors, and sports. The "Owl" About Me Sacks were a great tool for learning more about these sweet kiddos! They did an awesome job speaking in front of the class as well. I was quite impressed.

I found out that Gavin is an Alabama fan. Bless his heart. He will learn one day. Go Vols!

I learned that Tarah loves Barbies. Here, she is holding a sweet picture of her family.

Anah shared her makeup and hair brushes. She talked with such enthusiasm!

Nathan helps his dad work on cars. He has his own drill. Pretty cool, huh?

Thanks for sharing guys!

First Day

Our first day was busy, busy, busy. We read First Day Jitters and talked a lot about our school rule. We visited Art and took a few pictures outside. Our day was mostly spent going over classroom procedures and rules. We will discuss them again tomorrow, so that expectations are clear. I hope everyone enjoyed their first day back to school as much as I did!

Welcome Back Scholars!

Hello everyone! It was very nice meeting all of you during registration. I can already tell that I am going to have a wonderful group of kids and parents to work with this year, and I'm thrilled. In fact, I've never been so eager to get a school year started as I am now. I guess that happens when school is delayed, right?

I hope you will check our class blog often for updates and pictures of what's going on in our classroom. If you would like to enter your email address (somewhere on the right side of this page) you will automatically receive an email when updates and pictures are posted. It's pretty convenient!

I guess for now, I'll post some pictures from my summer vacation. I am patiently waiting for school to begin!  Enjoy those last few days of summer. -Mrs. Hester

On my summer vacation, my family went to Chattanooga and visited Rock City. It was our first time there, and we absolutely LOVED it! Will rock climbed, Henry watched for deer, and Eric and I enjoyed the scenery. Rock City in Chattanooga was a great start to our summer vacation!

Will, my seven year old found a new love... LEGOS! He had gotten some for Christmas, but I stuffed them way up high in his closet until I thought he was good and ready for the challenge of putting them together. Well, HE decided that HE was ready when he received MORE Legos for his birthday, in June.This prompted a shopping spree for Legos funded by his Tooth Fairy money. So basically all summer, Will worked on Legos, Legos, and more Legos. He calls it an addiction. I agree, and it's quite an expensive one too! He will need to lose about seven more teeth to continue funding it. Bless his heart! 

My boys and I spent a LOT of time with our "summer buddies" AKA the second grade teachers and their kids/grandkids. We scheduled several little trips for the summer. In the picture below, we are at Lost River Cave in Bowling Green, Kentucky. We also went to the flea market, Russel Simms Water Park, Chaney's Dairy Barn, and many many pool days at Mrs. Black's house. Can I say FUN? It sure was... tons of it. We had a blast spending quality time with our "summer buddies"!

Fortunately, I also spent some much needed time with family. Below is a picture of my cousin Lauren and her sweet baby John Erik. While I've been missing my Dad and brother Ben (working the pipeline out of state) I am thankful for the extra time spent with other family members. We had lots of yummy family cookouts and get togethers.

This summer was also spent wrapping up my last few classes for my Masters in Education. My cohort finished strong after a long, hard, and rewarding thirteen months together. We graduated in Jackson, TN in late July at a church near Union University's quiet campus. Somehow, I cut off a few girls from my picture, but you can see that we all were very close and loved one another. While I'll miss seeing these girls every Saturday, bright and early for class, I sure will enjoy sipping coffee on my front porch while watching my rowdy boys run and play, knowing that my Saturdays are mine once again. Ahhhhh, what a great feeling! Now, it's time to bring what I learned from this amazing experience back to my classroom, and I can't wait for that!!!!

Strawberry Festival

Wiseman's float for the Strawberry Parade was a huge success. With the help of MANY teachers and parents, we were able to pull it off! All of the runners enjoyed waving at friends and family members watching from the streets in Portland. Hopefully, next year we can do it all over again.

Butterfly Release

After watching our caterpillars grow and change, it was time to release our beautiful butterflies into the world. We enjoyed watching and learning from these guys! Aren't they beautiful?

Rockin' the TCAP

We rocked the TCAP for four days. Our brains are tired, but only because we used them soooo much taking these tests. I couldn't be more proud of these kids. Each day after the tests, we ate "brain food" and danced and sang the YMCA... only we changed the "YMCA" to "TCAP". Here is a picture of our new moves.

Nugget Party

Zack and his dad threw our class a chicken nugget party! YUMMMMM! We had nuggets, fries, dipping sauce, and Capri Suns. It doesn't get any better than that! Thanks guys for the awesome party... We loved it!

Field Trip

The second grade field trip was amazing! Everyone was on their very best behavior, which made me one proud teacher, and we learned so many things that apply to the second grade curriculum. We are so thankful for the opportunity to take field trips like this one. It really makes learning fun!

*Parents, let me know if you would like me to email you a picture of your child spraying the water hose at the fire station. I got a picture of everyone, but unfortunately can't post all of them, due to unlimited space. I'd be glad to send one your way!

 

Our Easter party was a lot of fun! We made our own icing and decorated cookies to eat. It looks like Blaine and Kailee like a little cookie with their icing. (Haha!) Thank you parents for helping out with the stations and egg hunt. You were a huge help!

TCAP Pep Rally

The second and third grade teachers "rocked" the TCAP pep rally with our cheer and pom routine. I'm the one acting silly in the middle with the pom poms. It put me back into my old cheerleading days and was a lot of fun! We are hoping to "rock the test" ... whenever it gets here! 

Update

Parents,

You should expect a note coming home soon about our community wide spring carnival. Each elementary school is getting together to offer one huge, amazing carnival, and it's going to be located right here at J.W. Wiseman. The carnival is scheduled for Saturday, May 5 from 10:00-4:00. Mark your calendars now! This should be the event of the year.

Our grade will put together a "beach" themed basket. We will be accepting donations anytime between now and May 5. All the proceeds of the basket will help your child and our school. Thank you ahead of time for your donations to help make the carnival a success. We couldn't do it without you.

Also, if any of you parents are available to work the face painting station at the spring carnival, we would certainly appreciate it. You can just jot me a note in your child's planner. Let me know what time would work with your schedule that day, and I'll sign you up!

Your support means everything to us here at Wiseman. I am one lucky teacher to have such great parents, always willing to help out. Thanks for everything you've done this school year to make it memorable and enjoyable for my students and me!

Check out the dates to the right for other events happening in the month of May. We are hoping to take the TCAP next week. We are still waiting on materials at this time. We will DIBELS test on Monday, and hopefully begin TCAP on Tuesday. I'll keep you posted. Have a great rest of the week!

Mrs. Hester

Dr. Seuss Activities

 Mrs. Brown, our Title 1 teacher read to our class this morning and made Oobleck goo for us to all play with in class. It sure was slimy!

 Then, we partner read with kindergarteners in Mrs. Anderson's classroom. There were some great readers in her classroom. We were quit impressed!

We also had visitors read to our room. Aubree P. and Alex, both former students of mine, came to read their favorite Dr. Seuss book. They did a great job!

Even though our Dr. Seuss day has been cut short due to weather, it's been cram packed full of fun and exciting events. Who knew reading could be this fun?