Fantastic Friday Frivolity!

Don’t forget to wear your house shirts 5KP and let’s get those points moving on up for the PUMA team please!

Tomorrow at 1.30 our students get to enjoy the Pre- K – 4th Grade Winter Concert (parents of those students see the show at 10.30 am on the same day and our Winter Band and Strings Concert is next Tuesday at 1.30 pm.

Most students have their personal narrative in the form of a digital photo story on their blogs now so ask your child to show you what they have come up with and have a look at it with them, the whole process was a lot of fun for everyone. I think for some, the digital part got in the way of them further developing their narrative, but for most, the concept was still worthwhile.

Thank You parents for the wonderful response to the Giving Tree Program this year. We were able to donate 11 full bags and contribute over 1100 rmb, well done 5KP. It will be a wonderful experience for Grace and Roxanne, our Eagle Leaders, to be able to hand these bags over in person on December 10th, my 6 students last year that enjoyed the experience found it extremely rewarding.

Students, your homework over the weekend is to write a couple of paragraphs introducing yourself to your American Blogging Buddies…. yes, finally, we are ready and Mrs Chiavarini’s class have all just been given their blog accounts so we are good to go and your buddy is expecting to hear from you over the weekend. Due to the fact Mrs C has 22 students in her class, 14 girls and 8 boys, we have a few of our students ‘doubling up’ and also a couple of our boys have been paired with a girl in the States, so I think it is going to work really well.

These are the things I want you to introduce to your buddy in paragraph form in the comment section on their blog.

1. Your name, age, date of birth, physical appearance, cultural background, you know, the basics, you’ve done it before!

2. Some information about what a day at SAS is like, the schedule, your subjects, your favorite things to do at school and with your friends.

3. General information about what it is like to live overseas, how long have you been o/s, whereabouts, why, who with, for how long etc.

That is enough to start with, however students, be clear, any disrespectful language, or inappropriate talk will see you taken out of this buddy program very quickly. You never get a second chance to make a first impression. The world is watching and your digital footprint leaves a very long trail behind you so making mistakes now could cost you dearly in the future.

Here is the list of who you are partnered with, let me know if you have any trouble getting onto their blog, remember it is early days for these students, you are a few months ahead of them in this field, so be patient and give good advice and encouragement as needed. As yet, they don’t have any posts on their blog, so maybe you could suggest some good things for them to write about, like book or film reviews, adding some links and making a blog roll.

Girls names are in Red, Boys are in Black.

Screen shot 2010-12-02 at 4.01.11 PM
Alex                         Roxanne
Lauren A.
Kevin
Lauren  B.              Patricia
Avery                      Kyra
Anabel                    Kyra

Mitchell                  Mike
Caroline F.            Grace
Jack                        Spencer
Maggie                   Maddie
Matthew                Kevin
Isabella                  Ingrid
Izzy                         Claire
Barrett
Carl Z.
Nick                       Thomas
Brett                       Max
Hannah                 Maddie
Brian                      Carl B.
Andrew                  Jonathan
Heidi                     Hsuan Hsuan
Amy
Calen
Caroline W.           Mrini
Jason                     Xing Chen

Introducing our Boston Buddies!

Hello Parents

It was very exciting last week to approve this comment on my blog:

Hi Kimbra,

My name is Cathy Chiavarini and I am a Grade 5 teacher in Dover, Massachusetts, which is located just west of Boston. I am enjoying exploring your blog!

My students and I are trying blogging for the very first time. We are all very excited about it. I see you’ve already got a lot of connections, but I was wondering if the students in your class might enjoy joining my students in reading and commenting on each other’s blogs? We have a class blog, and each student is just developing their own pages–these are linked to the class blog.

I think we may have some common interests–readers’ and writer’s workshop, we LOVE to read, looks like a similar math curriculum (we use Everyday Math)…and others, I’m sure.

We’d love to have you visit. Here is the link to the class blog http://gr5blogs.edublogs.org/

Look forward to hearing from you.
-Cathy

We certainly do have many shared interests

Our reading and writing units of study

Our Everyday Math program

We both agree that we have had wonderfully talented writers and readers in our class this past school year.

A surprise bonus is that a student in Mrs C’s class, Jake, has parents who are friends with Mrs Cole in 4th grade here. We only found that out after Mrs C sent out an e mail to the parents and Jake’s mom contacted Mrs Cole wondering…’isn’t that the same school you work in?’ What a small world the internet has created!

Today we matched up the students in each class which also went wonderfully as our student numbers and genders matched beautifully without any ‘boy or girl germs’ being transmitted across the globe.

Here is the list of student names from both sides of the world. If you go to Mrs Chiavarini’s blog you will her students listed by initials in the blogroll on the right. Your children have been asked to write to their buddy through their blog by Friday and that is their homework for tonight. Thursday Readers also need to complete their Readers Notebook entry and all students need to return library books for tomorrow as well as bring their goggles etc for swimming in P.E.

Shanghai-Dover Blogging Buddies

Picture 1

If only we had found each other sooner… however there is nothing to stop long-lasting relationships being formed and some of 5KP and Mrs C’s class have already swapped e mails and begun corresponding; there is no stopping them now.

Cathy Chiavarini is a 5th grade teacher at Chickering School in Dover and we welcome her and her students to our SAS online community.

The Chickering School in Dover Massachussets

Today 5KP impressed me yet again with their amazing soccer skills but even more so their sense of fair play, team spirit and determination. I will certainly miss my 20 wonderful 5KP students when the time comes in 4 weeks from now to wish them the best on their middle school journey.

Thank You 5KP