Seton Catholic Elementary and Middle School

Please read October’s S.O.S.
Place your copy of the flyer in your S.O.S. binder.
Sign off that you’ve read it and return the white form in the envelope.

Reminders

Check assignment notebooks daily
Discuss daily homework
Sign all tests and return in envelope

Reading

We will be taking a break from our readers to enjoy Little House and the Big Woods as a literature enrichment book. This book helps us to understand our October theme- Pioneer Life. We incorporate our reading skills plus many hands on activities throughout this book.

Pioneer Project

To add to our unit, the students are asked to complete a project depicting the life of a pioneer. There is a list of ideas attached to this newsletter, but your child can also come up with his/her own idea as well. This will need to be completed at home and turned in by Wednesday, October 31^st. This project will receive credit/no credit. Please help your child on this project. My goal is for this to be a fun, family project.

Pioneer Village

Wednesday, October 10^th will be our “Pioneer Day”. We will be going to the Pioneer Village to spend the day as a pioneer. The students will dress up in pioneer costumes for this day. Please have your child’s costume ready by Tuesday, October 9.

We will need drivers for this field trip. Please let me know if you are able to drive. You must have a valid driver’s license; a driver’s form filled out, and be cleared through the office before the day of the trip. A permission slip will be sent home soon and should be returned as soon as possible.

Reading Incentive Programs

Book-It: October begins this wonderful program sponsored by Pizza Hut. Attached is the reading log for October. This should be kept in a visible and easy to find location. The requirement for Reading and to earn a Book-It certificate is 150 pages per month. Please start recording what your child reads in October on the attached form. The form must be turned in on the last school day of every month. Consequently, the October form is due on Wednesday, October 31.

The Happy Reader Club: The same 150 pages count for this program as well sponsored by Happy Joes. You will receive a free Little Joe Pizza through this program!

McDonalds: The forms and requirements are attached.

Book Report

Every month the children will be required to do a book report on one of the Chapter Books they have read during the month. The October book report is attached. Please place it in the SOS Binder or a safe place until the end of the month. When your child has read a chapter book this month, have him/her do the book report activity. The book report is also due on Wednesday, October 31.

Sharing Our Faith

Our 4^th grade Mass is this Thursday, October 4, at 8:30. You are all invited to celebrate the Eucharist with us on this day. Please continue to remind your child to bring 25 cents a week for Jocenique and pop tabs for Katie- Thanks.

Late Slips

It is important to remember that study habits for the rest of your child’s schooling are being established here in the fourth grade. I am asking for your help and support in checking with your child for completed homework that is ready to be turned in on time. Ultimately, the responsibility lies with your child, but your help is necessary to establish this habit as part of your fourth grader’s everyday life. To help build this good habit, continue to sign the assignment notebook nightly for the rest of the first quarter. Let’s get every student off to a good start. Please remember Late Slips affect your student’s grades.

More importantly, it is crucial that your child begin to learn good study habits. If a test is scheduled, the students need to form the habit of bringing home all study materials, including the textbook, to review with a parent. The study habits that are forming now are the basis for your child’s approach to homework and tests in junior high and beyond. We need to get them off to a good start.

Test Schedule- I try to give the anticipated schedule of tests on Mondays in the assignment notebook. Because we have things that come up during the week, we may not get as far as I would like and the test will be postponed. Be aware that these are just projected dates so that your child can be aware that a test will be coming soon.

Study Guides- We make study guides for Science and Social Studies in our spirals shortly before the test. In Religion, we highlight the important information to study in our books. In English we have a review assignment to complete and study before the test. The Spelling words can be found on the website if your child forgets to bring his/her words home. Please use these to help your child prepare for the upcoming tests.

Book Orders

One way to continue to supply your child with inexpensive chapter books is to order from school book clubs. This also allows the class to receive free books and other things. The October book forms are attached. When ordering, please send a check(s) for the amount of each book order you are participating in. The clubs will only take checks-thank you. The orders are due by Thursday, October 4.

Homework

Please remember our policy is to try to give only one hour of homework each night. If the homework seems to be taking longer than one hour, please let me know. This helps me to monitor homework and adjust it when necessary. Please be sure that your child puts his/her class number on every paper he/she completes. Starting in the second quarter, if he/she does not have the correct heading, points will be taken off and this includes his/her number.

Halloween

As fourth graders we do not dress up for Halloween. We are the audience for the Halloween parade for the younger students. Our opportunity to dress up is Oct. 10 for “Pioneer Day” at the Pioneer Village. The Halloween Party will be on October 31 following the parade. The parade begins at 1:30. Our head-room parent is Mrs. Noe. If you would like to help with this party, please contact her. You will need to be cleared through the office to participate with the class on that day.

Map Quizzes

We will begin our map quizzes with the Middle West. We will fill out our map study guide this week. For the next three Fridays the students will take a map quiz where they’ll need to fill in the state, capital, and abbreviation. The first map quiz will be given next Friday. They will have three opportunities to receive a 100 percent. When they receive a 100 percent, they will not need to continue to take the test. Each time we add a new region we will test over the all the regions to that point. This is part of the Social Studies grade. Please help your child study for these quizzes.

Spelling

Last week I sent home a Spelling assignment sheet that we will use throughout the school year. My intention in starting this new program is to enhance the retention of our spelling words. Each student should do the assignments in his/her spiral unless it is done on the computer. Even your note to say that you studied with your student goes in the Spelling spiral. These assignments are due each week on Friday.

Thank you

Thank you for all of your support and help this year. Thank you to each family who has so graciously filled our wish list of goodies from Parent Night. Everything sent is greatly appreciated.

Thanks for all you do for us!

Happy Halloween-

Ms. Vander Vennet