October 28th, 2009

Dear Shorecrest parents,

H1N1 vaccine forms are being sent home today with students from Kindergarten to 12th grade. Early Childhood will receive theirs as soon as I receive them from the Pinellas Health Department. Please review all information carefully. If you would like to have your child vaccinated, you will need to fill out and sign both front (screening form) and back (consent) sides of the form and return it to school by Thursday November 5th, 2009.
The consented forms will be sent back to the Pinellas Health Department and vaccination date (s) will be set. Keep in mind that all students under 9 years of age will need to receive a second dose 30 days apart.
Meanwhile, continue to encourage the basic infection control measures such as proper hand washing with soap and water, the use of alcohol-based hand sanitizer if soap and water is not available, covering cough and sneeze, keeping hands away from face/mouth/nose and getting enough rest and sleep etc.
As always I will keep you updated on any new development. Until next time, remain healthy.

Sincerely,

Marie Confident, RN, BSN
Shorecrest school nurse
727-456-7523

I would like to call your attention to a Math Skill that was introduced recently, called Frames and Arrows. This is an extremely important skill that your child will continue to use over and over again each year. They must be able to read and understand the rule, and how to apply the skill to complete the sequence of numbers. This skill helps your child with their computation skills, as well as working on their number sense. Please read the additional information provided on the Home Links.
Thank-you!

Happy Wednesday! I would like to tell you that our spelling test will be on Thursday this week due to the four-day week for students. Please review the words that I sent home on Tuesday. The students are only going to be asked this week to identify the "th" sound. They will be required to identify whether they hear it at the beginning or the end of a word. I will help them fill in the rest of the letters. Thank-you for all your help with the Reading Folders last week, the students reading yesterday was awesome!

Well everything in first grade is moving right along.
First, I would like to Thank Dr. Carina Rodriguez for donating her time this morning, and doing a fabulous presentation about the functions of our heart.
Next, I want to remind everyone that has not seen our weather video yet, that it is available for you to preview on Ebytes. If you click on Ebytes, lower division, we are first on the page.
Lastly, I have started studying homophones and homonyms with the children. I have asked them to think about this at home, and write down any homophones that they hear, or come across in their reading with their families.
Hint: A homophone are two words that sound exactly the same, but are spelled differently, and mean different things. Example: flour, flower
A homonym is the same sound, spelling, but mean two different things. Example: bat, bat
We talk about these, but I am really looking for the two different spellings, and meanings in homophones.