Castlebay Lane Elementary PATH » School fun

First Grade Community Project

jkwan — Fri, 18 May 2012 14:44:29 +0000

For their Social Studies, the first graders have been learning about their community. This includes learning about interdependence and how a community operates. As part of this unit, each student was asked to visit a place in their community and write a summary about what they visited, the people that work there, the type of work they do there and if goods or services are provided.

Students also created a diorama of the place they visited. In class, they shared their project with their classmates and gave a little report of their findings. It was very interesting hearing some of the reports. Their friends asked questions after and were very supportive of the work done (“I think you did a great job on your diorama”).

Community Workers: CBS/KCAL Meteorologist

jkwan — Wed, 09 May 2012 02:46:04 +0000

Meteorologist Evelyn Taft from KCAL9/CBS2 visited the first grade classes to talk about her job as a primetime meteorologist. She gave the students a few pointers about how to look at clouds and the sky to get a hint of what type of weather to expect on a given day.

Community Workers: HazMat Squad

jkwan — Wed, 02 May 2012 04:08:34 +0000

The first grade is learning about community workers and has had several visits from various members from the community to talk to the classes about the work they do and the equipment they use. One student’s dad works for the LAFD Hazardous Materials Squad. He gave a little talk about the work he does and gave the classes a demonstration of the hazardous material suit he has to put on for some of his work.

Spelling Bee – 2nd, 3rd and 4th Grade Finalists

jkwan — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 23:02:58 +0000

Castlebay held the local spelling bee for the second, third and fourth grades a few weeks ago. The pictures below are the finalists for each grade level. Congratulations to all these top spellers!

Second Grade Spelling Bee Finalists

Third Grade Spelling Bee Finalists

Fourth Grade Spelling Bee Finalists (crazy hair day!)

Community workers: firefighter visit

jkwan — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 21:10:05 +0000

The kindergarten class is learning about community workers and during a recent assembly, they had a visit from Firefighter Hale. He’s an uncle of one of the students, and works for the Beverly Hills Fire Department. He reviewed fire safety, including Stop, Drop and Roll, when and how to call 911. He showed the children the tools and equipment that firefighters use to do their jobs. Firefighter Hale put on the 60 pounds of gear a typical firefighter wears during a fire. He demonstrated what a firefighter looks like and sounds like (talking through a mask) during a fire. Following the demonstration, he had a question and answer session. One student asked “are their girl firefighters?” He told them he works with two female engineers. Another student asked if he had a fire dog (no they don’t). Asked how long he has been a firefighter, he said 15 years. They wanted to know if he uses the fire pole when there is a fire and he said they do because it saves time. He enjoyed meeting the kindergarten class and looks forward to coming again for a visit to Castlebay Lane Elementary.

The Learning Rainbow – A Donors Choose Project

jkwan — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 01:53:37 +0000

The Learning Rainbow was Mrs Lingard’s Donors Choose project.

Mrs Lingard: My project covers both Science and Physical Education concepts for my second grade students. At this young age, they need hands-on ways to learn both agility and teamwork. A large parachute to be used during daily Physical Education will allow them to work in cooperative groups while further strengthening their hand eye coordination. Teamwork is a unit we discuss heavily in second grade so these activities will pair nicely with what I am already teaching. Science is an additional area that can be explained using parachute games.

Push and pull forces are hard to understand without feeling the difference in tension for each converse action. The laws of gravity also come into play when a student can physically see how a ball shooting up off the parachute must come down. The students also learn about how their own strength can affect the trajectory of the ball. Kids remember what they learn from doing and this project allows them to learn key concepts while getting some physical activity.

One of her students provided this description:

These pictures shows the class using the new parachute. This is the second time we used the parachute, but the first time we used it with the balls. Mrs. Lingard gives us instructions on what we need to do. We were doing this for P.E. and Mrs.Lingard tries to do P.E. with us everyday.

Big Mama’s and Papa’s Pizzeria – Cook’s WEEK OFF!

jkwan — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 20:39:25 +0000

Cook’s WEEK OFF! Thanks for putting those pots and pans away!!!

Parents, thank you for attending this wonderful fundraiser. We earned $200 and 5 classrooms have earned FREE pizza parties! Big Mamas and Papas has agreed to do this again during the week of May 14, 2012 to May 20th!

All Week Long! Monday 5/14/2012 to Sunday 5/20/2012

Big Mama’s and Papa’s Pizzeria

Zelzah and Chatsworth

(818) 368-1111

The rules are simple:

Order a pizza, leave your name and your room, after 10 pizzas per class are ordered, your class wins a party! Plus the school earns $2 per pizza, or sandwich ordered, and your kitchen doesn’t have to get dirty!

Download: flyer

The results from the last Pizza Party Competition:

room 20 Listening Center

jkwan — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 18:21:23 +0000

Mrs Chang’s first grade class has a new Listening Center, funded by Donors Choose for the project she posted. For her project, she wrote Literacy in first grade is very important. This is the grade where they practice independent reading. Books on CD helps students’ literacy experiences tremendously. Listening skills are also enhanced since students are not expected to read the words. Children can spend more time improving their comprehension since they can focus solely on listening.

She received two sets of CD read-alongs which contains the audio CD and six sets of books. Two or three kids can listen to the same story at the same time through headsets connected to an audio distributor and a boombox. Children follow along with their own separate books. The audio stories have page turn signals indicating when the children should flip the page.

All children in Mrs Chang’s class are required to read at least 20 minutes every day as part of their Reading Contract for first grade. They write their times and titles on a Reading Contract that are turned in on Fridays. Mrs Chang announces the top readers each month and the winners receive various prizes and books and stickers for their sticker charts. Last year the top reader in her class read over 20,000 minutes during the school year! Read on!

Castlebay Connection student newspaper

jkwan — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 14:41:16 +0000

The Castlebay Connection is the new student newspaper written entirely by fifth grade students. Fifth grade students were invited to become reporters based on their proven ability to be responsible, dedicated, committed to excellence, and have a passion for journalistic writing. The goal of the newspaper is to keep students connected to what’s going on in their school and their community, and to provide students with a “voice”. The Castlebay Connection or “CC” for short is published monthly. Students meet weekly after school with teacher Mrs. Dorfman, to receive their column assignments, to discuss ideas for articles, to learn journalism techniques, and distribute the newspaper after the respective issue has been published. The students are very enthusiastic and very proud to go about the campus and the community looking for newsworthy articles, interviewing teachers, faculty and students for various columns. “They are definitely developing a nose for news” says Mrs. Dorfman. We are grateful to our publisher and editor Renee Missakian, whose creative talents has given the Castlebay Connection its professional look!

Download: March issue

pictures from the 100th day of school

jkwan — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 02:12:51 +0000

Wednesday, February 22nd was the 100th day of school. Various classrooms had activities celebrating the 100th day of school. These are some pictures taken from K1, K2 and room 21.