Hello Blackberry Families,

 

Hoping everyone is well! Lots of students and teachers have been sick lately at The Berkeley School. As the season has changed, just sending another reminder for students to wear appropriate clothing for colder weather. If children are not feeling well, it is better they stay home than to get others sick. If they are feeling better to return to school, encourage children to wear a mask to protect others in their community.

Thank you to those who were able to join us during VIP day. It was so nice to see everyone take agency over their work, and show the things they were proud. It was also lovely to see collaboration between our Blackberians and their VIP while sorting their needs and wants. This week we heard Blackberians give the sweetest compliments, give someone their favorite fidget, and help without being asked to. As we send you off on break we are reminded of the importance of community and caring for one another. We are so thankful for our Blackberry community and we thank you for entrusting us with you most precious Blackberian.

We have begun to explore various new themes and subjects in our academics:

Last week in math, we did some addition, using beans for counting. Also, we have begun learning about coins and their values! We have introduced pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters. We viewed their characteristics, their sizes, what is written on them – and even had a chance to view some coins from Mexico! Students made a booklet with the description of each coin, as well as completed a categorizing chart for these coins.

In literacy and writing we learned four new vocabulary words; annoy, exhausted, pond, and grumpy. We had a chance to practice writing it, using it in a sentence and drawing pictures to describe it. We also worked on l-controlled words -ell,-all,-ull,-oll and practiced spelling different words with those patterns.

Cultural studies and science has been intertwined with learning about the differences of “wants” and “needs”. We also discussed things like: spending, saving, and sharing. In these discussions, we viewed someone that did too much spending and then was out of money in their savings. This led to the concept of budgeting, a plan on how to spend your money. We also learned about the geography of thanksgiving, seeing where most of our food is harvested and placing it on a map of the US.

In Spanish, students were introduced to the names of certain fruits! They created a paper basket as well as a new song that goes along with it. The 7th grade middle school students visited Blackberry to give a presentation about Dia de Los Muertos. This gave middle schoolers a chance to do some public speaking, as well as gave Blackberry students a chance to ask some questions about a theme they have previously learned about. 

Questions to ask your child:

-What new vocabulary words did you learn? (annoy, exhausted, pond, and grumpy)

-How many cents is a penny, how many cents is a dime, how many cents is a nickel, how many cents is a quarter, What do they look like?( Bonus points if they can remember the presidents on them, because boy did the teachers ask Google) 

-What is the difference between “wants” and “needs”

-What is budgeting? Can you explain: saving, spending, sharing

-How do you spell..spell,call,roll,pull

Reminder: 

Monday – Friday, November 20th – 24th, TBS will be closed for Fall Break – Enjoy your time everyone!

Monday, November 27th – Visiting artist Jesús Sosa Calvo, master woodcarver of Oaxacan Alebrije will be at TBS, Blackberry will visiting and see his demonstration at 1:35pm – 2:15pm

Friday, December 1st – TBS will be closed for report writing.

 

Gracias y saludos,

Leslie and Mark