Hi there. I hope you all had as great of a day as I had!!!

This morning we finished up our Character Warrior unit in CC Meeting. The kids are officially Ms. Erickson's Character Warriors!!! I can't wait for you to see them at open house next week. We talked a lot about how I didn't want this to just be an art project but that I actually wanted them to BE character warriors! I want them to really truly work on the things that are on their shields. We finished the unit by reading the story, One Brave Knight by Karen Kingsbury. She is one of my very favorite authors! She writes amazing Christian adult books, but had no idea she also wrote powerful children books. There was the mention of God in the story. That lead to another discussion in class. We talked about bringing God into the classroom. There are times where it is allowed, like saying the pledge and when reading it from a character's point of view, but it is not ok for a teacher to try to impose their beliefs or any religion's beliefs onto their students. Even though this story was under those guidelines, I did offer an alternate setting for anyone who did not feel comfortable hearing a story with the word God in it. No one chose that option. At any rate, the story had a wonderful lesson in ALL of the character traits. Ask your child why the knight from the West Village became prince of the kingdom and why the other three knights did not. If they can tell you that he didn't cheat, lie, or disobey the king's orders then write the word KNIGHT in the planner for $20 tomorrow.

The shields look awesome! Thanks for mounting those last night. A couple came in done incorrectly, so they are coming back home tonight to get fixed. The mounting should be larger than the paper shield so we can see some of the tinfoil. I modeled this in class for the kids yesterday. Those that are coming home had a discussion with me to ensure that they now understand my expectations.

Thanks so much for all the fun gift cards for our basket. Yum!!! Please check the list off to the right of this blog before purchasing yours to avoid duplication. We are going to have a GREAT basket thanks to all of you.

There are just a few kiddos left to bring in their Fallen Rock money. Please remember to send in that $4 for your child's copy of the fun book we are reading in S.S. The author will be here on Oct. 3rd.

Homework tonight is two spelling sheets. One is ABC order of 4th grade level words. it is a cut and paste one. The other is a money connection to spelling. They have to look at words that have the long and short e sound and then find the money value of each word using the chart. The test is tomorrow. Please remind kids to study the words on the blog tonight.

Have a wonderful evening!
Ms. Erickson