ETE Golden Chronicles
Dear ETE Families,
As we begin November, I want to take a moment to share how grateful I am for our wonderful ETE families! October was filled with exciting activities, special events, and opportunities to come together as a school community. From helping your children participate in our dress-up days to supporting school events and activities, your involvement helped make the month so special for our students.
I know that participating in these activities often takes extra time, planning, and effort from families, and I want you to know how much we appreciate it. Whether you donated items, attended an event, helped put together a costume, or simply encouraged your child to participate, your support makes a difference!
As we enter this season of gratitude, I am especially thankful for the partnership we share with our families. Your involvement, encouragement, and continued support help us create a school where students feel valued, connected, and excited to learn.
Thank you for being such an important part of our ETE family. We are grateful for you and all you do to help our students shine!
Mrs. Buttars
Principal
Monday, November 2nd: Tooth Fairy Visits
Tuesday, November 3rd: 3rd Grade Field Trip
Monday, November 9th: PJ Day
Tuesday, November 10th: World Kindness Day (Wear Purple)
Wednesday, November 11th: Veterans Day (Wear Red/White/Blue)
Thursday, November 12th: Wear House Colors
Tuesday, November 17th: House Meeting/Lunch (Wear you House Colors)
Tuesday, November 17th: PTO Meeting 4:15pm
Tuesday, November 18th: Thanksgiving Feast 11:00-12:30pm
November 23-26th: Thanksgiving Break
Thank you, Mr. Chang!
Come Join Us!
Thank you, Mr. Kotz!
📖 We are readers now!! Part of learning to read in kindergarten is practicing our sight words. Sight words are words that cannot be decoded or “sounded out” with the phonics skills we have learned so far. Students who are able to immediately recognize high frequency sight words when reading are more fluent readers. There are many ways to practice these words at home. Going on a sight word hunt when reading together, writing them outside with sidewalk chalk, or even making a game like memory or go fish.
✏️ First grade is using multiple strategies to add and subtract, while also checking their work by solving problems in more than one way. They are practicing math skills using number lines, ten frames, drawings, fingers, doubles facts, and make-a-ten strategies to explain their thinking.
In reading, students are learning the definitions of vocabulary words, using them in sentences, and identifying examples and non-examples.
At home, ask your child, “How do you know?” or “Can you show me another way?” when they solve a problem. Looking ahead to next month, students will learn the digraphs th, sh, ch, and wh and practice identifying, reading, and writing words that contain these letter combinations.
🏔️ Second Grade has been practicing different strategies for adding two-digit numbers in math. Students are learning to break larger numbers apart into tens and ones, use a Hundreds Chart to visualize counting on by tens and ones, and make stops along an open number line (ask your children about the “station stops” if they’re in Ms. Rollow’s class!). They’ve also been practicing compensation, which involves changing a problem to make one addend a “landmark” number ending in zero so the other addend can be added more easily. In reading and writing, students have been learning about “guardian consonants” and how to prove whether a vowel makes a long or short sound in a word. Classes have also been exploring the suffixes -s, -es, and -ing. In science, we’ve been focusing on landforms and weathering, and we even got to go outside in the rain to observe how water moves down mountains! Check out the pictures to see mountain weathering in action! :)
At home, try building a landscape box! Pile damp sand in a plastic bin or on a cookie sheet, and have your child use their fingers or some sticks to create landscape features such as canyons and valleys. Then, have your child slowly pour water from the top of the mountain or other high points in the landscape and observe where the water goes and how it changes the landscape through weathering.
We have just started setting goals with your children for reading and math fluency. In the coming weeks, check in with your child to see which specific goal they are working toward and what progress they are making!
🚀 In 3rd grade, we will be continuing to use and practice multiplication and division facts to problem solve in math. In reading, we will be flying through our “sky and space” unit practicing accuracy and fluency, while learning different suffixes and prefixes, nouns and verbs. Then we will be entering into a unit of “amazing animals.” In writing, we will continue to use knowledge we acquire through reading to build graphic organizers that help us turn our ideas into thoughtful and organized paragraphs for narrative, informative and opinion pieces. In Science, we will be wrapping up our unit on fossils and changing environments with a field trip to the Denver Museum of Science, which leads us into our next topic: “life cycles”.
Try it at home! Did you know that Scholastic has more than just books?! Check out:
https://studyjams.scholastic.com/studyjams/jams/math/multiplication-division/multiplication.htm has math videos and science videos, https://studyjams.scholastic.com/studyjams/jams/science/animals/animal-life-cycles.htm
They also have printables for parents, check out this family reading bingo challenge https://www.scholastic.com/parents/books-and-reading/reading-resources/free-book-bingo-idea-to-rev-up-reading.html
Think about and talk about how you use math in everyday life, figuring out when to leave, how long it will take to get somewhere, a grocery budget, rounding and adding while shopping or when paying at a restaurant.
📚 Our fourth graders are growing as confident, fluent readers! Students are engaging with texts on their Chromebooks while exploring a slide presentation about how setting influences characters and plot. Through choral reading, they are practicing reading at an appropriate rate with smoothness and expression. As they work together to strengthen their fluency, our fourth graders are polishing their reading skills and building a deeper understanding of the stories they read. We are proud of their progress and enthusiasm for literacy!
At-Home Literacy Challenge: Set aside 10–15 minutes to read a book together! Have your student read aloud with fluency, using a smooth pace, expression, and punctuation. After reading, discuss how the setting influences the characters and events in the story. Ask questions like, “How would the story change if it took place somewhere else?” or “How does the setting affect what the characters do?” This is a great way to build reading confidence, strengthen comprehension, and enjoy learning together as a family!
🌎We are practicing how to make mental math EASY! You can support at home by going to the grocery store and having them estimate several grocery prices in their heads using rounding or compatible numbers. Read, read, read! Reading 15 to 20 minutes every night can boost their reading skills by a year before the end of the school year. We are also learning how to help our environment by making small choices that have a BIG impact.
At-Home Learning Challenge! 🏡 Families, try these fun activities at home to support what we are learning in class! 🛒 Math on the Go: At the grocery store, have your child estimate the cost of 3–5 items by rounding prices to the nearest dollar. Then, add the estimates in their head to find the approximate total! 📚 Read Every Day: Spend 15–20 minutes reading together each night. Ask your child to share their favorite part of the story or explain what they learned. 🌎 Make a Difference: Choose one small way to help the environment at home, such as recycling, turning off lights when leaving a room, or using a reusable water bottle.
🎨🌿 In Creative Arts, we have continued our projects based on nature as well as choice-based studio time.
Kindergarten and First Grade have focused on foundational drawing and painting skills, learning how to represent animals, pumpkins, aspen trees and more. We have started turning many drawings into puppets for a newly created puppet theater.
Second Grade did a deep dive into LEGO architecture collaborations with nature, taking our work outside to see how they held up against the elements. We created collages to showcase our builds.
Third Grade wrapped up an intensive study of watercolor and color mixing, creating “nature potions” and painting outside, then making representations of our potions.
Fourth Grade finished our mural of South Park, created from our ideas we gathered while sketching outside. Our finished mural is amazing and taught us so much about collaborating while creating.
Fifth Grade has been exploring music throughout the year, and recently began “scoring” wildlife videos to create a musical soundtrack inspired by nature.
We also learned about the cultural celebration Dia De Los Muertos (Day of the Dead), and all of the art associated with it such as La Calvera (decorative skulls) and Papel Picado (cut paper flags.)
Two ways to help Creative Arts at home:
Draw together! No matter your skill level, drawing to visualize your ideas is a powerful way to boost creative thinking.
Donations! We are currently collecting: Cardboard, egg cartons, paper towel rolls, and socks to make masks and puppets. Do you have any wood scraps or fabric scraps? We would love to collect these things for future projects. Thank you!
Our students continue to build their endurance and improve their long-distance running skills! This week, each class participated in a three-minute timed run around the gym. Everyone gave it their best effort, and we saw some really impressive lap counts! We are so proud of their hard work, determination, and progress.
For our skill focus, we have been working on throwing and catching through fun, active games like basketball and dodgeball. These activities help students develop coordination, accuracy, and teamwork while staying active and having fun.
Coming up, we will shift our focus to dribbling and kicking skills as we explore new games and activities.
At home: Challenge your student to a friendly game of basketball and see if they can show off their growing skills!
🫶 Celebrating Kindness!
November is all about KINDNESS! In celebration of World Kindness Week (November 13–18), our students will begin their next Social-Emotional Learning (SEL) unit, focusing on Kindness, inspired by our very own House Nukumori – the House of Kindness!
Throughout this unit, students will explore what kindness looks like, sounds like, and feels like. We will focus on recognizing our own strengths, showing compassion and empathy toward others, and understanding how even the smallest acts of kindness can make a BIG difference in our school community.
Families, we encourage you to join us! Challenge your child to complete one act of kindness each day, whether it's helping someone at home, including a friend, or simply offering a kind word.
Together, we can remind our students that kindness isn't just something we do—it's who we choose to be!
Four Houses, One School, Endless Kindness!
🍁 Parent Tip of the Month – November
Growing Readers, One Little Moment at a Time!
November is a wonderful time to slow down, enjoy family, and find little moments to be thankful for. It's also a great time to remember that reading doesn't always have to mean sitting down with a book. Some of the best reading practice happens in everyday moments!
📚 Make Reading Part of Your Day
Reading opportunities are everywhere! Have your child help read a recipe, make a grocery list, or look for familiar words while you're out and about. Even 10 minutes of reading together each day can make a difference. The important thing is to keep it fun and positive!
🌟 Reading Strategy Spotlight: Hear It, Say It, Read It!
Help your child become a stronger reader by playing with sounds in words. Say a simple word like ship and ask your child to tell you the sounds they hear: /sh/ /i/ /p/. Then, if they're ready, have them write the letters that match those sounds.
For older readers, try breaking longer words into syllables. Little activities like these help build the skills children need to become confident readers!
🧡 Family Reading Challenge: A Little Gratitude Goes a Long Way!
This month, try starting a family gratitude jar! Have your child write or draw something they're thankful for each day. Younger children can tell you their ideas while you help write the words. At the end of the month, read them together!
It's a simple way to practice reading, writing, and sharing what matters most.
💻 Helpful Reading Resources
Colorín Colorado – Wonderful reading tips and resources for families, available in English and Spanish.
Starfall – Fun, interactive activities for beginning readers.
Florida Center for Reading Research – Free, research-based reading activities to try at home.
Remember: Raising a reader doesn't happen overnight. Every word practiced, every story shared, and every little success matters. ❤️
🎃 October is a great time to practice patterns! Sort and classify harvested vegetables and candy of course. Items can be sorted by color, same and different, and patterns created. Remember to try putting holes in a pattern to build thinking skills! Please continue to practice basic math facts, addition and multiplication. Prodigy at home can be fun and helps practice skills at your student’s level.
Staying Connected with Alma!
Did you know that you can use Alma, our school's online student information system, to stay up to date on your child's academic progress throughout the school year?
Through the Alma Parent Portal, families can view report cards and check current grades as teachers update them weekly. This is a great way to stay informed about your child's learning, celebrate their successes, and see areas where they may benefit from additional support.
Need help getting started? We've included some helpful videos below that walk you through logging in and navigating Alma so you can confidently access your child's information.
We encourage all families to take advantage of this helpful tool to stay connected to their child's learning throughout the year!
💛 A special thank you to Mrs. Bintz, our fifth-grade teacher, for sharing her knowledge and expertise to help make this resource more accessible to our ETE families!
Attendance Matters
Building Strong Habits for Student Success
Every day at school gives students a chance to stay connected, grow in confidence, and make the most of each learning opportunity.
When students arrive on time and attend regularly, lessons flow smoothly and the whole class can enjoy focused, meaningful learning time together. This gives teachers more time to keep lessons moving and less time helping students catch up, so everyone benefits.
Clear Communication Is Essential
We appreciate you letting us know whenever your child is absent. Sharing the reason helps us better understand and support your student’s or family’s needs. Please call Jessica Newton at 719-836-4421 so we can record the absence as excused rather than unexcused.
Thank you for partnering with us to support regular attendance and student success.
