"We Are James John" by Room 12 & Greta Pedersen

@RightBrainNews 

Hear our School Song:

Happy Birthday Parfait!

Today Parfait turned the big "0-9"!

Happy Birthday Parfait!

Mr. Morantte's Classroom Adventures: Final Day in Room 12

Mr. Morantte's Classroom Adventures: Final Day in Room 12: It has been a fun and enjoyable experience to work with these lovely children since december. They have taught me so much and hopefully the...

Recording & Performing our School Song

@rightbrainnews
We have been writing our school song with local songstress, Greta Pedersen from The Right Brain Intiative.  Last Friday we were able to record the song in the auditorium.  What's next?  Stay tuned.

Celebrity Guest Read Alouder Today: Jefferson Smith, Portland Mayoral Canidate

Jefferson Smith stopped by our room today for Read Aloud.  We learned that he is running for Mayor of Portland.  Which seemed like a pretty big job to us.
We learned that any registered voter could run for mayor.  We also learned that you have to put in some really long days when you are running for a public office, which we found out is called campaigning.
Thank you Mr. Smith for taking time out of your super busy schedule and stopping by today hang out with us.

Congratulations to our Students of the Month!

Congratulations to our April Students of the Month: Julian, Ema & Cheyenne (not pictured)

A Full Friday Tomorrow That Your 3rd Grader Won't Want To Miss!

• Tomorrow we will be having our Monthly Awards Assembly at 8:30 in the Auditorium.
• Right after lunch Portland Mayoral Candidate, Jefferson Smith will be stopping by our room for Read Aloud.
• We will be doing final rehearsal and recording the School Song that we just finished writing with our Resident Artist, Greta Pederson, from The Right Brain Initiative  
• We are very sad that tomorrow will be our fabulous Student Teacher Mr. Morantte's last day in our class.



Don't worry, there will be no cowbell, in our school song.

• After their afternoon nap, bring the whole family to Family Traditions Night to the School at 6:30.

Our Read Aloud Book for just $5?

Nena with her ladybugs "Lucy & Noor".

 Our local St. Johns Bookseller (and Lucy's Mom) has ordered in a few copies of our current Read Aloud Book and she is generously selling them for only $5.  We are calling it the "The Room 12 Special"   

Conveniently located in St. Johns.

Thank You Nena!

Who Will Be Portland's Next Mayor? What's a Mayor?

As you may have noticed over the past few months, we have been inviting some really important people from the Portland Community into our classroom for what we are calling Celebrity Guest Read Aloud.  We have had Famous Authors, Leaders in Education and  Non-Profit Groups.  In the next few weeks we will be having the top three Portland Mayoral Candidates stop by our room.  Jefferson Smith, Charlie Hales and Eileen Brady will all be stopping by Room 12 for a short Read Aloud and to (hopefully) answer some of our short questions like "Why are you running for Mayor" and "What is a Mayor?"

Mr. Morantte's Classroom Adventures: Mind Mangling Math

Mr. Morantte's Classroom Adventures: Mind Mangling Math: This week room 12 has been doing math testing and so this week all the students have been getting an extra dose of their math in the morni...

State Math Test this Week.

 We started taking our Math StateTest this week. 


Thanks for making sure that your 3rd Grader is getting plenty of sleep.  It's a great week for early bedtimes.

  

Celebrity Guest Read Alouder Today: Dana Hepper from Stand For Children

Dana, a former third grade teacher, did a great job reading!

We were so excited when Dana Hepper, Advocacy Director  at Stand for Children stopped by today.


Dana and I met a few years back when we were both taking an excellent class at PSU .

Thank You Ms. Hepper for coming in to read to us today!

Books 2 U This Morning

Paul from Multnomah County Library's Books 2 U Program stopped by during breakfast this morning.


He showed up with a big bag of books for us to check out.


Books 2 U is a great program that brings a sampling of the 1,994,541 books from Multnomah County Library into our Schools.

After hearing Paul's Book Talk- we wanted to read them all!

PARENT PRESENTATION TUESDAY NIGHT

Progress Reports Came Home Today.

Celebrity Read Alouder Today: Portland Public School Board Member Matt Morton

We were so lucky to have Matt Morton stop by our room to read to us today.

Matt is the Deputy Director of NAYA and is a member of our Portland Public School Board.

It turns out Mr. Morton was a pretty good read alouder.  We all think he must get a lot of practice reading to his preschooler at home.

We all really enjoyed hearing Matt read.

Thank you Mr. Morton for helping us get started on our new book.

Congratulations Mallory!

Mallory is our Learn for Life Student of the Week!

Missed the latest School Newsletter?

Our School's Newsletter, The Pride, is now digitized!  No longer do you have to do late night archeological digs into your kid's backpack uncovering all sorts of "treasures" along the way, only to find that the soggy newsletter you are pulling out is from last fall.
You can find a brand new copy on our school's website or right here on the sidebar of our class blog.  All the information you need, without the hassle.

Familiar Artwork on Wildwood Chronicles Blog

You might remember back in January we had a certain local author stop by our class and read from his book.  Our hallway was full of really great artwork that the kids had drawn from the book.  As he was leaving, Colin pulled out his iPhone and took a few pictures of the kids's drawings.  Turns out, now they are up on the Wildwood Chronicles Blog with captions by the author himself!

What Reading in 3rd Grade Looks Like

This was our afternoon yesterday.  (Well, at least 45 minutes of it)  Your 3rd Grader is learning to sustain their independent reading.  You may see some of them writing as well.  They are actually responding to what they our reading.  This afternoon they will be sharing their responses in their reading groups.

Our class is learning that we really need it to be quiet in order to do our best reading.  Does your 3rd Grader have a quiet place at home they can read every night?  I know, with having a 3 1/2 year old daughter- that our house isn't very quiet.  Many parents have told me that they allow their kids to read for the last 30 minutes of the day before lights out.  This is a great strategy.  They younger kids are hopefully already asleep, it's quiet and it's a great way to let their minds unwind from the day.

Late Opening Tomorrow

http://sophieblackall.blogspot.com/2008/12/christmas-greetings.html

Tomorrow will be another late opening.  School starts at 10.  Buses are on a 2 hour delay.

Learning with iPads

Malakai, Parfait & Damian working with words. . .

Yesterday, and most days here in Room 12, we are able to reinforce our learning with iPads.  Whether it's helping us see common spelling patterns, learn our multiplication facts, or supporting our English Language Learners- we are finding that there is an app for that.  Our students our now learning with 12 iPads here at James John School.

as are Savannah and Ema

Mr. Crockett from Lewis and Clark stopped by to work with Ignacio and Francisco.

Mr. Morantte's Classroom Adventures: Nursery Rhymes: Room 12 style

Mr. Morantte's Classroom Adventures: Nursery Rhymes: Room 12 style: We have been using old-fashioned nursery rhymes and changing them as we go along. We break the pattern. Here are 3 examples Room 12 has cre...

No School Tomorrow (for kids)

No School Tomorrow.  Teachers will be in doing Progress Reports.
Have a great weekend!

Mr. Morantte's Classroom Adventures: "I Am From" Gallery Walk

Mr. Morantte's Classroom Adventures: "I Am From" Gallery Walk: On Monday we put our finished I am from poems on our tables and walked around as if we were in a museum and wrote compliments about the po...

James John School Website Has Been Updated!

Yesterday our school's website was updated.  We took down all of the weird stock photos and you can now see actual James John Kids in the photos on top of the site!  There are also links to all of the great blogs coming out of our building.  
Didn't catch the last Pride Newsletter?  You can now see a digital version on our school website and this blog.

Vote For PAST&E

Our own Portland After School Tennis is in 3rd Place!


Vote for their video.

Ema congratulates James on a good game.

Congratulations Demetrio!

Demetrio is our Learn for Life Student of the Week!

Burgerville Tonight!!!

Come on out to St. Johns Burgerville Tonight anytime between 4 and 8 and support James John School PTA.

PPS Budget Meeting Roosevelt High 6pm this Wednesday

Budget meetings are this week

The Portland School Board will hold hearings on the 2012-13 budget, Monday, April 9, at 5 p.m. at Cleveland High School and Wednesday, April 11, at 6 p.m. at Roosevelt High School. A third meeting about the budget-based recommendation to consolidate Humboldt PK-8 School and close the Harriet Tubman Leadership Academy for Young Women is Thursday, April 12, at Humboldt.

Bowling This Thursday Night!

Thank You St. Johns Starbucks!

We went and visited our "I Am From" Poems at Starbucks this afternoon.

Sara & Kelly were nice enough to provide us with some of their sweet treats!

Thank You St. Johns Starbucks for your ongoing support of our classroom!

Right Brain Intiative with Greta Pederson

This year we are so lucky to have local songstress Greta Pederson come into  our school and help us with songwriting.  Our  class will be writing a School Song.  Today we brainstormed ideas for our song.  This is all made possible through
The Right Brain Intiative:  Bringing the Arts into your Public School.

Congratulations Cheyenne!

Cheyenne is our Learn for Life Student of the Week!

Mr. Morantte's Classroom Adventures: Who is visiting Literacy Block?

Mr. Morantte's Classroom Adventures: Who is visiting Literacy Block?: Roald Dahl is one of the key authors that most children grow up with and room 12 decided that this author would be fun to read.  Ge...

Welcome Back!

Welcome Back.  
We have a busy full week here at James John.
SUN School classes begin today.  Spring Break Pictures and
Walk to School Day is Wednesday.
Stay up to date on all the happenings by subscribing to Our Calendar.