As many of you know Santa Clause is a very busy man! However, over the weekend he left stockings for every kid in the class with a little note. In the note he asked that parents send in small presents such as pencils, candy, etc. to take some of the work off his shoulders. Please send in only enough items for you child's homeroom. Whitelaw has 21 students, Gibbons has 21. I wrote back to him that I would ask the APE parents to send in small trinkets before December 18th. We will open the stocking on the 19th as part of our Christmas Bash!

This is a photo I got of Santa last year in Massachusetts when I woke up in the middle of the night.

Learn about the Christmas Pickle this week!

Candy Grams and Candy Canes

The Pecks are ready for Christmas!

It is no longer safe to let Ellen stay in their apartment. They fooled the Gestapo once. How will they hide Ellen now? Find out on Monday!

CandyGrams! (I copied this from Mr. Sofferin's blog)
Student Council will be selling CandyGrams in December! CandyGrams are special treats that you can buy for your friends, relatives, and current or former teachers throughout the school. All you have to do is fill out a tag and send it in with 25 cents and Student Council will do the rest! On the day before Winter Break, student council will hand-deliver your CandyGram! Information and order forms will come home Monday, December 1st!

Cool and Useless Information:
A History of the Candy Cane
The history of candy canes goes back to the 17th century, when candy-makers across Europe were already producing hard sugar sticks, a popular treat at the time. Unlike their modern counterparts, however, these candy cane predecessors were completely straight and all-white in color. Then, in 1670, the choirmaster of Germany's Cologne Cathedral introduced a new twist to the sweet sugar sticks. He intended to hand the candy out to children to keep them quiet during the church's lengthy Christmas ceremony, and to commemorate the occasion he had the sticks bent at one end to resemble shepherds' crooks. Thus was born the familiar hook-shaped appearance of today's candy canes. Following the choirmaster's innovation, bent sugar stick treats became a popular holiday confection throughout Europe. The first documented reference of candy canes in the United States goes back to 1847, when a German-Swedish immigrant named August Imgard decorated his Christmas tree by hanging the treats from its branches. Friends and family members were delighted by Imgard's idea, and they rushed home to adorn their own Christmas evergreens with candy canes. This tradition quickly spread across the country, making candy canes a staple of Christmas celebrations in the United States. But these plain white canes still lacked the colorful designs seen in today's versions. No one is sure exactly when the customary red stripes were introduced, but it was somewhere around the turn of the century. Christmas cards produced before 1900 show plain white canes, while striped ones appear on many cards printed almost immediately thereafter. Additionally, the popular peppermint-flavored variation also emerged around the same time as the striped patterns.Yet despite these innovations in appearance, candy canes were not as widely available as they are today. Producing the canes was a time-consuming and labor-intensive process - candy-makers had to pull, twist, cut and bend the sticks by hand, without the help of machinery. Furthermore, because of their frail construction and vulnerability to moisture, the canes could not be packaged adequately to withstand long-distance shipping. As a result, production was limited to a local scale.The man responsible for changing this was Bob McCormack, who began making candy canes as special Christmas treats in the 1920s in Albany, Georgia. For years, Bob dreamed of distributing the confections around the country. Then, around 1950, Bob's brother-in-law Gregory Keller, a Catholic priest, invented a machine to automate the production of candy canes. Almost simultaneously, Bob and his eldest son, Bob Jr., developed a new packaging device that wrapped and sealed the treats in moisture-proof plastic wrappers.Together, these two innovations led to the widespread distribution of candy canes. Soon Bobs Candies had become the world's largest candy cane producer. Thanks largely to the inventive spirit of the McCormack family, sweet-toothed individuals now have no problem getting their hands on a share of the estimated 1.76 billion candy canes that are currently produced each year.

Thanksgiviing at the Pecks

As is tradition, the Smaglis triplets spend the weekend after Thanksgiving with me. This year they came the two days before Thanksgiving. They usually decorate my house for Christmas the day after Thanksgiving, so they decided to just do it the day before. We had a lot of fun. We took the canoe out for a spin on Lake Gibbo, then trolloped all over Jacksonville searching for blowup lawn decorations, not my favorite, but they thought it would look good. They proceeded to put up my tree and decorate it.

Send me a picture from your Thanksgiving, and we will publish it on the blog. Send it to gibbonsp@duvalschools.org

Hannah and John canoe on Lake Gibbo

Patrick, John, and Hannah

Sunset on Lake Gibbo

Hannah and John (Patrick fell asleep)

We finally got them all set up!

Francie is a little annoyed at all this new stuff in her way!

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

Many students have seen the advertisement for the movie The Boy in The Striped Pajamas. Many have expressed an interest in seeing the movie. It is based on a book that we will be reading after Christmas in mid January. I strongly suggest that you DO NOT allow your child to see the movie due to the graphic nature of many of the scenes. The book is a masterpiece which has spent months on the New York Times Best Seller List.Author John Boyne

In the movie, many of the scenes which are depicted graphically are only eluded to in the book. I find the book very appropriate for mature fifth graders with a deep background knowledge of the Holocaust (that would be us). I would recommend the movie for children older than 14 only if they also have a in depth knowledge of the Holocaust. I also feel the movie would destroy your child's experience with the book. All the hoopla over the movie will make your child that much more excited about reading the book.Schmuel is the boy in the pajamas.

FUN IN ART!

We had a blast today with Mrs. Robinson in Art! We are making puppets. I would go into more detail about the process, but would probably get it wrong. Everyone seemed to be having fun. Thanks to those of you who sent in fabric, yarn, and newspaper.Ms. Robinson helps Woody put her wet newspaper ont her thing.

Thanksgiving Pictures

THANK YOU

Thanks to all those who came out today to help us celebrate Thanksgiving. We truly have a lot to be thankful for!

Special thanks to Mrs. Wood for an awesome blessing!

Pictures from our awesome day will be posted tomorrow night, I'm too tired tonight to post pictures!

See you tomorrow!

Spelling test was rescheduled for tomorrow due to the craziness of the day!

Check new dates on sidebar calendar

SPELLING

Don't forget you have a Spelling Test on Monday!

Don't forget to check out the new PUZZLES below!

See you Monday at noon for DINNER!

Here are a few chuckles!

GREAT JOB APES

Star Students for November 21, 2008 are Jennifer Davis and Derek Haberman!

We had a blast today, and we learned a lot of cool information. Special thanks to Mrs. Gaspard and Mrs. Zinn for helping Mr. Gibbons, Mrs. Peck, and Mrs. Whitelaw. If your picture is missing .......just let me know and I will stick it in Monday!

We enjoyed Mr. Sofferin and Mrs. Yadon/Rowan's museum on Thursday as well.

We can't wait to see what Mrs. Hayden, Mrs. Hartless, Mrs. Hollaway, and Ms. Harris have in store for the museum on Monday and Tuesday.
Rashod as your tour guide

Ashely as Maya Angelou (She's a phenomenal woman)

Dylan as Eli Manning (Did they win that game?)

Evan McCance as Jerry Spinelli (He played for the GREEN SOX!)

Tina Turner (Mobbed by her adoring fans)

Bryan as Ernie Davis (Is that a Heisman pose?)

Chris as Dwyane Wade (that's how it is spelled)

Jamie as Laila Ali (She's a knockout)

Queen Elizabeth (lovely accent)

Antonio as Nelson Mandela

Jennifer as Amelia Earhart

Griffin as Evel Knievel

Jaliyah Jaliya as Diana Ross

Trenton as Kurt Cobain (smells like fifth grade spirit)

Octavia as Oprah Winfrey

Leanna as Jennifer Lopez (No pictures please)

Gary as "The Rock"

J.T. as Bruce Lee (I'm scared of you)

Lillian as Walt Disney

Nick as Walt Disney

Robbie as Edgar Allan Poe (Is he writing a scary story?)

Matilda as Emily Dickinson

Andy as Lou Gherig

Andrew as Michael Jordan

Matt as Muhammad Ali

Natalee as Mia Hamm

Derek Jeter as HIMSELF!

Karson as Mia Hamm

Lauren as Mia Hamm

Miss Keke as Michael Jordan (can't you see the resemblance?)

Noah as Winston Churchill

Griffin as Ben Franklin

Joshua as Thomas Edison

Kiet as Calvin Coolidge

Edwin as Thurgood Marshall

Jasmine as Rosa Parks

Savannah as Bonnie Parker of Bonnie and Clyde

Maurice as John Paul Jones

SCENES FROM THE MUSEUM:















HAPPY BIRTHDAY MS. RAMANAN