Come check out the I Like Me display in the hallway near first grade - their first project alongside middle school Literacy Helpers, who will spend time with us each Friday. Dear families, I am looking forward to connecting with you this coming Thursday for Parent's Night at 6:30! Though this week was short, it felt very full. Please take a look at all the wonderful work your children have been completing. You will have a chance to see it in person next week. Curricular HighlightsMath: - Continued in chapter 1, Numbers to Ten, in workbooks - Continued showing strategies to count accurately and to look for directions and examples in workbooks that can help students be more independent - Number words to ten with their spellings - Finishing and extending number patterns counting up and down - Introduced the terms greater than and less than and practiced using them - Did a chapter review in preparation for our first formal assessment on Monday - In connection to a beading activity, used rulers to measure 3 inches of wire remaining from the tops of their self-portraits to leave room for hanging Writing: - Weekend news - Practiced conventions like spacing, uppercase starter, and period at the end - Wrote reflections on our use of classroom concentration tools (bumpy seats, noise-cancelling headphones, and toobaloos for silent reading) - Wrote about what parts of their bodies they think are important in connection to I Like Me by Nancy Carlson alongside middle school Literacy Helpers
Reading: - Continued with reading stamina practice - Opportunities to read the morning work assignment, morning message, math directions, etc. - Comprehension skills during read-alouds (predicting, making connections, identifying character feelings) - Introduced Lexia Core 5 on the iPads and proper iPad use and care Handwriting and Spelling: - Worked on numbers 6 and 7 in handwriting workbooks - Reviewed formation of lowercase b and d (two of the most common reversals - don't worry!) - In spelling, we reviewed the short vowel sounds for e and u and all the rest of the consonants - Played short vowel spelling games with partners - Did a 'write the room' activity where students needed to find short vowel words around the room, write them, and then sort them into word families Social Studies:
- Continued practicing responsibly doing classroom jobs - I read the students the story Lily and Her Purple Plastic Purse by Kevin Henkes, about a little girl who has trouble with self-control in the beginning of the story. She makes some choices that aren't good and has to figure out how to fix her mistakes and also how to control her strong impulses. This book will be an anchor for us as we work on self-control and think about what that means, what it looks and sounds like, and how we need to use it differently in different settings and interactions. - Finished self-portraits and did beautiful beading on the wires that will be used to hang them from our classroom ceiling - Thought about our strengths and things that make us feel successful and how we use parts of our bodies to complete them in connection to I Like Me by Nancy Carlson ("I need my legs because they help me do tricks on my bike." "I like my mouth because I like singing." "I like my brain because it helps me do multiplying and hard math.").
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Dear families, We had another busy week in first grade! It is normal for your child to be tired at the end of the day when they return from school, especially as we settle into our routines and students learn so much about how to work within our group all day long. Hopefully they are getting some time to rest at home - I have been trying to build in free times for students to recharge during our school time. We continued to practice routines learned over the first week, and I added new things that will become regular activities in the coming months (using our book bins, knowing how to store our workbooks, etc.). Giving students agency is one of my top priorities. After seeing how a week in our classroom went, I asked them to come up with 13 jobs that would help our class run more smoothly. They then created the job chart and got to have a job for the week. They will rotate through all of them for one week at a time. They also made months for our calendar of birthdays and will be working to create our shared word wall as we learn sight words. Students also came up with personal school goals this week. They thought about things they wanted to get better at in first grade and I had them choose one or two to focus on in the beginning of the year. They illustrated their goals and dictated them to me. They are now hanging in our classroom where they can see them often and work toward them. From these goals, we will develop classroom guidelines next week that will help us all move toward reaching our goals as a productive team. Everyone brought in fabulous All About Me bags, too! The students loved sitting in the bird chair and sharing their items, fielding questions, and connecting with one another. I tried to have them make sure their comments and questions added depth to the sharer's time to shine, rather than putting the attention back on themselves; this is a challenge for some of our young thinkers - one we will return to all year. Curricular HighlightsMath:
- Began chapter 1, Numbers to Ten in workbooks - Practiced using a ten frame with counters - Introduced the vocabulary more, fewer, same, pattern - practiced counting accurately and using different strategies to check - Number words to ten with their spellings Writing: - Created covers for their binders - Wrote their first weekend news and learned the routine for that - Practiced conventions like spacing, uppercase starter, and period at the end Reading: - Built our reading stamina to 5 minutes (got it on the first try!) - we will continue to add minutes as stamina grows. This is the best way for students to grow as readers - uninterrupted time to read - Unscrambled sentences - Practiced reading the morning message - Comprehension skills during read-alouds Handwriting and Spelling: - Worked on numbers 1-5 in handwriting workbooks - Reviewed formation of lowercase b and d (two of the most common reversals - don't worry!) - In spelling, we reviewed the short vowel sounds for a, i, and o and reviewed about half of the consonants. We will do the rest of the short vowels and consonants next week - Students got to practice word families and rhyming as well Social Studies: - All About Me bags - Job Chart - I read the students the story Chrysanthemum by Kevin Henkes, about a little girl who is teased about her long name. I asked them what they thought the author was trying to teach us and they said, "To not be mean to other people," "To stand up for someone if people aren't being nice to them," "To not make fun of people's names." I brought in a chrysanthemum plant for them to look at because many didn't know what one looked like. They thought it was beautiful and they especially liked the buds. - Read and discussed The Colors of Us by Karen Katz. We talked about how important it is that people are different, but that what links us is that we are all humans who matter - Began self-portraits (there are some amazing artists in the group!) - Visited Kindergarten and read a Counting Book the class made to the Kindergarten group (thanks, Mrs, Bullard!) Room Parent Search If you are interested in becoming a room parent who helps plan about 4 first grade events over the course of the year and helps reach out to other parents, please contact Jamie Ross-Cory at [email protected]. Thank you for considering! Have a fantastic weekend! Katie Hello, First Grade!Dear families,
Thank you so much for visiting this site to view our classroom newsletter! I will share classroom news, important dates, curricular updates, and photos with you frequently throughout the year. Talking about these things with your first grader is a great way to start conversations at home about what is going on in school. I truly believe in the importance of the home/school connection. When children feel and understand that the adults in their lives are on the same page, they feel safer to take risks with their learning and social interactions and push themselves to reach their goals. Community Building The beginning of the year is all about learning about each other - our likes, dislikes, learning styles, and family life. Through verbal sharing, photos from home (thank you!), conversations, writing prompts, art projects, and free play, students have learned many things about each other that have helped us begin forming a cohesive team that can tackle great things throughout the year. Students have been working in small groups to explore math materials, discuss what makes a good friend, work on art projects to put their stamp on the classroom space, and learning to navigate our classroom library and free play corner. In all of these situations, they are practicing listening to each other, learning that the knowledge of the team is greater than the knowledge they bring to the table, and practicing skills like sharing and negotiating. Check out the Documentation tab to read what first grade thought were things people could do to be good friends to others after hearing The Invisible Boy by Trudy Ludwig - an amazing book about friendship and inclusivity. Next week, we will begin an All About Me unit. Over the course of the unit students will: - Share their All About Me Bags and write reflections. - Make self-portraits - Think about what they like about themselves (what makes them feel strong or successful) and make an art project to show that - Try classroom tools to discover more about what helps students concentrate and do their best work with the fewest distractions (alternative seating choices, quiet headphones, clipboards, etc.) - Begin an All About Me book, which will be their first published work - Set beginning of the year goals - Start to add their first work to their learning portfolios I am excited to continue learning along with your children over the coming weeks as we practice routines and learn more about ourselves by sharing and listening to others. Feel free to come by and check out your child's work and our classroom displays! Be sure to click on the Photos tab above to see tons of pictures from our first week! Have a wonderful weekend, Katie Nelson |
AuthorKatie Nelson Archives
January 2018
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