This week we discussed story elements, such as main and supporting characters, setting (where and when-past or present), and problem and solution. The kids acted out action words (verbs) and did some dancing too! We even added -s to a word to make it plural! We visited the library with our AR library cards! Many students are VERY excited about AR. Several kids took AR Quizzes on Friday! Now, I do not think AR is the end all, but when used correctly, it can be a good motivational tool for students. I only require them to check out one AR book at a time because I want them to read other books too. Just because a book is not AR, that does not mean that it is not worth reading! The guidance counselor visited our classroom this week. She told the class we will be learning all about study skills this year, like eyes and ears on the speaker and reading directions. Of course, these are skills we have been working on since the beginning of the school year, so it's great that these skills will be reinforced.
In math, we continued studying place value. The students have really improved with this. Also, the other day in the hall I was calling out addition problems, and the students were supplying the answer. I could tell that a few other first grade teachers were really impressed! At math stations this week the students got to visit a station where there were dot cubes (that's dice to you all), whiteboards, markers, and erasers. Each student got two dot cubes, rolled them, and wrote an addition number sentence on the white board to represent the dots on the dot cubes. For example, if they rolled 4 and 7, they wrote 4+7=11. They did great! I am so proud of them. They get OVERLY excited about math stations on Fridays, so when they got too loud yesterday during stations, all I had to do was mention not having stations next week, and you could have heard a pin drop (not that I expect or require that low of a noise level, they are 6 and 7 after all)! I am glad the class loves math so much. I was always a math fanatic! There are so many adults, though, who strongly dislike math. It's like a fraternity that almost everyone is a part of. My goal is to always make math fun, so that my students leave first grade loving it!!!
For our unit of study this week, we learned all about apples. In a few weeks we will have our apple tasting extravaganza! I wanted to do it closer to Johnny Appleseed's birthday.
The coming week will bring a big change. Our student teacher, Miss Brawley, will take over teaching! I assure you that she has been and will continue to do a great job! She has been teaching math, spelling, and unit already, so she has mastered those areas. I will be closely guiding her through teaching phonics, reading, grammar, and small groups.
The coming week also brings conferences, art, music, and computer!
I am hoping to begin taking pictures of some of our class learning activities. I have many parents (and other teachers) who ask me how I teach a certain skill, so I think that perhaps by posting some pictures of our activities, you will have a better idea of how we learn at school! Please let me know if there is anything else that you would like to see added to our Blog!
I love the Piggy Pictures! What a great idea to post pics of the kids here. It's always a joy to see that they are having fun in the classroom. I'm glad to hear the Math Fridays are going well. Look forward to coming in the classroom to help with the apple tastings!!
ReplyDelete-Katie G (Lexi's mom)