1/25-1/29

This week we loved celebrating the 100^th Day of School. We began the day by eating 100 pieces of cereal for breakfast. We found words inside the phrase ‘one hundred days,’ we read poems about the 100^th day, and we wore awesome hats that we decorated with 100 items. I wish we had more time that day because we did not even get to do all of the fun activities that were planned. Oh, well. We still had fun! Now we’ve been in school 103 days! That means we only have 77 school days to go. It doesn’t sound like a lot when phrased that way, does it?

In reading and science we are learning about life cycles. We read about the similarities and differences between toads and frogs. Ask your child if (s)he can name a few. We have been taking TONS of AR quizzes. I am so proud of all of the students who met and exceeded their January AR goal! All of the students have new goals beginning Monday.

Please keep practicing the r-controlled vowel sounds at home. While most of the class has retained this information, there are still a few students who need extra reinforcement.

In math we have learned to tell time and count money. You can also help your child practice those skills at home. Also, whenever you encounter a three or four digit number, ask your child to try to read that number. We have only made it to three digit numbers so far, but there’s nothing wrong with going ahead and exposing our children to even more!

We have been super busy for the last few weeks, preparing for Parade of Readers. If you’re not familiar with the program, you soon will be. It is the biggest elementary program I have ever witnessed! Ms. Gilbert and I are the teacher chairs this year, so of course, I am super excited about PoR!!! All of 1^st grade has been practicing for our big PTA program on Tuesday night at 6 pm and for our even bigger Kick-Off Rally Friday morning at 8:30 am. I hope to see all of you there!!! ReADiNG RocKs!!!

1/11-1/15

We had another fun, learning-filled week at school. We are trying to get back into the swing of school work after being off for two weeks, just to be followed by another day and a half out for weather reasons. J

In phonics this week we have been reading words that end in nk and ng, such as thank, link, sunk, rang, and swing. We also learned about compound words, like doghouse and bedtime. When we read compound words we always try to find the small words first. We are also still working on the vowel sounds of y (as in fly and baby). At our word work center this week we read words that ended in y and sorted them by the sound that y made in them.

We are continuing to study nouns and verbs in grammar. Before Christmas break we went on a noun search. We looked through magazines for pictures of persons, places, things, and animals. We then cut out those pictures and glued them onto a paper with those headings. This week we added –s to verbs when appropriate, like in the following sentence. The bird feeds the baby. We also learned about synonyms, or words that have almost the same meaning. We looked in our Reading Street book to this week’s story and found synonyms in the story for words that I called out to the class. See the example below.

We continue to analyze stories so that we can better comprehend them. We look for connections between the story and ourselves. Also, we look for the characters, setting, and plot. We also look for the main idea of a story and for the beginning, middle, and ending, like we did in the example below for a read aloud story this week. Try asking your child about story elements after completing a story.

In math we are still adding and subtracting, but we are also learning to tell time!!! Please work on this at home with your child. By now students should know the difference between a digital and an analog clock, as well as the difference between the two hands. We have been telling time to the hour and half hour (on analog clocks). We will have a test on telling time at the end of next week.

Our unit of study this week and next week revolves around matter. We are learning about the states of matter: solid, liquid, and gas. Be looking for States of Matter homework coming home on Tuesday. I have some fun activities planned for the upcoming week.

Thank you for all of your support. I am immensely blessed by you all!

Happy New Year

Today was the 90th day of school, so we have made it halfway through first grade! I can not believe how much my sweet students have progressed already. I look forward to continued academic, emotional, and physical growth! We have a lot of fun upcoming activities, especially Parade of Readers!!!!

11/16-11/24

We have had so many learning adventures! We have read about forest animals, counted money, and learned about Thanksgiving. We have had math stations, ActivBoard lessons, and even an edible turkey and Harvest Blessing!

I love being with my terrific students and their great parents!!! Thank you for sharing with me your precious children! Happy Thanksgiving!!!!!

11/2-11/13

We have been having so much fun learning at school that I have been going home exhausted! That’s why I am a bit behind on our posts.

We have continued to read words with long vowels. We have visited Starfall.com for additional review. Perhaps you can visit Starfall.com with your child to play fun phonics games!

In grammar we have continued to learn about nouns. We have learned about special titles, such as Mr., Dr., Mrs., and Officer. We have also learned to capitalize days of the week, months, of the year, and holidays. You can see one of our activities to reinforce this skill in the pictures below. This was a quick check to make sure that the students were grasping the concept, and they did great.

We have read about dinosaurs. We discussed carnivores, herbivores, and omnivores. Hannah told us that, “Omnivores are animals who eat meat and plants, like humans do.” I also read aloud to the class Dinosaurs before Dark, the first Magic Treehouse book. These are great chapter books for first through third graders. The class even took an AR Quiz on the book!

We also read about forest life. We learned that bears eat grubs, and woodpeckers peck holes in trees to try to find bugs to eat.

In math we have been counting lots of money. Please practice this skill at home. We will continue to count money, but not as much as we have been over the past several weeks. Math skills are very developmental. Some first graders are just not ready to count money, but hopefully, but the end of the school year, they will be! Keep ADDING and SUBTRACTING with flash cards!

We loved learning about our bodies during our unit of study. We made q-tip skeletons to represent our bones. We also made My Body, My Buddy. We used everyday items to represent some of our body parts: an absorbent sponge for our brains, a heart, bubble wrap for our air-filled lungs, a scratchy sponge for our liver, a balloon for our expandable stomach, yarn for our winding intestines, sandpaper for our filtering kidneys, and a fishbowl for our bladder. We know many new facts about our bodies, including ways to take care of ourselves.

10/26-10/30

In phonics we are beginning to learn about long vowels. This week we learned about long a with sneaky e (as in lake). We watched a video on Starfall.com about sneaky e and we played a long a game on the website. We also visited SpellingCity.com to review our long a spelling words. Our class loves technology, and we especially love our ActivBoard!!! J

We read an amusing story: The Farmer in the Hat. That cat sure did make for an interesting farmer! We discussed cause and effect and the characteristics of a play, such as rehearsals, lines, and roles.

In math we continued working with addition and subtraction. We can add ten to a number by using the number chart. We can count forwards and backwards by tens and forwards by fives. We are also beginning to count by even numbers. We are ready to begin counting money next week! It’s going to be a blast!!!

During our unit time, we had a lot of Spooky Fun. We read many spooky books. We completed Dem Bones math, and we made Haunted Hands. Some students brought in extra treats on Friday afternoon, and all of our students left school EXCITED about Halloween! I hope you had a great Halloween. We sure did! Check our family blog for pictures of Kennedy and Case in their costumes.

10/19-10/23

This week we learned all about digraphs th (as in thick) and sh (as in ship). We also studied the –all family.

At the Following Directions Center we had fun making fish for Max to enjoy. At the Vocabulary Center we used magnets to spell our story words. We solved Firehouse Rhymes at the Word Work Center, and we listened to good stories at the Listening Center.

We enjoyed music, art, and computer classes! These are wonderful additions to our classroom creative time.

All week long we learned about fire safety. We watched a fire safety video, learned and practiced the stop, drop, and roll method, made firefighters, and wrote about fire safety. Now we’re fire prepared. We even made edible firetrucks! A big thank you goes to the parents who donated items for the firetrucks and/or those parents who came to the classroom to help make the firetrucks!