Just as a reminder, our classroom does get pretty chilly during the day. Your student can bring a sweater to class or they can leave one here at school just in case.
Please also remember to send your student with a nutritious and delicious snack each day. We have snack in the afternoon and they get pretty hungry after specials! They must be off of the approved snack list in order to eat them in class! Thank you!
From the PTO:
Check the PTO Blog to see events and important information!
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Literacy
Writing:
We are becoming authors in first grade! We began our narrative writing talking about what a narrative is and how we brainstorm ideas. Students were introduced to using a TAK (topic, audience, and key words) to help analyze and understand a writing prompt. Our prompt this week came from the story Stellaluna. In this story Stellaluna makes friends with a group of birds that help care for her. Students wrote a story about a time they helped a friend. Students we also introduced to the flow map this week. A flow map is our graphic organizer/planner that we can use to help organize our thoughts for each narrative. This includes writing or drawing the characters, setting, problem, events, and conclusion of their stories. We started using these to plan our writing.
Reading:
We have finished our first stories Stellaluna and "Dragons and Giants" from Frog and Toad Forever. Within these stories we have discussed how to describe characters and setting using text and picture evidence to support their answers. We have also looked at what the central message is in each story. Students have been working toward the goal of retelling a story. When retelling we want students to be able to give the most important events and details in order. They might even include conclusions they had about the story or emotions the characters were feeling at certain points in the story.
We have also been working on our reading stamina in class! I have noticed so many student logging those minutes at home! Please have your student put their name and date on the log. They can write how many minutes they read each day. I will collect these logs at the end of September when they will get a new one. If they run out of room we will staple a new one to their first.
As students continue to build stamina in class, you may have to build stamina at home too. Start by having your students read 5 minutes on their own and maybe 10 with a parent or sibling. When you see that 5 minutes seems easy for them to maintain focus on reading, then increase their time to 7 minutes on their own. You can continue to build stamina by increasing their "on their own" time. "On their own time" could mean reading aloud to someone at home or reading to themselves. Another great way to begin is to shared reading with your child. Have them pick a story to read with you and take turns reading a page from the story (they read a page, then you read a page etc.). These strategies can help your student increase the amount of time they can focus on reading to themselves.
MathAs students continue to build stamina in class, you may have to build stamina at home too. Start by having your students read 5 minutes on their own and maybe 10 with a parent or sibling. When you see that 5 minutes seems easy for them to maintain focus on reading, then increase their time to 7 minutes on their own. You can continue to build stamina by increasing their "on their own" time. "On their own time" could mean reading aloud to someone at home or reading to themselves. Another great way to begin is to shared reading with your child. Have them pick a story to read with you and take turns reading a page from the story (they read a page, then you read a page etc.). These strategies can help your student increase the amount of time they can focus on reading to themselves.
We have been working hard on our math fluency! We are working on using our rekenreks and tens frames to create two addends that make 10 (2+8, 6+4, 9+1). The idea behind this practice is to gain automaticity in creating 10. We want students to get to the point where you can say 6 and they within a few seconds would say 4. We have also been working on skip counting by 5's, 10's, and 2's. Students have been introduced to nickels and pennies. We know nickels are worth 5 and pennies are worth 1. Our goal is to be able to count the total worth of nickels and pennies together. During number corner we have been practicing recognizing patterns, seeing the pattern of 10 and some more (10+9, 10 +8, 10+7...), seeing the pattern 5 and some more (5+1, 5+2, 5+4 ...), and how to build numbers like 16 using these ideas. For example 16 can be: 5+5+5+1 or 10+5+1 or 10+6.
We will continue to working on our fact fluency to ten as well as to any number within 10. We will also explore measurement with popsicle sticks and cubes.
Social Studies
We began our social studies unit by discussing symbols. Students looked at symbols we see each day as well as important patriotic symbols such as the Bald Eagle and American Flag. In the next few weeks we will also be discussing the job of the president of the United States. We will talk about our current president and important jobs the president has.
We have begun our amazing journey in science focused on light. We have been experimenting with how light moves and what happens if something is put into the path of the beam of light. Students discovered that some objects will block light, while others will let light pass through. We have started talking about how mirrors can reflect light changing its direction completely.
September/October Current Events
** Please also check our School Calendar for other events that may not be listed below! Calendar
September 10 - No School
September 19th - No School
September 25th - Early Release
September 10 - No School
September 19th - No School
September 25th - Early Release
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