Thankful

Hello Room 4 families! Hope you are all looking forward to the holiday season and the family time that is approaching with some time off from school and hopefully some time off from work for you! I want to thank so many of you for attending the potluck and those of you who have visited or are planning to visit to share about your family and your traditions. I am so thankful to have such wonderful families as part of our classroom community! Here is a look at our learning for this week and the short two day week before the Thanksgiving break:

ELA and Writing:

We will be wrapping up unit 4 before the Thanksgiving break. Students have been working on character traits and retelling of stories during their differentiated guided reading time. Students have used Story Grammar Marker to retell and then completed a comprehension packet that goes along with each book they have read. Asking students to respond to their stories in writing builds both their comprehension and writing skills. We have worked on memory words and pattern words ending in -le, -ng, -er and the 3 sounds of -ed (/d/, /ed/ and /t/). 

Students are continuing their work on their "How To" story and will completing it before the break. Students are using: First, Next, Then and Last to talk about their steps and adding warnings and helpful hints. Students are also adding a section to their stories: About the Author, where they share info about themselves. Students are working on punctuation and capitalization. When we get back, students will work on sentence writing and build a stronger understanding of the parts of a sentence and what makes a complete sentence.

Math:

Students will be wrapping up  unit 4 for math before the break. Students have been learning their doubles facts (1+1=2, 2+2=4....) and their near doubles facts (doubles +1), which include 2+2+1/4+1=5. Some students have worked on breaking apart numbers into their doubles pairs and their doubles plus one pairs: 4=2+2 or 5=4+1. When we get back from the break we will dive into our unit on subtraction.

Social Studies:

Students have been learning about families, mostly first hand. We have had so many families and staff members volunteer to speak! It is neat for students to see that everyone's family is so different and how we define a family is different than they thought when we started this unit. Students are in the process of creating a beautiful multi-step family portrait. It is a fun way to infuse art into the unit! When we return from vacation we will wrap the unit up and then start a science unit on air, wind and weather.

Hope you have a great Thanksgiving for those who celebrate it! I also take a little time to think about all the things I am thankful for and how lucky I am! Hope you get to spend some time with your family and awesome Room 4 kids!

Wish List:

-Dry Erase Markers
-Extra Snack
-Tissues

A Room 4 Story

This week for my weekly post I want to share a story that we wrote as a class. We read a story about the Superkids call, "Fiddlesticks", where they pass a stick and each add on to a story, So, we gave it a try in our class and here is our story:

Once upon a time there live a boy named Jack and a girl named Emma and they lived in an enchanted forest. They got bitten by a spider and then they found a lost horse. The horse showed them a magic potion. Emma drank the magic potion but Jack did not. The potion allowed Emma to breath fire like a dragon. Jack was a little nervous about Emma breathing fire so he ran deeper into the forest and soon found himself lost. Suddenly Jack saw two big blue eyes watching him from a bush. The bush moved and out came a baby tiger. Thank goodness it was just a cute baby! Meanwhile, Emma was thinking of a plan to save Jack. She started breathing fire to burn down trees in order to get to Jack. But there was no Jack in sight. Emma continued to burn through the woods, while Jack was in his own pickle. The mom Tiger was nearby and she had seen Jack. She was chasing Jack trying to protect her baby. The baby tiger pounced on his mom, protecting Jack because Jack and the baby were friends. Then the mom tiger ran away with her baby. Emma was breathing fire and then she finally saw Jack. They were both really happy! Emma said, “Let’s follow the burnt trail to find our way back home.” They followed the trail and were finally home. When finally home, they fell quickly asleep. 

ING, ANG, ONG, UNG!

Hello families! This week was a busy one with Halloween (those who celebrate),the rain and the shift in weather to more "normal" fall temps. Here's a (quick) look into our learning:

ELA/Superkids: Students began unit 3 of Superkids. We are starting to learn word patterns and looked at word endings: -le and -ng. So we learned words like cattle, puddle, simple and learned that we need two consonants before the -le so sometimes we need to double to consonant. This is not such an easy rule to remember so we will keep practicing. We also learned the -ng ending such as -ing, ang, ung, and ong. Memory words for this unit are: do, have, show, how, me, and a.  Please keep reading nightly with your child at home! It really makes a difference!

Writing: In writing we started out "How To" unit and we read some  "How To" stories as well as did a demonstration and shared writing for "How to Make a Sun Butter and Jelly Sandwich." You should ask your child about it. It was a lot of fun. Students started to think of ideas for their How To story and things that they know how to do very well. Our first step was then thinking of the materials we would need.

Math:In math this week, we wrapped up our unit on skip counting and part/part/total. We will continue to look at these skills throughout the year and go back into part-part-total when we do more with number lines, addition and subtraction and fact-families, where were learn that addition and subtraction are related.

Family Unit: We started our family unit this week and defined family as a "kick-off". This definition should change as we learn and get deeper into discussion. I suspect by the end of the unit, when we revisit this, it should be quite different. We also looked at some photos of diverse families and had some open discussions. This would be a great topic for you to discuss at home with your child. Students have also started to share who is in their family and started the process of creating a family portrait. We have also had some staff visit and share about their families. Next week I look forward t having some room 4 parents visit and to our family potluck!

Reminders: 

• Family Potluck is on October 8th from 5:30-6:30 in the cafeteria. Don't forget to rsvp.
• Please remember to turn in your child's permission slip for the Nutcracker Field Trip on December 8th. I know it's early but we need to pay in advance to reserve a spot.
• Keep reading nightly with your child at home!

Wish List:

• Snack
• Kleenex
• glue sticks

School in Holland

This week we have a teacher, Sissi, from Holland come visit and help in our classroom. She taught us about Holland and share with us a video about her school and students.She talked to us about life in Holland and brought us a book about Holland and shared a treat with us. It was fun sharing ideas and I hope one day that Crocker Farm teachers can visit her school to gain ideas and knowledge to bring back.

Here's a quick look at our learning this week:

ELA-Students have become more independent and comfortable with our ELA centers. We are doing daily guided reading and written response that is differentiated. Students are working in pairs, groups and independently. We are finishing up the Superkids unit next week and will move from digraphs (wh, th, sh, ch, tch) into endings -ng and -le. Students are practicing tricky memory words: what, where, when, why, who, which. Students also wrapped up their small moment writing and will be starting "How To" writing next week.

Math-Students have been working on using the part/part/total model to solve for the total and missing part. We have been using the number line as a tool to count and practicing counting on from a larger number, when adding larger numbers. Students can also skip count by 2's, 5's and 10's and are able to show the jumps on a number line. We will look at frames and arrows next week and students will look at "rules".

Unit Study-We continued our work in mindfulness and our social/emotional curriculum with 2nd Step. Next week we will start to talk about families. We have 1-2 families interested in sharing their traditions with the class. If you are interested, please let me know!

Reminders:

Our class potluck in on 11/8 from 5:30-6:30. Please rsvp and let me know what you plan on sharing! The more the merrier!

On 12/8 we will go to Academy of Music for a performance of the Nutcracker Ballet. Please return your child's permission slip as soon as possible. Space is limited and we need to get them in early in order to go!

Wish List-classroom snacks!

Families

As I am in the midst of family conferences, I am writing this, and I just wanted to let you know how nice it has been, between both Open House and conferences, to start to get to know the families. All students have things they are working on, but they also have so many strengths, both academically and socially. It is clear that they are well cared for and supported by their families! Thank you! I can't wait for our Family Potluck on November 8th. Please rsvp if you haven't already.

Here's a quick look at our first grade learning: 

In reading we have started centers, where students do partner/group reading, guided teacher reading, independent reading, games and folder work. These centers are all differentiated and Ms. Bartolini, who does intervention also pushes in during this time to work with a small group. Students are working on digraphs: th, wh, sh, tch, and ch. Students are also practicing memory words like she, he, me, her, his, I and the question "w" words: who, what, where, when, why. These can be tricky. Watch for the pattern and memory word lists to come home as we start new units and you can practice with your child if you wish. Keep reading at home and let me know if the books your child is bringing home don't feel right (too easy or too hard).

In math we are working on decomposing numbers. Students are practicing structuring numbers and looking at the part/part/total model, where students are solving for the total and fr the missing part (or addend). Students are solving story problems and working with raw numbers. We have been playing Treasure Hunt at teacher time, to work on skip counting, both forward and backward.

Students have started their 3rd small moment story. This story will be done with less scaffolding than the two previous ones. The first one we wrote as a shared writing project about our farm field trip, the second was individual but all students followed a very specific writing process and it was paced. For this story, students are working more freely at their own pace. At the end of the unit we will share our stories and look for growth from start to finish through this writing unit. We will be wrapping this up next week. We will also be starting our family unit the week of the 30th. 

Your child may mention to you tomorrow when they come home from school that we will be having a teacher visit from the Netherlands. Yes, this is correct. A teacher from the Netherlands is visiting to learn more about schools in the United States. She will teach us about what her day looks like, observe and help in the room. I am sure we will learn a lot from her as well!

Open House Tonight!

Hello Families!

Just a quick entry this week because I am sure I will be chatting with you all in person both this week and next...

Hope you can make it to Open House tonight! It is from 6-6:25 and then the whole school will meet in the cafeteria at 6:30. Following that, the older kids will have their open house at 7:00. First grade open house is very casual. I may say a few (very brief) words and then will have a slide show playing with info about the year and there will be packets with info for families. Students will be the ones to tell you about what they do in first grade and show you their rekenreks and how they use them, as well as their letter to you. If you cannot make it, now worries! Packets will be sent home.

Another quick update is that tomorrow is Field Day! Students will participate in games in the morning and will have a surprise in the afternoon for getting more points than the teacher for behavior last week! Next week are conferences and I look forward to meeting with you all.

In two weeks we will be starting our family unit. Please let me know if you think this might be a difficult subject for your child. I want to be sensitive to all families and situations. Thanks!

Fun in our "Spare" Time

In first grade it doesn't seem like we have a lot spare time in our schedule (thank goodness for our weekly mindfulness), however, this week students took a break and went disco bowling at Spare Time Bowling in Northampton. Okay, so maybe not a total break, as students practiced their combinations of 10, but when learning is all fun, it's not so bad. Thank you to all of our chaperones across the 2 classes! 

As mentioned students continued their math work with combinations of 10 and practiced using the number line to solve story problems with the idea of "start, hop and land". We wrapped up this unit and students showed great progress on their assessments. Next week, we will start part-part-total with unit 3.

In ELA, students started "Adventures of Superkids", with secret decoders and an initial focus on digraphs: /sh/, /ch/, /tch/ and /th/ + /wh/ will be coming up next. Students continued to work on tapping and decoding. We also continue our daily work in Handwriting without Tears and students focus on one letter per day. We are working on using upper and lowercase letters, punctuation and finger spaces in our writing. Students continued their work on their personal small moment stories. Students brainstormed ideas, sketched their ideas, worked on a story lead, started their writing of the body of their story, including: first, next, then and last, and added details to make their stories stronger. We will continue to work on these stories into next week.

Students filled up their 2nd jar of pom-poms and won the teacher-class tally challenge. I have noticed a lot of growth with behavior and listening skills already! Students will celebrate this coming week-TBD!

Hope you all have a great 3-day weekend! 

Here are some reminders: 

• Please return your conference sign-up sheet if you have yet to do so! Would love to meet with all of you.
• Keep reading at home each night-reading logs are not required but keep up all the great reading!
• Back to School Night is on the 12th at 6:00. Hope to see you there!

Wish List:

• Extra snack
• dry erase markers
• chlorox table wipes
• gallon size ziplockbags
• hand sanitizer
• tissue boxes