**The students appeared to have had a restful break and returned ready to learn! We have begun our new cross curricular theme--TRADITIONS and CELEBRATIONS. We talked about what a tradition is--the handing down of a custom, belief or way of doing something from generation to generation or for long periods of time. Families have traditions. Friends have traditions. Schools have traditions. Classrooms have traditions. I shared with the students my tradition of doing a literature study of Gingerbread stories and comparing the various characters and outcomes. At the end of our study we create, decorate and bake gingerbread cookies to share with family and friends. It has been a tradition of mine for 17 years! Please chat this weekend with your child about traditions in your family. We will be talking more about this next week. If you are interested in coming to talk to our class about a holiday you celebrate, let me know. We will be talking about Diwali (India), St. Lucia (Scandinavia), St Nicholas Day (Germany), Hanukkah, the Christmas story, Epiphany, Boxing Day, Kwanzaa and New Years around the World. If you have a special tradition in your family and want to share it with class, let me know and we can schedule a time.
** A BIG SHOUT OUT for one more volunteer to help us bake Gingerbread Cookies!! We have 7--Ms. Jones, Ms. Struckmeyer, Ms. Frank, Ms. Gurgas, Ms. Bovio, Ms. Pointer and Ms. Connelly who is part of our regular station day for that day. If we could have 1 more--that would be perfect! It is Friday, December 7th from 12:30-2:55 pm. Think about it and email me. All you need to bring is cookie sheets and a spatula. I have the dough, sprinkles, rolling pins and cookie cutters and aprons. (It gets a little dusty with the flour, so don't wear your party clothes!)
**Route to Reading Rotation 4 has begun. Your child has brought home a paper indicating the skill that they are working on.
**Report cards will go home on Tuesday, December 4th.
**The PTO sponsored program of CHINESE ACROBATS was totally awesome! The students loved the balancing of bodies, plates and fun rope tricks as well as the colorful costumes and cool music. The gentleman introducing the show said that the acrobats study for many years to perfect their skills. It was a great event! Thanks to our Irving PTO!
**The students enjoyed their second Pajama Day and literature viewing and discussion. There were fuzzy slippers, interesting pajamas and cuddly stuffed animals. The students viewed the talking book, "Harold and the Purple Crayon." Afterwards, they discussed what it would be like to have a magic crayon and what they would draw. This was a great reward for a job well done on collecting Eagle Wings as an entire class!
**Keep sending in those pennies and other coins for the Student Council sponsored, "Pennies for Sandy" drive to raise money for school children affected by Superstorm Sandy. The drive is from now until 12/7.
**The students did enjoy a dance or two at our all school PBIS outdoor dance party today.
**The students are hard at work practicing their songs and instruments for their Winter Concert featuring Kindergarten and First Grade that will be held on Thursday, December 20th at two showings--one at 8:15 am and the second on at 9:45 am. It will be in the Irving Auditorium. Our room parents are finalizing plans for refreshment table and craft making project for families and students. Families, grandparents, aunts, uncles and friend are invited to attend.
**Our Green Team reps, Amare and Ivy are helping reinforce our recycling efforts at lunch time by reminding students were to place trays and milk cartons.
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms Bell Bey discussed and the students participated in an activity related to working together as a team. She also discussed human kindness words and being thoughtful and kind to others.
This week:
It was all about tying up loose ends--a few more Bear stories, completing Unit 3 Transportation in our Treasures Series, reviewing our sight words, letter sounds, blending and segmenting words, counting and adding up sets and thinking about our next cross-curricular theme--Celebrations and Traditions. The students began an inquiry into not only how they celebrate during the winter months, but also how children in other parts of the world celebrate that time. The students began to look through books and internet web sites for information. They observed that many of the celebrations both in our country and other countries, have lights, candles, or lanterns as part of that particular celebration. Stay tuned for more! Our station day activities included putting together sound blending wheels for homework use and sounding out the words they made, creating candles with glitter and jewels (so sparkly), reading and following the directions in their Gingerbread Color Find Book and playing the "Roll a Gingerbread Man Game" with a partner.
Reading/Social Studies: The completed Unit 3 Transportation in our Treasures series. The students built background knowledge about the different ways wheels are used to move people and things around. They worked on their listening comprehension listening to David Shannon's story, "Duck on a Bike," read both in English and in Spanish! Students identified the characters and the plot (what is happening in the story.) They took a closer look at the way the story is organized (a beginning, middle and end), and responded to the story by discussing the connections that can be made from the story to their daily lives. (Sometimes I see kids riding bikes in my neighborhood.) The students retold the story in their own words using their retelling cards. The students reviewed the sight words go and see using chants and rhymes. This week we started using the Wacky Sentences format. I take their sight words and pictures and create a mixed up sentence lacking such things as punctuation, capitalization, word order. The students analyze the sentence and decide how to move the words and pictures around to make sentence make sense. They are really beginning to think about sentence structure!! The students reviewed target sounds Short Ii and Tt and used their elkonin boxes to sound blend and segment 3-4 phoneme words. Lots of discussion on nouns and verbs. The students used their photo cards to create a sentence with noun/verb order. We also had an introduction to Consonant Blends and Digraphs. Do you know the difference? Ask your child! Our Robust Vocabulary this week included ADVENTURE, WHEELS, ATTACH, HAUL and MASSIVE. The students read their pre decodable story, "I see a Truck Go," and made predictions about story content. The students used their oral vocabulary cards to expand their knowledge of types of trucks. The students read, "I Can Go," and practiced reading to a partner to build fluency. The partners discussed the story noting the characters, setting and what was happening. (plot) Our workstation activities included read it and add to it-where students read and discuss their story and then add a new page about what might happen next and share it, playing the Humpty Dumpty short i and a Game, using the iPad app Magnetic Letters to create sentences using their sight words, using a sentence prompt with go and see and illustrating it, sorting words with consonant blends and digraphs and reading and discussing a story and using the iPad app Story Kit to record the story discussion.
Math: The students worked on rote counting to 60. They used their dry erase boards to listen to a given number and record it. They are working on single and double digit numbers. We continue to work on counting by 2"s and 5's. The students worked on the concept of probability and estimation this week. Next week, I will set up our guessing jar activities. The students experimented with weight and balance scales. They also used nonstandard measurement items such as cubes, bears, tiles and pennies to measure the distance around their classmate, the table, a book, their finger. Next week, we will begin to learn strategies to assist in proper number formation. The students are really beginning to listen for information in our story problems in order to tell if you add something or take away something.
Writing: The students have finished work on the Starting Corner Capitals-H K L U V W X Y Z. We will begin our 'Magic C" Capitals next week. The students writing abilities continue to progress! They are really loving their new journals and working hard at letter formation, grammar, spacing between words in a sentence and placement of letters on a given line.
Technology: The iPads continue to support our overall learning. In reading and literacy, student small groups are using the app Word Wizard to sound blend and spell targeted words with short i and a. Individual students are recording there reading using the app Story Kit. It is also used for small group discussions. The apps Montessori Crossword and Magic Reading 2 are assisting small groups of students with blending and segmenting skills. The app Rocket Speller is used to enhance sequencing of letters in a targeted word. In math, the students are working with partners using the iPad app Top It Addition. They are sharpening their memory, attention, spacial reasoning and problem solving as they work on the app Underwater Memory Match.
Literature: "No Jumping on the Bed," "Celebrations," "The Gingerbread Man," "The Gingerbread Man," "The Gingerbread Boy," "Celebrations Around the World."
Friday, November 30, 2012
Wednesday, November 21, 2012
UPDATES for 11/12-11/20 2012
**All of us have much to be thankful for. I am thankful for my students dedication to their education. I am so thankful for our wonderful and hard working assistant, Ms. Dennis, who is always anticipating my every thought! I am so happy to have Mrs. D., who volunteers her time to work with my students every Tuesday. I am thankful for the great support and help of all my kindergarten families. You truly make a difference! Please enjoy your family time together as I will. I hope you have had a chance to listen to our talking story book at the end of this blog. The students have worked so hard on it. Enjoy!!!
**Route to Reading Rotation 4 will begin on Tuesday, November 27th. At that time, you will receive notification of your child's skill level.
**The Irving PTO will sponsor the CHINESE ACROBATS on Tuesday, November 27th at 1:30 pm.
**Trimester 1 has ended. Report cards will go home on Tuesday, December 4th.
**Calling all cooks! We need lots of volunteers for our annual Gingerbread Cookie Baking. We will cut, create, decorate, bake and share on FRIDAY, DECEMBER 7th from 12:30-2:55 pm. I will provide the dough, sprinkles and cookie cutters. You can provide the baking sheets and spatulas and aprons! Please email if you can help. It would be great to have 6-8 parents!
**Our Winter Concert featuring our own KINDERGARTEN and FIRST GRADE is Thursday, December 20th. We have 2 seatings--the first is at 8:15 am. The second one is at 9:45 am. Come share the joy! I will be working with our room parents to coordinate a get together after each program.
**Our field trip to the Brookfield Zoo was awesome!! We had a beautiful day to walk around and see our animal friends. The students spent their free time exploring the world of big cats, gorillas, monkeys, rhinos, kangaroos, bison, wolves, bats, snakes, frogs to name a few and various activities at the Hamill Family Play Zoo. At the Great Bear Wilderness Exhibit, we enjoyed a classroom experience with our instructor, Fay. She guided us through an introduction on bears of all kinds, looking at artifacts and providing activities where the students could compare themselves to the height of a each types of bear. The students saw a black bear skull, touched black bear and polar bear fur and experimented with a grizzly paw print and compared it to their own hand. She took us out to the bear wilderness where the students saw a grizzly, sloth and polar bears up close and personal. The students also viewed Christmas trees decorated by local towns in the area. Our own Irving Girl Scouts and Daisys had a great tree decorated. The bus ride home was quiet and reflective (some napping students!) A special shout out to our volunteers-M. Schwager, C. Cummings, L. Banghart and S. Connelly for their assistance!
This week:
We completed our cross curricular unit on bears. It was all about illustrating and practicing our reading for our recording of our talking story book. What fun! The students listened to a story about life on the Mayflower and what it was like for adults and children in 1620. We took a look of what it was like once they arrived in Jamestown. The students made butter using their gross motor skills to shake the cream as hard as they could. Liquid changing into a solid. A child in the 1620's may have churned the butter from cream and the students made some comparisons. The students used their butter and honey to accompany the Bear Paw Snacks they made. The students had a flat circle of dough and used another circle to shape and roll little circles to make the toes. We all had a mini science lesson on gluten. Our gluten free students used a rice dough. We talked about how gluten is what makes it elastic and rubbery so the toes will stick. The rice flour did not have gluten so it was very hard for the toes to stick. We baked up our paws and served them with our butter and honey. YUM!!!! Our station day activities included creating YES/NO bear pop ups and answering the questions, creating pattern block turkeys, making bear caves (mixed media) and graphing, comparing, counting and recording brown bears and polar bears using teddy grahams.
Reading/Social Studies: The students continue to work in Unit 3 Transportation in our Treasurers Reading series. The students built background knowledge on their travels both near and far. The students listened to the big book story, "On the Go." They observed how people traveled from one place to another and the vehicles they used. We looked up each country on our world map. In their comprehension study, the students compared, contrasted and categorized the types of travel and vehicles. The sight words go and see were reviewed. The students worked on their target sound short i. The students used chants and rhymes to reinforce the sound. The students continued to review the use of action words or verbs. Our Robust Vocabulary this week included TRAVEL, JOURNEY, PREPARE, RELAX and FAMILIAR. In phonemic awareness, the students used their elkonin boxes (sound boxes) to sound blend 3 and 4 letter words using short i. The students read their pre-decodable story, "Go, Go, Go." They made predictions about story content and sound blended the word unknown. During an interactive writing exercise, the students made pop up signs using the word GO to help cheer on kids they knew in the Turkey Trot. We read two poems on transportation. "The Bike" and "Riding the Subway." The students noticed the rhyming in both and help to track the words as I read them. The students worked with partners to create sentences using their sight words and pictures. They shared stories with each other to build fluency. Our workstations this week included reading a story and making your own retelling cards, playing the Long Ride Game with a partner creating words using the word families ip, it, im, at, am, ap, creating a sentence using go and see and illustrating it, creating and categorizing real and nonsense words using the app, Word Wizard and practicing reading their story sentence for our talking story book.
Math: The students began work on sorting by common attribute. They participated in a game called "What's My Rule?" where the students listened and looked for obvious attribute being described by me. Great for enhancing listening skills! The students continued to participate in generating, continuing and copying patterns using blocks, tiles and bears. In our folding paper geometry activity, the students randomly folded their paper creasing it well. They unfolded it to see what shapes were revealed and outlined and colored the shapes. How many 3 sided? How many 4 sided? Any 5 sided shapes? The students wrote numbers from 0-50 on their way to 100 and continue to work on place value.
Writing: The students are working very hard in their yellow writing journals. They are beginning to be more aware of where they write their upper and lowercase letters when writing their sentences. We did have a discussion on where tall lowercase letters are written and where some lowercase are written that fall below the bottom line. The students continue to work on practicing the Starting Corner Capitals they have learned thus far. The students continue to use the writing prompts from their reading series and have also made reflections based on their growing knowledge of bears. We continue to stress beginning with a capital letter, spacing between words in a sentence and using an ending mark. Students are recognizing nouns and now--action words (verbs ) in their sentences.
Technology: In reading, student small groups used the app Word Wizard to create real and nonsense words using the word families--in, ip, it. The students continue to use the app iTalk to record what they sound like when they read. The students are beginning to recall how to email their work to me, They read their page of the talking book using the app Sonic Pics. The students are learning about speaking louder and clear when reading aloud. A shout out to our tech coach, Ms. Ortega for her assistance on our talking book! Students also used the app Montessori Crossword to reinforce segmenting and blending skills. In math, students small groups are using the app Starfall Patterns to practice generating and continuing a pattern. The apps Number Find, Sam Phibian, and Addition are very helpful in their skill development.
Literature: "Baby Bear, Baby Bear, What do you See," Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What do you Hear," "Friends," "A Day in the Life of a Bear Cub," "Polar Bear Cubs,' "Maybe a Bear Ate It," "When Will It Be Spring," "Sleep Big Bear, Sleep." "Polar Bears," "Panda Bear, Panda Bear, What do you See?" "Black Bear Cubs," "Bears in the Forest," "If You Lived in the Time of the Mayflower," "Thanksgiving Is.." "Thanksgiving is for Giving Thanks," "Little Bear Comes Home."
**Route to Reading Rotation 4 will begin on Tuesday, November 27th. At that time, you will receive notification of your child's skill level.
**The Irving PTO will sponsor the CHINESE ACROBATS on Tuesday, November 27th at 1:30 pm.
**Trimester 1 has ended. Report cards will go home on Tuesday, December 4th.
**Calling all cooks! We need lots of volunteers for our annual Gingerbread Cookie Baking. We will cut, create, decorate, bake and share on FRIDAY, DECEMBER 7th from 12:30-2:55 pm. I will provide the dough, sprinkles and cookie cutters. You can provide the baking sheets and spatulas and aprons! Please email if you can help. It would be great to have 6-8 parents!
**Our Winter Concert featuring our own KINDERGARTEN and FIRST GRADE is Thursday, December 20th. We have 2 seatings--the first is at 8:15 am. The second one is at 9:45 am. Come share the joy! I will be working with our room parents to coordinate a get together after each program.
**Our field trip to the Brookfield Zoo was awesome!! We had a beautiful day to walk around and see our animal friends. The students spent their free time exploring the world of big cats, gorillas, monkeys, rhinos, kangaroos, bison, wolves, bats, snakes, frogs to name a few and various activities at the Hamill Family Play Zoo. At the Great Bear Wilderness Exhibit, we enjoyed a classroom experience with our instructor, Fay. She guided us through an introduction on bears of all kinds, looking at artifacts and providing activities where the students could compare themselves to the height of a each types of bear. The students saw a black bear skull, touched black bear and polar bear fur and experimented with a grizzly paw print and compared it to their own hand. She took us out to the bear wilderness where the students saw a grizzly, sloth and polar bears up close and personal. The students also viewed Christmas trees decorated by local towns in the area. Our own Irving Girl Scouts and Daisys had a great tree decorated. The bus ride home was quiet and reflective (some napping students!) A special shout out to our volunteers-M. Schwager, C. Cummings, L. Banghart and S. Connelly for their assistance!
This week:
We completed our cross curricular unit on bears. It was all about illustrating and practicing our reading for our recording of our talking story book. What fun! The students listened to a story about life on the Mayflower and what it was like for adults and children in 1620. We took a look of what it was like once they arrived in Jamestown. The students made butter using their gross motor skills to shake the cream as hard as they could. Liquid changing into a solid. A child in the 1620's may have churned the butter from cream and the students made some comparisons. The students used their butter and honey to accompany the Bear Paw Snacks they made. The students had a flat circle of dough and used another circle to shape and roll little circles to make the toes. We all had a mini science lesson on gluten. Our gluten free students used a rice dough. We talked about how gluten is what makes it elastic and rubbery so the toes will stick. The rice flour did not have gluten so it was very hard for the toes to stick. We baked up our paws and served them with our butter and honey. YUM!!!! Our station day activities included creating YES/NO bear pop ups and answering the questions, creating pattern block turkeys, making bear caves (mixed media) and graphing, comparing, counting and recording brown bears and polar bears using teddy grahams.
Reading/Social Studies: The students continue to work in Unit 3 Transportation in our Treasurers Reading series. The students built background knowledge on their travels both near and far. The students listened to the big book story, "On the Go." They observed how people traveled from one place to another and the vehicles they used. We looked up each country on our world map. In their comprehension study, the students compared, contrasted and categorized the types of travel and vehicles. The sight words go and see were reviewed. The students worked on their target sound short i. The students used chants and rhymes to reinforce the sound. The students continued to review the use of action words or verbs. Our Robust Vocabulary this week included TRAVEL, JOURNEY, PREPARE, RELAX and FAMILIAR. In phonemic awareness, the students used their elkonin boxes (sound boxes) to sound blend 3 and 4 letter words using short i. The students read their pre-decodable story, "Go, Go, Go." They made predictions about story content and sound blended the word unknown. During an interactive writing exercise, the students made pop up signs using the word GO to help cheer on kids they knew in the Turkey Trot. We read two poems on transportation. "The Bike" and "Riding the Subway." The students noticed the rhyming in both and help to track the words as I read them. The students worked with partners to create sentences using their sight words and pictures. They shared stories with each other to build fluency. Our workstations this week included reading a story and making your own retelling cards, playing the Long Ride Game with a partner creating words using the word families ip, it, im, at, am, ap, creating a sentence using go and see and illustrating it, creating and categorizing real and nonsense words using the app, Word Wizard and practicing reading their story sentence for our talking story book.
Math: The students began work on sorting by common attribute. They participated in a game called "What's My Rule?" where the students listened and looked for obvious attribute being described by me. Great for enhancing listening skills! The students continued to participate in generating, continuing and copying patterns using blocks, tiles and bears. In our folding paper geometry activity, the students randomly folded their paper creasing it well. They unfolded it to see what shapes were revealed and outlined and colored the shapes. How many 3 sided? How many 4 sided? Any 5 sided shapes? The students wrote numbers from 0-50 on their way to 100 and continue to work on place value.
Writing: The students are working very hard in their yellow writing journals. They are beginning to be more aware of where they write their upper and lowercase letters when writing their sentences. We did have a discussion on where tall lowercase letters are written and where some lowercase are written that fall below the bottom line. The students continue to work on practicing the Starting Corner Capitals they have learned thus far. The students continue to use the writing prompts from their reading series and have also made reflections based on their growing knowledge of bears. We continue to stress beginning with a capital letter, spacing between words in a sentence and using an ending mark. Students are recognizing nouns and now--action words (verbs ) in their sentences.
Technology: In reading, student small groups used the app Word Wizard to create real and nonsense words using the word families--in, ip, it. The students continue to use the app iTalk to record what they sound like when they read. The students are beginning to recall how to email their work to me, They read their page of the talking book using the app Sonic Pics. The students are learning about speaking louder and clear when reading aloud. A shout out to our tech coach, Ms. Ortega for her assistance on our talking book! Students also used the app Montessori Crossword to reinforce segmenting and blending skills. In math, students small groups are using the app Starfall Patterns to practice generating and continuing a pattern. The apps Number Find, Sam Phibian, and Addition are very helpful in their skill development.
Literature: "Baby Bear, Baby Bear, What do you See," Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What do you Hear," "Friends," "A Day in the Life of a Bear Cub," "Polar Bear Cubs,' "Maybe a Bear Ate It," "When Will It Be Spring," "Sleep Big Bear, Sleep." "Polar Bears," "Panda Bear, Panda Bear, What do you See?" "Black Bear Cubs," "Bears in the Forest," "If You Lived in the Time of the Mayflower," "Thanksgiving Is.." "Thanksgiving is for Giving Thanks," "Little Bear Comes Home."
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Saturday, November 10, 2012
UPDATES for 11/5-11/9 2012
**What qualities make a strong leader? The students pondered that question as well as learning about the process of voting for a president. The students learned about the candidates and found that they are men with families and pets and interests just like everyone else. They both have a strong desire to lead the country. The students listened to the story, "I Can Be President Too." We had a great discussion about the qualities of a strong leader. Many students talked about our own school's Eagle Essentials. Some of the girls wondered if there would ever be a woman president. Some wondered if they could be president when they are older. It was so cool to see how they saw themselves as citizens wanting to make a difference. The students cast their ballot in a school wide election under the direction of Mr. Packer. They got to sign in and go to a voting booth. Many students expressed a interest in going with their parents to view the voting process up close and personal.
**Don't forget to send in permission slip and money for our Field Trip to Brookfield Zoo. I would like them all in by Wednesday. I will email those of you who have expressed an interest in volunteering to come with us. Our trip is Monday, November 19th. We will leave school at 9:30 am. and return by 2:00 pm. Students and teachers will ride our school bus. Parent volunteers will carpool. I have money for your parking fee. Students need to bring a bag lunch and dress for the weather.
**There has been a change in the date of author Fran Manushkin's visit. It has been changed to Monday, November 19th. We will not be able to attend due tour field trip but your child can still order books if you choose to. The order blank is in you child's homework folder.
**Picture Retake Day is Tuesday, November 13th most likely in the morning. Please note that if you ordered pictures you will automatically receive a class picture too.
**The Turkey Trot Race for grades 3-5 is Thursday, November 15th at 2:00 pm. We will be out to cheer them on. Who will win the turkey??!!
**Our Student Council reps, Angus and Isabella were so excited to share with us that there were so many boxes of food collected, it was all over Mr. Gray's room. Great Job! They also reported that they are discussing ways to help the people affected by Superstorm Sandy. More info will follow--stay tuned.
**The Wellness Committee sponsored another Taste Test on Wednesday. This time they served quinoa and asked for reactions. Some students had heard of it and even tasted it before. Some students said NO WAY to trying it but others were more adventurous.
**Route to Reading Rotation 2 will conclude on Wednesday. At that time, you will receive information on your child's skill mastery. Route to Reading Rotation 3 will begin on Tuesday, November 27th.
**CALLING ALL COOKS!! We will need several volunteers for our annual gingerbread cookie baking on Friday, December 7th from 12:30-2:l55 pm. No experience needed!! Create, decorate, bake and share. Email me if interested. This activity is part of our cross-curricular unit on Traditions and Celebrations.
**SAVE the DATE! Our WINTER CONCERT featuring Kindergarten and First Grade is Thursday, December 20th. Because of our large class sizes, the concert will be held twice--first performance is at 8:15 am.--the second performance is at 9:45 am. in the Irving Auditorium. The students are already practicing!!
This week:
It was all about BEARS! We continued our inquiry on black and brown bears. The students gather information from books and online resources on habitats, characteristics and food. We have a black bear skull, bear fur, bear claw and some other interesting artifacts courtesy of the Field Museum on our nature table. The students learned that the black bear is the most common bear in North America. The students began to notice some differences between the brown and black bears (smaller paws, smaller claws, loves honey!) Stay tuned--our study will include polar bears next week. Our station day activities this week included, creating a pattern block design and counting and recording the number of shapes used, writing and illustrating a page for our talking book (our take on the Brown Bear, Brown Bear story,) sequencing the stages in a bears growth and development, creating a bear paw using mixed media and word search with short i words.
Reading/Social Studies: The students have begun work on Unit 3 Transportation in our Treasures Reading series. The students discussed what is meant by transportation--a way to move people and things from one place to another. They brainstormed ways that they get around and discussed forms of transportation that move fast and slow. They listened to the Big Book story, "A Bus for Us." The students made predictions about story content using the title and picture. The students made connections in their own lives about the various vehicles showcased in the story. The sight words see and go were introduced. Our target sounds for this week are Tt and short i. They worked on activities that had Tt as the first and last sound in a word and hearing short i in the middle of words. (think of Pickles the Pig!!) In our grammar section, the students learned about action words or verbs. They had a blast acting out an action word and having others guess it. As part of listening comprehension, the students listened to the big book story for a second time and then used the retelling cards to retell the story in their own words. The students had a lively discussion about vehicles mentioned in the story and their function. Our Robust Vocabulary this week included TRANSPORTATION, VEHICLE, RAPIDLY, GLIDE and CONTINUE. In our phonemic awareness study, the students used their sound boxes to mark where they heard the sound. They practiced blending 3-4 letter words using their sound boxes. The students read their predecodable story, "I am Sam." They continue to finger point each word and picture. They are beginning to take note of how they read--choppy or smooth? They are working toward becoming more fluent readers. In our story, "Tam Can See," students practiced their sound blending and share their story with a partner. Our workstation activities this week included, contributing to a graph about how we travel to school, writing a sentence about how we travel to school, illustrating and writing about a vehicle, reading a selected story, discussing it with a partner and filling out a Readers Response form, recording their sight words and creating real and nonsense words using the word family in on the iPad.
Math: The students reviewed all basic shapes and pattern block shapes. They worked on recognizing geometric solids--cones, cubes, cylinders, spheres and finding examples in the classroom. They continue to work on creating and continuing a pattern and finding patterns in math. (what is the pattern in counting by 5's?) The students worked on counting on from a random number, counting by 10's to 60 and recognizing numbers 0-75. The activities Top It Tally --draw 2 cards--what person has the higher number--you get a tally--was introduced as well as Top It Tally Addition on the iPad. They continue to explore creating multidimensional structures. Lots of team work in the creating!!
Writing: The students are working on Starting Corner Capitals--H, L, K. They worked on their mini boards with chalk and sponges. In our journals this week, the student used the last of their beginning journal
folders. They wrote about what they knew about bears. Next week, they will be starting in their Yellow Journals. These journal have lines for upper and lowercase letters. The students are very excited about this. They are beginning to take a much closer look at where they place letters. There is a place for upper case--dark lines on top and bottom, and a place for lowercase--dotted line. The students were also made aware of tall lowercase and lowercase letters that go below the black line. I notice them being more aware of where they place letters on lined paper.
Technology: In reading, small student groups worked with the app Montessori Crossword to listen and create 3 letter words. The app Magnetic Letters was used as students made sentences containing their sight words and learned to save the image and then recorded themselves reading their sentences and critiquing how they sound. Small student groups use the app Reading Magic to create real and nonsense words using the word family in. Students continue to read into the app iTalk to hear how they sound when reading. In math, small groups, students were introduced to the app Top It Addition and worked with a partner to add the number to see who had the greater sum. Monster Squeeze, Dot to Dot Lite, Into to Math, Sam Phibian and Number Find continue to be favorites to enhance skills being taught in the classroom.
Literature: "I Can be President Too," "So You Want to be the President?" "Amazing Bears," "Bears in the Forest," "A Baby Bear," "Black Bear Cubs," "Hibernation," "Hibernation Station," "Bears," "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do You See?" "Black Bears-Osos Negros," "Every Autumn Comes a Bear."
**Don't forget to send in permission slip and money for our Field Trip to Brookfield Zoo. I would like them all in by Wednesday. I will email those of you who have expressed an interest in volunteering to come with us. Our trip is Monday, November 19th. We will leave school at 9:30 am. and return by 2:00 pm. Students and teachers will ride our school bus. Parent volunteers will carpool. I have money for your parking fee. Students need to bring a bag lunch and dress for the weather.
**There has been a change in the date of author Fran Manushkin's visit. It has been changed to Monday, November 19th. We will not be able to attend due tour field trip but your child can still order books if you choose to. The order blank is in you child's homework folder.
**Picture Retake Day is Tuesday, November 13th most likely in the morning. Please note that if you ordered pictures you will automatically receive a class picture too.
**The Turkey Trot Race for grades 3-5 is Thursday, November 15th at 2:00 pm. We will be out to cheer them on. Who will win the turkey??!!
**Our Student Council reps, Angus and Isabella were so excited to share with us that there were so many boxes of food collected, it was all over Mr. Gray's room. Great Job! They also reported that they are discussing ways to help the people affected by Superstorm Sandy. More info will follow--stay tuned.
**The Wellness Committee sponsored another Taste Test on Wednesday. This time they served quinoa and asked for reactions. Some students had heard of it and even tasted it before. Some students said NO WAY to trying it but others were more adventurous.
**Route to Reading Rotation 2 will conclude on Wednesday. At that time, you will receive information on your child's skill mastery. Route to Reading Rotation 3 will begin on Tuesday, November 27th.
**CALLING ALL COOKS!! We will need several volunteers for our annual gingerbread cookie baking on Friday, December 7th from 12:30-2:l55 pm. No experience needed!! Create, decorate, bake and share. Email me if interested. This activity is part of our cross-curricular unit on Traditions and Celebrations.
**SAVE the DATE! Our WINTER CONCERT featuring Kindergarten and First Grade is Thursday, December 20th. Because of our large class sizes, the concert will be held twice--first performance is at 8:15 am.--the second performance is at 9:45 am. in the Irving Auditorium. The students are already practicing!!
This week:
It was all about BEARS! We continued our inquiry on black and brown bears. The students gather information from books and online resources on habitats, characteristics and food. We have a black bear skull, bear fur, bear claw and some other interesting artifacts courtesy of the Field Museum on our nature table. The students learned that the black bear is the most common bear in North America. The students began to notice some differences between the brown and black bears (smaller paws, smaller claws, loves honey!) Stay tuned--our study will include polar bears next week. Our station day activities this week included, creating a pattern block design and counting and recording the number of shapes used, writing and illustrating a page for our talking book (our take on the Brown Bear, Brown Bear story,) sequencing the stages in a bears growth and development, creating a bear paw using mixed media and word search with short i words.
Reading/Social Studies: The students have begun work on Unit 3 Transportation in our Treasures Reading series. The students discussed what is meant by transportation--a way to move people and things from one place to another. They brainstormed ways that they get around and discussed forms of transportation that move fast and slow. They listened to the Big Book story, "A Bus for Us." The students made predictions about story content using the title and picture. The students made connections in their own lives about the various vehicles showcased in the story. The sight words see and go were introduced. Our target sounds for this week are Tt and short i. They worked on activities that had Tt as the first and last sound in a word and hearing short i in the middle of words. (think of Pickles the Pig!!) In our grammar section, the students learned about action words or verbs. They had a blast acting out an action word and having others guess it. As part of listening comprehension, the students listened to the big book story for a second time and then used the retelling cards to retell the story in their own words. The students had a lively discussion about vehicles mentioned in the story and their function. Our Robust Vocabulary this week included TRANSPORTATION, VEHICLE, RAPIDLY, GLIDE and CONTINUE. In our phonemic awareness study, the students used their sound boxes to mark where they heard the sound. They practiced blending 3-4 letter words using their sound boxes. The students read their predecodable story, "I am Sam." They continue to finger point each word and picture. They are beginning to take note of how they read--choppy or smooth? They are working toward becoming more fluent readers. In our story, "Tam Can See," students practiced their sound blending and share their story with a partner. Our workstation activities this week included, contributing to a graph about how we travel to school, writing a sentence about how we travel to school, illustrating and writing about a vehicle, reading a selected story, discussing it with a partner and filling out a Readers Response form, recording their sight words and creating real and nonsense words using the word family in on the iPad.
Math: The students reviewed all basic shapes and pattern block shapes. They worked on recognizing geometric solids--cones, cubes, cylinders, spheres and finding examples in the classroom. They continue to work on creating and continuing a pattern and finding patterns in math. (what is the pattern in counting by 5's?) The students worked on counting on from a random number, counting by 10's to 60 and recognizing numbers 0-75. The activities Top It Tally --draw 2 cards--what person has the higher number--you get a tally--was introduced as well as Top It Tally Addition on the iPad. They continue to explore creating multidimensional structures. Lots of team work in the creating!!
Writing: The students are working on Starting Corner Capitals--H, L, K. They worked on their mini boards with chalk and sponges. In our journals this week, the student used the last of their beginning journal
folders. They wrote about what they knew about bears. Next week, they will be starting in their Yellow Journals. These journal have lines for upper and lowercase letters. The students are very excited about this. They are beginning to take a much closer look at where they place letters. There is a place for upper case--dark lines on top and bottom, and a place for lowercase--dotted line. The students were also made aware of tall lowercase and lowercase letters that go below the black line. I notice them being more aware of where they place letters on lined paper.
Technology: In reading, small student groups worked with the app Montessori Crossword to listen and create 3 letter words. The app Magnetic Letters was used as students made sentences containing their sight words and learned to save the image and then recorded themselves reading their sentences and critiquing how they sound. Small student groups use the app Reading Magic to create real and nonsense words using the word family in. Students continue to read into the app iTalk to hear how they sound when reading. In math, small groups, students were introduced to the app Top It Addition and worked with a partner to add the number to see who had the greater sum. Monster Squeeze, Dot to Dot Lite, Into to Math, Sam Phibian and Number Find continue to be favorites to enhance skills being taught in the classroom.
Literature: "I Can be President Too," "So You Want to be the President?" "Amazing Bears," "Bears in the Forest," "A Baby Bear," "Black Bear Cubs," "Hibernation," "Hibernation Station," "Bears," "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do You See?" "Black Bears-Osos Negros," "Every Autumn Comes a Bear."
Saturday, November 3, 2012
UPDATES for 10/29-11/2 2012
**It has been an exciting week at Irving School! Our leaf collection is complete. The students categorized leaves by their color, shape, edges (pointy.) Students were chosen to label each leaf group. Smile for the group photo!! On Halloween, the students made their bat origami and had a chance to fly their bats inside the classroom. Our Halloween Parade and Party were fun. There was a chill in the air but Super Heroes, Jedi Knights, Princesses, Bumble Bees, Furry Animals, Mummies and Prairie Girls were among the highlights of our classroom costumes. There was even a giant spider and Human M and M. The students enjoyed refreshments and leaf and spider rubbings when they returned to the classroom. A BIG THANKS to our Room Parents and Volunteers for assistance on a very busy day. Our 50th Day of School was full of the number 50. In the afternoon, the students worked in math stations playing "Race to 50," creating 50's inspired patterns and completing our number grid to 50.
**MILLION MINUTES UPDATE : Sophie's mom reports that 19 students have read 300 minutes!!
That qualifies them for a red ribbon!! Our class has read a total of 15,000 minutes!!! WOW! Let's keep reading everyone. We can do it! The next benchmark will be 600 minutes.
**Students participated in an informative presentation by Ms. Allen of the Multicultural Center on Dia De Los Muertos, a Mexican celebration of the dead. Ms. Allen used a variety of pictures and artifacts in her presentation. At the end, the students were able to go up close and personal and look as well as try some of the instruments and artifacts. Great presentation!
**Thanks to all of you who sent food for ROCK the PANTRY. It was a total success and Room 110 were all rock stars. I am told that Student Council has an amazing amount of food to give to the Food Pantry. Our reps, Angus and Isabella will help pack it up for shipping at their Tuesday meeting.
**Information and permission slip for our field trip to BROOKFIELD ZOO is in your child's folder. The cost of the trip is $7.00. It will take place on Monday, November 19th. Please send in your slip and money ASAP. Thanks!
**NO SCHOOL on Tuesday, November 6th--Election Day. This is a Teacher's Institute Day.
**Students at Irving School will cast their own ballots on Monday, November 5th. Who will be our next president??!! Mr. Packer will have our school results by the end of the day.
**The Wellness Committee is having another Taste Test on Wednesday, November 7th at 2:00 pm. The clue is--something you can eat with a spoon!
**Picture Retake Day is Tuesday, November 13th in the morning.
**Irving School's Annual Turkey Trot is Thursday, November 15th at 2:15 pm. Come on out and cheer students from Grades 3-5. Who will win the turkey this year????
**Author Fran Manushkin of the Katie Woo stories fame will be visiting Irving School on Tuesday, November 20th at 9:00 am.
**SAVE the DATE! Our WINTER CONCERT featuring Kindergarten and First Grade is Thursday, December 20th. Because of our large class sizes, the concert will be held twice--first performance is at 8:15 am.--the second performance is at 9:45 am. in the Irving Auditorium. It is going to be great!
**Mr. Packer continues to work with student small groups on a Probability and Chance project.
**Ms. Bell Bey continued with her unit on Personal Safety.
This week:
It was all about skeletons, the number 50 and leaves! Skeletons are not so scary. Everyone has one! The students viewed a human leg bone (courtesy of my brother, Dr. Gullo,) animals bones, a lizard bone, a backbone of a mouse and of course examined our own resident skeleton, Mr. Skelly. The students read informational texts about the human body. They learned that we would just be blobs without our skeletons. We have 206 bones in our bodies but babies have more! That is because their bones are not fully fused together. Our own Lucy, shared a great book called, "Dem Bones." The story took a look at how all the bones connect! We will see the story and music version on Monday. The number 50 will be cover in the Math section. The students did have fun dressing up in 50's garb--white shirts, slicked back hair, pony tail ans even a pink poodle skirt! The students discussed, labeled and photographed their leaf collection. We began our second author study on author and illustrator Lois Elhert and read the story, "Leaf Man." We also began pour prep inquiry on our next cross-curricular theme--Bears. Station Day activities this week included creating our own leaf man or animal--we will write about it on Monday, sponge painted bears, patterns block bears, unifix cube build, count and record and writing 50 words.
Reading/Social Studies: The students are working to complete Unit 2 Friends in our Treasures Reading series. This week centered around friends who solve problems together. The students listened to the story, "Simon and Molly Plus Hester." They asked and answered questions and responded to the literature by making connections in their own lives. The students reviewed the sight words a and like and used them in their written sentences. They reviewed letter sounds Pp and Ss and what a noun is. Students took turns in small group retelling our story using the retelling cards. In phonemic awareness, the students categorized and blended phonemes (individual sounds) to create 3 letter words. The students read their pre decodable story, " I Like, We Like." They made predictions about story content and practiced reading to a partner. We used our oral vocabulary cards to develop our Robust Vocabulary in the tale from Haiti called, "The Turtle and the Sheep." Robust Vocabulary this week included PROBLEM, SOLVE, GRATEFUL, THOUGHTFUL and INCLUDE. Our reading puppet, Mr. Happy assisted in our blending of 3 letter words. The students used their dry erase boards to record the sound they heard at the beginning or at the end of a given word. In our read aloud folktale, "The Little Red Hen," the students listened to fluent reading, recurring phrases and discussed what the lesson of the story was. The students sequenced events in the story. The students read their predecodable stories, "Pam" and "We Like" and practiced reading for fluency. We continue to review asking questions, nouns, colors and initial sounds Pp, Ss, Aa and Mm. Workstations this week included, creating a sentence 2 friends might say to each other and putting it in a speech bubble, expressing your feelings by drawing yourself happy and sad and writing a sentence about both, reading and discussing a story and creating a new page, using iTalk to record students reading and playing it back for their own critique and working with blends or short a word construction using Word Wizard.
Math: The students practiced counting to 50 by 1's and by 10's. They practiced writing their numbers to 50. The students continued work on creating 2 and then 3 dimensional structures using straws and pipe cleaners, Magneetos, Mini Magneetos and Konnects. Some students worked together with others for a combined project. We are in the process of setting up a Structure Museum! Students are working on telling a number story--tell a 2 plus 1 story --tell a 5 minus 2 story. The students are beginning to understand the combining and decomposing of sets. We continue to work on counting by 10's and place value.
Writing: We have begun looking at the formation of our Starting Corner Capitals--H, K, L. The students are using wooden pieces to assist in formation understanding, They continue to use their mini boards, chalk, sponges. The students are beginning to use more lowercase in their journals and are beginning to locate where to write an uppercase letter and lowercase letter on lined paper. Students continue to use inventive spelling and their sight vocabulary to create sentences. I am stressing starting with a capital letter and making sure there is a space between every word. All sentences have some sort of ending mark.
Technology: In reading, student small groups used the app Montessori Crossword to sound out words with 3 sounds--Look at the picture-- touch the box--listen to the sound--find the letter and move it to the box to spell the word, the same app was used with student small groups working with beginning blends. Partners worked on the app iCardSort to move words into categories--colors--not colors. Students are practicing their listening to a recording of themselves reading using the app iTalk. In math, students continue to work with the apps Monster Squeeze, Dot to Dot Lite, Intro to Math and Sam Phibian. This week we introduced the app Number Find.
Literature: "Leaf Man," "Creak, Thump, Crack," "Dem Bones," "Your Bones," "The Thirteen Nights of Halloween," "Skeleton Cat," "Skeletons," "Mi Cuerpo," "The Human Body," "Going on a Bear Hunt," "Amazing Bears," "Bears."
**MILLION MINUTES UPDATE : Sophie's mom reports that 19 students have read 300 minutes!!
That qualifies them for a red ribbon!! Our class has read a total of 15,000 minutes!!! WOW! Let's keep reading everyone. We can do it! The next benchmark will be 600 minutes.
**Students participated in an informative presentation by Ms. Allen of the Multicultural Center on Dia De Los Muertos, a Mexican celebration of the dead. Ms. Allen used a variety of pictures and artifacts in her presentation. At the end, the students were able to go up close and personal and look as well as try some of the instruments and artifacts. Great presentation!
**Thanks to all of you who sent food for ROCK the PANTRY. It was a total success and Room 110 were all rock stars. I am told that Student Council has an amazing amount of food to give to the Food Pantry. Our reps, Angus and Isabella will help pack it up for shipping at their Tuesday meeting.
**Information and permission slip for our field trip to BROOKFIELD ZOO is in your child's folder. The cost of the trip is $7.00. It will take place on Monday, November 19th. Please send in your slip and money ASAP. Thanks!
**NO SCHOOL on Tuesday, November 6th--Election Day. This is a Teacher's Institute Day.
**Students at Irving School will cast their own ballots on Monday, November 5th. Who will be our next president??!! Mr. Packer will have our school results by the end of the day.
**The Wellness Committee is having another Taste Test on Wednesday, November 7th at 2:00 pm. The clue is--something you can eat with a spoon!
**Picture Retake Day is Tuesday, November 13th in the morning.
**Irving School's Annual Turkey Trot is Thursday, November 15th at 2:15 pm. Come on out and cheer students from Grades 3-5. Who will win the turkey this year????
**Author Fran Manushkin of the Katie Woo stories fame will be visiting Irving School on Tuesday, November 20th at 9:00 am.
**SAVE the DATE! Our WINTER CONCERT featuring Kindergarten and First Grade is Thursday, December 20th. Because of our large class sizes, the concert will be held twice--first performance is at 8:15 am.--the second performance is at 9:45 am. in the Irving Auditorium. It is going to be great!
**Mr. Packer continues to work with student small groups on a Probability and Chance project.
**Ms. Bell Bey continued with her unit on Personal Safety.
This week:
It was all about skeletons, the number 50 and leaves! Skeletons are not so scary. Everyone has one! The students viewed a human leg bone (courtesy of my brother, Dr. Gullo,) animals bones, a lizard bone, a backbone of a mouse and of course examined our own resident skeleton, Mr. Skelly. The students read informational texts about the human body. They learned that we would just be blobs without our skeletons. We have 206 bones in our bodies but babies have more! That is because their bones are not fully fused together. Our own Lucy, shared a great book called, "Dem Bones." The story took a look at how all the bones connect! We will see the story and music version on Monday. The number 50 will be cover in the Math section. The students did have fun dressing up in 50's garb--white shirts, slicked back hair, pony tail ans even a pink poodle skirt! The students discussed, labeled and photographed their leaf collection. We began our second author study on author and illustrator Lois Elhert and read the story, "Leaf Man." We also began pour prep inquiry on our next cross-curricular theme--Bears. Station Day activities this week included creating our own leaf man or animal--we will write about it on Monday, sponge painted bears, patterns block bears, unifix cube build, count and record and writing 50 words.
Reading/Social Studies: The students are working to complete Unit 2 Friends in our Treasures Reading series. This week centered around friends who solve problems together. The students listened to the story, "Simon and Molly Plus Hester." They asked and answered questions and responded to the literature by making connections in their own lives. The students reviewed the sight words a and like and used them in their written sentences. They reviewed letter sounds Pp and Ss and what a noun is. Students took turns in small group retelling our story using the retelling cards. In phonemic awareness, the students categorized and blended phonemes (individual sounds) to create 3 letter words. The students read their pre decodable story, " I Like, We Like." They made predictions about story content and practiced reading to a partner. We used our oral vocabulary cards to develop our Robust Vocabulary in the tale from Haiti called, "The Turtle and the Sheep." Robust Vocabulary this week included PROBLEM, SOLVE, GRATEFUL, THOUGHTFUL and INCLUDE. Our reading puppet, Mr. Happy assisted in our blending of 3 letter words. The students used their dry erase boards to record the sound they heard at the beginning or at the end of a given word. In our read aloud folktale, "The Little Red Hen," the students listened to fluent reading, recurring phrases and discussed what the lesson of the story was. The students sequenced events in the story. The students read their predecodable stories, "Pam" and "We Like" and practiced reading for fluency. We continue to review asking questions, nouns, colors and initial sounds Pp, Ss, Aa and Mm. Workstations this week included, creating a sentence 2 friends might say to each other and putting it in a speech bubble, expressing your feelings by drawing yourself happy and sad and writing a sentence about both, reading and discussing a story and creating a new page, using iTalk to record students reading and playing it back for their own critique and working with blends or short a word construction using Word Wizard.
Math: The students practiced counting to 50 by 1's and by 10's. They practiced writing their numbers to 50. The students continued work on creating 2 and then 3 dimensional structures using straws and pipe cleaners, Magneetos, Mini Magneetos and Konnects. Some students worked together with others for a combined project. We are in the process of setting up a Structure Museum! Students are working on telling a number story--tell a 2 plus 1 story --tell a 5 minus 2 story. The students are beginning to understand the combining and decomposing of sets. We continue to work on counting by 10's and place value.
Writing: We have begun looking at the formation of our Starting Corner Capitals--H, K, L. The students are using wooden pieces to assist in formation understanding, They continue to use their mini boards, chalk, sponges. The students are beginning to use more lowercase in their journals and are beginning to locate where to write an uppercase letter and lowercase letter on lined paper. Students continue to use inventive spelling and their sight vocabulary to create sentences. I am stressing starting with a capital letter and making sure there is a space between every word. All sentences have some sort of ending mark.
Technology: In reading, student small groups used the app Montessori Crossword to sound out words with 3 sounds--Look at the picture-- touch the box--listen to the sound--find the letter and move it to the box to spell the word, the same app was used with student small groups working with beginning blends. Partners worked on the app iCardSort to move words into categories--colors--not colors. Students are practicing their listening to a recording of themselves reading using the app iTalk. In math, students continue to work with the apps Monster Squeeze, Dot to Dot Lite, Intro to Math and Sam Phibian. This week we introduced the app Number Find.
Literature: "Leaf Man," "Creak, Thump, Crack," "Dem Bones," "Your Bones," "The Thirteen Nights of Halloween," "Skeleton Cat," "Skeletons," "Mi Cuerpo," "The Human Body," "Going on a Bear Hunt," "Amazing Bears," "Bears."
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