**It has been a busy week! The students are busy tracking the growth of their sprouted seeds. They are becoming plant nurturers! Our class garden is also sprouting. Next week we will plant our cucumber, carrot, nasturtium and sweet basil seeds in our outside planting bed. Students from RED BEAR Table will be responsible for bringing in "food" to "feed" our "wormy" compost. Once again, little bits of paper, banana/peel, veggies, egg shells, (nothing cooked or orange peels) are acceptable.
**Don't forget to send back the permission slip for our Walking Field Trip to the Oak Park Conservatory. It is this coming TUESDAY!! I cannot take anyone who doesn't have a slip in.
**In your child's homework folder--please look for 3....yes....3 permission slips for future Field Trips! Barrie Park Lunch-May 20th----Trip to visit and learn about raising chickens and eggs in the Gurgas/Chien backyard-May 21st and Pizza and Play-Annual End of the Year Family Picnic at Rehm Park-May 28th. All trips a being powered by FEET! There is a $2.00 cost for Pizza and Play. I will be mobilizing our wonderful room parents to help in organizing Pizza and Play. They will be contacting you. If you would be so kind as to send back all permission slips as soon as you can--that would be much appreciated. Please feel free to join us on any of our trips---especially Pizza and Play. Siblings are most welcome!
**I am beginning to send home student Science Journals and work portfolios. Your child's past Science Journals are enclosed. Work portfolios are next week and then Writing Journals. Marvel at the growth!!!!!
**Students are having a great time listening to the "Traveling Poets" coming to our room, as well as traveling to Ms. Williams, Mr. Hancock and Ms. Saliny's room to recite their poetry. Our students will travel again next Thursday. Keep practicing your poems!!!
**We have 5 SLAMMERS signed up to recite poetry at the Poetry Slam/Art Fest to be held next week on Thursday evening, May 17th. The Kindergarten-2nd Grade slammers will go on at 7:00 pm in the auditorium. I will send you specific info on our meeting place next week. Come on----there is room for more slammers!!!!! Join in the fun!!!! Remember, you can recite your favorite poem, write your own poem, recite your traveling poets poem, sing, rap etc. You can recite solo, in a group, partner up, with a sib or parent. See the schedule enclosed for all the other events going on. Let's celebrate the arts!!!
**RUN WITH ME!! Come on out this Saturday, May 11th at 8:00 am to Lindberg Park for District 97's Annual Fun Run around the park. We had a nice turn out from Irving!!!!
**The students will be planting in our class garden bed this coming Monday, May 13th at 8:30 am. Ellie's mom will help get our soil ready. We will be learning about garden tools and view a video on planting cucumbers prior to our planting.
**Family Math Night is Tuesday, May 21st from 6:30-8:00 pm. This years theme is MONEY MADNESS. Let me know if you need a sign up sheet.
**All School Olympic Day is Friday, May 24th around the school. We will perform our Olympic feats from 8:30-10:30 am. Stop by to see us!
**Our final assessments for this year are almost complete. A HUGE THANKS to our Route to Reading teacher, Mrs. Cruz and our beloved Ms. Dennis for their assistance in testing this week. Report cards will go home on Friday, May 31st, the last of school.
**NO SCHOOL--Monday 27th in observance of Memorial Day.
**Last day of school events---Please join us for Family Hour on Friday, May 31st from 12:55-2:55 pm. We will sign autographs, have refreshments, get our summer packets/report cards and read a closing story. All are welcome!
This week: It was all about our sprouting seeds and baby plants! The students came back to a great discovery on Monday. Most of their seeds had germinated. All morning glories, marigolds and sunflowers showed signs of growth at about 5 days. The nasturtium plants took longer at about 9 days. Students hypothesized that the very hard coat surrounding the seed was why it took longer for the seed to soften. Each day the students checked their plant. They checked to see if water was needed. They observed leaf structure and stems and drew a diagram in their science journal of their plants parts. Very cool! More in the science section.
The students had a great time chasing bubbles. Our new bubble machine from Asher and his family had us all running around on a great Monday afternoon. Thanks, Asher!!!
Students are feeling the changes that will soon take place--end of the year--no school--end of kindergarten--new teachers--new classroom--different expectations--new friendships. Turning into a First Grader is big!! We chat daily as a class about expectations, fears and the fact that it will be an adventure that they are ready for! They all have come so far!
The students are loving observing our "wormy" compost. They are very concerned about "feeding" the compost to produce the new soil. The magnifying window lets them view the worms at work! Cool!
Station Day activities included--seed sequence part 2, flower making with bottles and paint, writing--If I Were a Seed.... and Story Problems with Flowers.
Reading/Social Studies: The students are continuing to work on skills and literature from Treasures Units 9 and 10. They are working on sight words with, me, my, where and reviewing target sounds and letters Jj, Yy and Zz. All kindergarten sight words have now been introduced. The students spent time in pairs using their word cards, picture cards and punctuation to create sentences. Each pair of students shared their sentences. Students continued work on recognizing and using nouns, verbs, adjectives and pronouns. Each day, the students work on group substitution activities to strengthen sound recognition and automatic recording of phonemes to form words. Students read their decodable and leveled readers and paper stories on their own this week and discussed the stories in small groups. Robust vocabulary included AMAZING, DEEP, INVITE, OCEAN, REASON. Workstations this week focused on leveled readers reading for meaning and fluency, responding in writing to what you read and retelling key events in a story. In our Common Core lessons, the students worked on asking and answering questions about unknown words in a text, being able to recognize common types of texts, finding details in informational reading and clarifying the meaning of multiple meaning words.
Math: The students continue to work on reading a story problem from the board and recording information in their math process journal. Most students are able to read the problem, illustrate the the process, write the number sentence and explain their work. They continue to work on the relationship between numbers in a number sentence. Numbers from 0-15 are currently part of their story problems. The use of concrete objects continues to be helpful to some students--fingers, blocks, pennies, tally marks, circles, the number line are a part of that process. The students continue to review counting by 10's, 2's and 5's, counting on from a random number, rote counting to 120, writing 2-3 digit numbers, exploring the concept of place value and recognizing and using pattern blocks and geometric solids.
Writing: The students have finished their primary paragraphs on the topic: "My Shadow." They are on display in our hallway. What a great job!!!! The students have begun journaling each day on a person at Irving School that they have contact with. So far---Ms. Gullo, Ms. Dennis, Ms. D. and Mr. Hodge have been the topics of their entries. They are writing 4 sentences and using their writer's checklist--capital letter at the beginning, naming and telling, checking their letter formation, having a ending mark, reading it back to see how it sounds---all this before they come to the writer's conference with me. At the writer's conference, they read their writing to me and we look at it together. I may point out--wow, great sentence...or next time don't forget this....and ask what they think of their work. We have begun to do some prep on our final primary paragraph on the topic of WORMS!!! Stay tuned!
Science: Our plants are growing everywhere! This week in our class garden, pumpkin, spinach, cosmos, beans, peas and nasturtiums, marigolds, morning glories and sunflowers have sprouted. Students have brought in cantalope, strawberry and plum seeds to plant too. In Experiment 4, the students observed what is growing under the ground. We removed baby nasturtiums, morning glories, sunflowers and marigolds from the soil to take a closer look at the root and shoot systems. The students looked at the similarities and differences in the each plant. Thicker shoots, skinny shoots, straight shoots, curvy shoots, lots of roots, one stringy root, tons of tiny roots were their observations. The students also took a look at the leaf structure of each plant. They sketched their leaves in their science journals--leaves that looked like butterfly wings (morning glory), wagon wheels (nasturtium), ovals (sunflowers), dragonfly wings (marigolds). In Experiment 5, the question was asked-- What if the seed has no soil? Can it still sprout? We had discussed that all plants need water, sun, soil to grow. The students sprinkled a variety of seeds on a sponge and watered it. Each table has a seeded sponge that they will water and check. What will happen? The students made some predictions. Stay tuned! Next week--We will plant in our outside garden plot.
Technology: The students continue to use all apps introduced throughout the year. The focus on reading is apps related to vocabulary recognition, blending, segmenting and substituting phonemes. In math, students are using apps on addition, subtraction, place value and problem solving. This week students created teams of 4 students and began work on the app Teach Me. The app contains math--addition/subtraction, spelling, and sight word recognition. Students play each other and move up the levels. It includes sticker rewards too. Fun! Fun! Then student have also been exploring the app Life Cycles and and National Geographic Explorer.
Literature: "Plants," "What Moms Can't Do," "Tools for the Garden," "Fancy Nancy's Marvelous Mother's Day," "Worms," "Seeds," "The Ant Bully," "Ants Day Off," "Ice Cream Everywhere," "How Does a Seed Grow?" "Yucky Worms," Poetry--"A Bad Case of the Giggles," Poetry--"A Pizza the Size of the Sun," "Poetry for the Young by Langston Hughes," "Poems for Teachers."
Saturday, May 11, 2013
Friday, May 3, 2013
UPDATES for 4/29-5/3 2013
**Spring is in the air!!! The students began their study of seeds and plants. The very "green" Ms. Henry, gave an informative talk with "hands on" experiences on worm composting. Students from YELLOW BEAR TABLE are responsible for bringing in "food" to "feed" our "wormy" compost. Little bits of paper, bananas/peel, fruits, veggies, egg shells, (nothing cooked or orange peels) are acceptable.
The students continue to explore other galaxies and the universe with dramatic play in their space stations.
**Permission slip for our Field Trip to Oak Park Conservatory is in your child's homework folder. We will be WALKING to the conservatory on Tuesday, May 14th leaving at 9:00 am and returning right before lunchtime. There is no cost. Come and join us if you like!
**The students are busy working on their TRAVELING POETS poetry selection. Those poems went home last Monday. Please help your child learn his/her poem. The students will "travel" to recite their poems in another class on Thursday, May 9th and again on May 17th.
**Route to Reading Rotation 7 has concluded. This is our last route to reading of the year. You should have received notification of your child's final skill level. Email me if you have not.
**Final assessments for the end of the year report card will begin next week. DIBELS, Everyday Math, Darrell Morris Sound Assessment, Treasures Unit Assessment and assessments from our new Common Core Standards will be given. Report Cards/Summer packets go home with students on Friday, May 31st--the last day of school.
**We did not have our Million Minutes Reading Assembly this week. It will be rescheduled.
**Irving Pacers was cancelled due to rain. We will try again next week.
**ART FEST is Thursday, May 17th from 6:30-8:00 pm. throughout our school. A piece of art from every child in the school will be on display along with music from the chorus, plays, Spanish games and the POETRY SLAM!!!!! Come on--join the fun!!! You can say a poem from a book, write a poem, sing a poem, rap--solo, with a partner or a group. Fill out the form that went home last Friday and send it back. Mr. Williams will be out on the playground during the lunch hour with "Mr. Microphone" so students can practice.
**We will be planting outside in our class garden bed on Monday, May 13th at 8:30 am. Our class has chosen to plant and nurture cucumbers, carrots, basil and nasturtiums.
**Check out the activities planned for NATIONAL SPORTS and FITNESS WEEK under the direction of our own Mr. Hancock. The schedule is in your child's homework folder.
**Family Math Night is Tuesday, May 21st from 6:30-8:00 pm. This years theme is MONEY MADNESS. The green sign up sheet is in your child's homework folder.
**RUN WITH ME! Come on out on Saturday, May 11th at 8:00 am to Lindberg Park to participate in District 97's Fun Run. Students and families from all 10 Oak Park schools will be there. Don't miss it. The Kindergarten students will run once around the park. See me or Mr. Hancock for the sign up form.
**All School Olympic Day is Friday morning, May 24th from 8:30-10:30 am. Come on out and see our Kindergarten Olympians!!!
**Future Field Trip--PIZZA and PLAY End of the Year Family Picnic--Tuesday, May 28th from 9:30-12:30 pm at Rehm Park. We will needs lots of help with this one. Information and permission slip will go out on Friday. Stay tuned.
**The students had their last Friendship Club session today. Ms. Bell Bey read the students a story and passed out participation certificates. She urged all students to keep being a "social detective."
**A special "thank you " to Asher and his family for giving us a brand new BUBBLE MACHINE!! We will try it out on Monday. It sure looks cool!
This week:
It was all about seeds and planting! The students began their last unit in science--From Seed to Plant. The students brainstormed what they knew about seeds. Much of the discussion centered around seeds and what they produce. Some students recognized that we even eat some seeds and that not all seeds look alike. The students conducted some experiments (see science heading) and then learned about the particular seeds that they could choose to nurture into a plant. Each student chose a particular flower seed. Our choices were--Sunflower, Nasturtium, Morning Glory and Marigold. Each seed has their own distinct shape, growing pattern and leaf structure. The students planted their seed. Each student is responsible for checking to see if their plant needs water. All students agreed that plants need water, sun and air to grow. We are keeping a class chart to see when growth begins and which type of seed sprouts first. We are at Day 4--Did Henry discover something????----the weekend might be magical!!!! Stay tuned! Station Day activities included ladybug math, seed sequence, plant part diagram, origami tulips.
Reading/Social Studies: I am combining vocabulary, skills and literature of the Treasures Reading series Units 9 Amazing Creatures and 10 We Know A Lot. The students are also going to study poetry and experience the feeling, types and vocabulary associated with it. This format will also give us some time to work on Common Core Standard lessons that will continue to prepare students for the rigors of First Grade.
Students worked on target sight words--she, he, look, has. Target sounds Gg, Ww, Xx, Vv along with all short vowel sounds are being reviewed. Student small groups created sentences using all the kindergarten words taught thus far and incorporating some of the First Grade sight words. Students worked in small groups with leveled readers discussing story elements, cause and effect, making connections and drawing conclusions and making inferences. Student small groups worked on recognizing nouns, verbs, adjectives and pronouns. Many students have become curious about the use of articles and adverbs. The true quest of reading for meaning has begun to become more apparent for our kindergarten readers. The process of asking and answering questions about a text, identifying the meaning of an unknown word using contextual clues and looking for details in the story is also becoming clearer to students. Robust Vocabulary for this week included AMAZING, DEEP, INVITE, OCEAN, REASON. The students are also using a variety of games and iPad apps as reinforcement. Students continue to review phoneme blending, adding, deleting and substituting phonemes as well as consonant blends, digraphs, silent e, vowel teams and even controlled r! The students listened and responded to a variety of poems and learned that poetry can be about how you feel about something or what you know about certain things. It can be silly or very serious. Poetry can also be very emotional!
Math: Instead of orally telling a story, I am writing the story problem on the board and the students continue to illustrate the process, write the number sentence and explain their answer in their math process journal. They are reviewing counting to 120 by ones, counting by 2's. 5's and 10's, recognizing and writing 2 and 3 digit numbers. The students continue to use the "function machine" to play "What's My Rule?" They are using a game format to review coins and their values, tell time by the hour and count up or down from a random number.
Writing: Students continue to work on refining all upper and lowercase letters. Students have begun to bring home their completed orange practice books. I continue to stress spacing between words on a line and placement of letters. Reading back what they have written is key as well as making sure their sentences name and tell and that they have some ending mark at the end. Students are using their writer's checklist before they come to conference with me. Students are writing 4 sentences about a given topic. We are finishing up our final copy on our Shadow paragraphs. They are so cool! Next week--we will begin our final writing project on our "wormy" friends.
Science: The students began with the inquiry question--What is a seed? With magnifiers in hand, the students closely examined a variety of small objects--some were seeds-some were not. Each table conducted sorting activities and tried to decide which were in fact seeds and which were not. In the next experiment, each student selected a seed for planting and nurturing. They were struck by the shape differences in the Nasturtium, Marigold, Morning Glory and Sunflower seeds. Students accessed information on the internet on growth patterns (horizontal vs. vertical,) stems and root structures (tiny, thin, wide, large,) and leaf shapes (wagon wheel, long and pointed, small.) We made a class growth chart to track which type of seed will sprout first. In our next experiment, the students examined a pinto bean and pea seed. They were soaked overnight in water. Each student was given a set of the two seeds--one that was soaked and one that was not. Students observed that the soaked seeds were bigger. Yes--the water climbed into the spaces in the seed!!!! With some assistance, the students split the seed in half to look at the inside. They noticed the outer covering (coat) and in the inside corner was the tiny baby plant (embryo.) The rest of the inside is called the seed food where the seed gets its nourishment. The students worked in their journals recording their findings. Next week----hydroponics!! Stay tuned!
Technology: No new apps this week. Looking for information on the internet on seeds and plants.
Literature: "Oh Say Can You Seed," "The Boy Who Didn't Believe in Spring," "Diary of a Worm," "Wonderful Worms," "Seeds," "How Do Seeds Grow?" "I'm a Seed," Poetry---"Hip Hop Speaks to Children," "The Poetry of Langston Hughes," "A Pizza As Big As The Sun," "Poetry Speaks to Children."
The students continue to explore other galaxies and the universe with dramatic play in their space stations.
**Permission slip for our Field Trip to Oak Park Conservatory is in your child's homework folder. We will be WALKING to the conservatory on Tuesday, May 14th leaving at 9:00 am and returning right before lunchtime. There is no cost. Come and join us if you like!
**The students are busy working on their TRAVELING POETS poetry selection. Those poems went home last Monday. Please help your child learn his/her poem. The students will "travel" to recite their poems in another class on Thursday, May 9th and again on May 17th.
**Route to Reading Rotation 7 has concluded. This is our last route to reading of the year. You should have received notification of your child's final skill level. Email me if you have not.
**Final assessments for the end of the year report card will begin next week. DIBELS, Everyday Math, Darrell Morris Sound Assessment, Treasures Unit Assessment and assessments from our new Common Core Standards will be given. Report Cards/Summer packets go home with students on Friday, May 31st--the last day of school.
**We did not have our Million Minutes Reading Assembly this week. It will be rescheduled.
**Irving Pacers was cancelled due to rain. We will try again next week.
**ART FEST is Thursday, May 17th from 6:30-8:00 pm. throughout our school. A piece of art from every child in the school will be on display along with music from the chorus, plays, Spanish games and the POETRY SLAM!!!!! Come on--join the fun!!! You can say a poem from a book, write a poem, sing a poem, rap--solo, with a partner or a group. Fill out the form that went home last Friday and send it back. Mr. Williams will be out on the playground during the lunch hour with "Mr. Microphone" so students can practice.
**We will be planting outside in our class garden bed on Monday, May 13th at 8:30 am. Our class has chosen to plant and nurture cucumbers, carrots, basil and nasturtiums.
**Check out the activities planned for NATIONAL SPORTS and FITNESS WEEK under the direction of our own Mr. Hancock. The schedule is in your child's homework folder.
**Family Math Night is Tuesday, May 21st from 6:30-8:00 pm. This years theme is MONEY MADNESS. The green sign up sheet is in your child's homework folder.
**RUN WITH ME! Come on out on Saturday, May 11th at 8:00 am to Lindberg Park to participate in District 97's Fun Run. Students and families from all 10 Oak Park schools will be there. Don't miss it. The Kindergarten students will run once around the park. See me or Mr. Hancock for the sign up form.
**All School Olympic Day is Friday morning, May 24th from 8:30-10:30 am. Come on out and see our Kindergarten Olympians!!!
**Future Field Trip--PIZZA and PLAY End of the Year Family Picnic--Tuesday, May 28th from 9:30-12:30 pm at Rehm Park. We will needs lots of help with this one. Information and permission slip will go out on Friday. Stay tuned.
**The students had their last Friendship Club session today. Ms. Bell Bey read the students a story and passed out participation certificates. She urged all students to keep being a "social detective."
**A special "thank you " to Asher and his family for giving us a brand new BUBBLE MACHINE!! We will try it out on Monday. It sure looks cool!
This week:
It was all about seeds and planting! The students began their last unit in science--From Seed to Plant. The students brainstormed what they knew about seeds. Much of the discussion centered around seeds and what they produce. Some students recognized that we even eat some seeds and that not all seeds look alike. The students conducted some experiments (see science heading) and then learned about the particular seeds that they could choose to nurture into a plant. Each student chose a particular flower seed. Our choices were--Sunflower, Nasturtium, Morning Glory and Marigold. Each seed has their own distinct shape, growing pattern and leaf structure. The students planted their seed. Each student is responsible for checking to see if their plant needs water. All students agreed that plants need water, sun and air to grow. We are keeping a class chart to see when growth begins and which type of seed sprouts first. We are at Day 4--Did Henry discover something????----the weekend might be magical!!!! Stay tuned! Station Day activities included ladybug math, seed sequence, plant part diagram, origami tulips.
Reading/Social Studies: I am combining vocabulary, skills and literature of the Treasures Reading series Units 9 Amazing Creatures and 10 We Know A Lot. The students are also going to study poetry and experience the feeling, types and vocabulary associated with it. This format will also give us some time to work on Common Core Standard lessons that will continue to prepare students for the rigors of First Grade.
Students worked on target sight words--she, he, look, has. Target sounds Gg, Ww, Xx, Vv along with all short vowel sounds are being reviewed. Student small groups created sentences using all the kindergarten words taught thus far and incorporating some of the First Grade sight words. Students worked in small groups with leveled readers discussing story elements, cause and effect, making connections and drawing conclusions and making inferences. Student small groups worked on recognizing nouns, verbs, adjectives and pronouns. Many students have become curious about the use of articles and adverbs. The true quest of reading for meaning has begun to become more apparent for our kindergarten readers. The process of asking and answering questions about a text, identifying the meaning of an unknown word using contextual clues and looking for details in the story is also becoming clearer to students. Robust Vocabulary for this week included AMAZING, DEEP, INVITE, OCEAN, REASON. The students are also using a variety of games and iPad apps as reinforcement. Students continue to review phoneme blending, adding, deleting and substituting phonemes as well as consonant blends, digraphs, silent e, vowel teams and even controlled r! The students listened and responded to a variety of poems and learned that poetry can be about how you feel about something or what you know about certain things. It can be silly or very serious. Poetry can also be very emotional!
Math: Instead of orally telling a story, I am writing the story problem on the board and the students continue to illustrate the process, write the number sentence and explain their answer in their math process journal. They are reviewing counting to 120 by ones, counting by 2's. 5's and 10's, recognizing and writing 2 and 3 digit numbers. The students continue to use the "function machine" to play "What's My Rule?" They are using a game format to review coins and their values, tell time by the hour and count up or down from a random number.
Writing: Students continue to work on refining all upper and lowercase letters. Students have begun to bring home their completed orange practice books. I continue to stress spacing between words on a line and placement of letters. Reading back what they have written is key as well as making sure their sentences name and tell and that they have some ending mark at the end. Students are using their writer's checklist before they come to conference with me. Students are writing 4 sentences about a given topic. We are finishing up our final copy on our Shadow paragraphs. They are so cool! Next week--we will begin our final writing project on our "wormy" friends.
Science: The students began with the inquiry question--What is a seed? With magnifiers in hand, the students closely examined a variety of small objects--some were seeds-some were not. Each table conducted sorting activities and tried to decide which were in fact seeds and which were not. In the next experiment, each student selected a seed for planting and nurturing. They were struck by the shape differences in the Nasturtium, Marigold, Morning Glory and Sunflower seeds. Students accessed information on the internet on growth patterns (horizontal vs. vertical,) stems and root structures (tiny, thin, wide, large,) and leaf shapes (wagon wheel, long and pointed, small.) We made a class growth chart to track which type of seed will sprout first. In our next experiment, the students examined a pinto bean and pea seed. They were soaked overnight in water. Each student was given a set of the two seeds--one that was soaked and one that was not. Students observed that the soaked seeds were bigger. Yes--the water climbed into the spaces in the seed!!!! With some assistance, the students split the seed in half to look at the inside. They noticed the outer covering (coat) and in the inside corner was the tiny baby plant (embryo.) The rest of the inside is called the seed food where the seed gets its nourishment. The students worked in their journals recording their findings. Next week----hydroponics!! Stay tuned!
Technology: No new apps this week. Looking for information on the internet on seeds and plants.
Literature: "Oh Say Can You Seed," "The Boy Who Didn't Believe in Spring," "Diary of a Worm," "Wonderful Worms," "Seeds," "How Do Seeds Grow?" "I'm a Seed," Poetry---"Hip Hop Speaks to Children," "The Poetry of Langston Hughes," "A Pizza As Big As The Sun," "Poetry Speaks to Children."
Friday, April 26, 2013
UPDATES for 4/22-4/25 2013
**Enjoy the VOKI ANIMAL ALIENS as they describe each space station project! You will find them at the end of this post. Just click on the triangle to hear the message! Human like aliens ...or....animal aliens????? It appears that the animal aliens won out in each group. A huge thanks to our tech adviser, Ms. Ortega, for her assistance on this project. The students had a ball creating the voki alien, writing the script and working together to choose a reader for the voki voice. It's out of this world!!!
**Check out our own ABC COUNTDOWN of activities beginning Monday until the end of the school
year, starting with the letter A all the way to Z! We will have a different activity everyday. It all starts Monday with "Act Like an Astronaut Day." Now that our space stations are completed, we will spend some time with movement and dramatic play as we blast off into the universe! Family and friends can come to view the student projects anytime before or after school until the end of the year.
**Please adjust your calendars: Due to our "rain day," the last of school is now Friday, May 31, 2013. This will be a full day of school. In the afternoon, from 2-2:55 pm, we will have a family and friends gathering in our classroom to read a parting story, sign student autograph books and have some refreshments. Stay tuned for more info!
**Our Eagle Wing lunch at Barrie Park was chilly but fun. Thanks to the parents and sibs who joined us. The students had a huge freeze tag game going on led by Isabella's dad. What energy!
**Thanks to Student Council (yeah-Amare and Ivy) for a very informative Earth Week. The students learned about the energy given off by Irving's solar panel, reviewed ways to reuse and recycle, learned about how valuable a tree is and ways to conserve energy at home and at school. Sunny Notes were delivered, but unfortunately Ms. Gullo forgot to pass them out! Students will receive them on Monday.
**On Monday, the students will pick their poems for participation in the Traveling Poets Project, under the direction of our own Ms. Noonan. Have your child practice their poem at home. We will also practice at school. The students will "travel" on selected days to other classrooms to read their poems for a "poetry break." Stay tuned for more info!
**An assembly to celebrate our school wide Million Minutes of Reading will be held on Friday, May 3rd at 2:00pm. What a great job all the students have done!
**For interested parties: There will be an informational meeting for parents on the new Common Core Standards on Monday, April 29th at 7:00 pm right here in the Irving Auditorium.
**Irving Pacers are back! We will have our first spring walk/run on Friday, May 3rd at lunchtime. Don't forget to have your child wear gym shoes and socks.
**Smoothie Fridays are also back! Homemade smoothies will be sold May 3rd, 10th and 24th at dismissal.
**Run With Me! Come on out on Saturday, May 11th at 8:00 am to Lindberg Park and participate in the District 97's FUN RUN. Students and families from all 10 Oak Park schools will be there. Don't miss it. See me or Mr. Hancock for an entry form.
**Future Field Trip---Oak Park Conservatory on Tuesday, May 14th beginning at 9:00 am until 10:45 am. I will need 2-3 volunteers to walk with us. Permission slips will go out on Friday.
**Future Field Trip--Pizza and Play End of the Year Family Picnic--Tuesday, May 28th from 9:30-12:30 pm at Rehm Park. We will need lots of volunteers for this one. Stay tuned for more info!
**All School Olympic Day--Friday, May 24th from 8:30-10:30 am in and around the school.
**Our final Friendship Club with Ms. Bell Bey will be Friday, May 3rd.
**Our final get together with our Book Buddies is Friday, May 17th. We will wish them well. They will be moving on to the Middle School!
This week:
It was all about putting the finishing touches on space station projects and each group choosing and detailing their alien voki. What fun they had!!! Lots of work went into drawing, making, placing and staging of items and materials in, on and around their space stations. Great use of conversation, negotiation, compromise and teamwork during this process. They are truly sensational! The students also used this week to finish Treasures Unit 8 Plants and Science Unit-"Sunshine, Shadows, the Moon and Space."
Reading/Social Studies: The students completed Unit 8 Plants. This will serve as a nice introduction for our final science unit--"From Seed to Plant." The students reviewed all their sight vocabulary taught thus far. They completed their activity books and they have been sent home. We continue to use the Haggerty Blue Book exercises to sharpen blending, segmenting, substituting adding and deleting of phonemes skills. They also continue to work on decoding CVC, CCVC and CVCC words, recognizing consonant blends and digraphs and using pronouns and adjectives along with nouns and verbs in their sentence work. The students also continue to work on responding in writing to questions about a story they have read or has been read to them. Workstations this week focused on leveled readers and working on story elements, using quotation marks and pronouns and using the iPad to strengthen and enhance vocabulary development.
Math: The students continue to work on counting by 2's, 5's, and 10's to 100 and rote counting to 120. In their math journals, students continue to work on listening for information to solve a story problem, analyzing and illustrating their work and writing a number sentence. They continue to work on place value in the tens and hundreds places, reading and writing 2-3 digit numbers and reviewing pattern block and geometric solid shapes as well as analyzing, describing and comparing 2-3 dimensional shapes.
Writing: The students are finishing up their orange handwriting books. They have finished formal instruction on all upper and lowercase letters and have begun a number formation review. The students are working on their shadow paragraphs. They will put the finishing touches on them next week. The students are working on writing 4 or more sentences on a topic using their sentence rules. Wow!
Science: The students got to use their star gazers in the sunlight! (finally!!!!) It was cool to see the "stars" in their star gazer tubes. We talked about the moon phases and the fact that we are really seeing different amounts of light being reflected on the moon. How much light we see depends on the positions of Earth, moon and sun. The students will continue to work on their moon observation this weekend as an assignment. Next week, we begin prep for our last science unit on seeds.
Technology: The students were introduce to a site called VOKI where you can create an avatar and give it a voice. They absolutely loved experimenting with the figures and backgrounds. It really was a group effort to create their alien and choose a reader. I commend all the teams on their hard work. In reading small groups, the students worked with iPad apps relating to vocabulary development and recording their reading for fluency development. In math workshop small group, students worked on iPad apps to strengthen addition and subtraction as well as problem solving.
Literature: "Pinkalicious-Fairy House," (thanks, Isabella!) "Zoom," "And Then It's Spring," (thanks, Ellie!)
"Pirates Go To School," (thanks, Ellie!) "The Moon Book," "Saving Water and Energy," "What is Global Warming?" "I Always Turn Out the Lights," "Ugh! Don't Be a Litterbug," "Magic School Bus-Get's Cleaned Up," "Communication."
**Check out our own ABC COUNTDOWN of activities beginning Monday until the end of the school
year, starting with the letter A all the way to Z! We will have a different activity everyday. It all starts Monday with "Act Like an Astronaut Day." Now that our space stations are completed, we will spend some time with movement and dramatic play as we blast off into the universe! Family and friends can come to view the student projects anytime before or after school until the end of the year.
**Please adjust your calendars: Due to our "rain day," the last of school is now Friday, May 31, 2013. This will be a full day of school. In the afternoon, from 2-2:55 pm, we will have a family and friends gathering in our classroom to read a parting story, sign student autograph books and have some refreshments. Stay tuned for more info!
**Our Eagle Wing lunch at Barrie Park was chilly but fun. Thanks to the parents and sibs who joined us. The students had a huge freeze tag game going on led by Isabella's dad. What energy!
**Thanks to Student Council (yeah-Amare and Ivy) for a very informative Earth Week. The students learned about the energy given off by Irving's solar panel, reviewed ways to reuse and recycle, learned about how valuable a tree is and ways to conserve energy at home and at school. Sunny Notes were delivered, but unfortunately Ms. Gullo forgot to pass them out! Students will receive them on Monday.
**On Monday, the students will pick their poems for participation in the Traveling Poets Project, under the direction of our own Ms. Noonan. Have your child practice their poem at home. We will also practice at school. The students will "travel" on selected days to other classrooms to read their poems for a "poetry break." Stay tuned for more info!
**An assembly to celebrate our school wide Million Minutes of Reading will be held on Friday, May 3rd at 2:00pm. What a great job all the students have done!
**For interested parties: There will be an informational meeting for parents on the new Common Core Standards on Monday, April 29th at 7:00 pm right here in the Irving Auditorium.
**Irving Pacers are back! We will have our first spring walk/run on Friday, May 3rd at lunchtime. Don't forget to have your child wear gym shoes and socks.
**Smoothie Fridays are also back! Homemade smoothies will be sold May 3rd, 10th and 24th at dismissal.
**Run With Me! Come on out on Saturday, May 11th at 8:00 am to Lindberg Park and participate in the District 97's FUN RUN. Students and families from all 10 Oak Park schools will be there. Don't miss it. See me or Mr. Hancock for an entry form.
**Future Field Trip---Oak Park Conservatory on Tuesday, May 14th beginning at 9:00 am until 10:45 am. I will need 2-3 volunteers to walk with us. Permission slips will go out on Friday.
**Future Field Trip--Pizza and Play End of the Year Family Picnic--Tuesday, May 28th from 9:30-12:30 pm at Rehm Park. We will need lots of volunteers for this one. Stay tuned for more info!
**All School Olympic Day--Friday, May 24th from 8:30-10:30 am in and around the school.
**Our final Friendship Club with Ms. Bell Bey will be Friday, May 3rd.
**Our final get together with our Book Buddies is Friday, May 17th. We will wish them well. They will be moving on to the Middle School!
This week:
It was all about putting the finishing touches on space station projects and each group choosing and detailing their alien voki. What fun they had!!! Lots of work went into drawing, making, placing and staging of items and materials in, on and around their space stations. Great use of conversation, negotiation, compromise and teamwork during this process. They are truly sensational! The students also used this week to finish Treasures Unit 8 Plants and Science Unit-"Sunshine, Shadows, the Moon and Space."
Reading/Social Studies: The students completed Unit 8 Plants. This will serve as a nice introduction for our final science unit--"From Seed to Plant." The students reviewed all their sight vocabulary taught thus far. They completed their activity books and they have been sent home. We continue to use the Haggerty Blue Book exercises to sharpen blending, segmenting, substituting adding and deleting of phonemes skills. They also continue to work on decoding CVC, CCVC and CVCC words, recognizing consonant blends and digraphs and using pronouns and adjectives along with nouns and verbs in their sentence work. The students also continue to work on responding in writing to questions about a story they have read or has been read to them. Workstations this week focused on leveled readers and working on story elements, using quotation marks and pronouns and using the iPad to strengthen and enhance vocabulary development.
Math: The students continue to work on counting by 2's, 5's, and 10's to 100 and rote counting to 120. In their math journals, students continue to work on listening for information to solve a story problem, analyzing and illustrating their work and writing a number sentence. They continue to work on place value in the tens and hundreds places, reading and writing 2-3 digit numbers and reviewing pattern block and geometric solid shapes as well as analyzing, describing and comparing 2-3 dimensional shapes.
Writing: The students are finishing up their orange handwriting books. They have finished formal instruction on all upper and lowercase letters and have begun a number formation review. The students are working on their shadow paragraphs. They will put the finishing touches on them next week. The students are working on writing 4 or more sentences on a topic using their sentence rules. Wow!
Science: The students got to use their star gazers in the sunlight! (finally!!!!) It was cool to see the "stars" in their star gazer tubes. We talked about the moon phases and the fact that we are really seeing different amounts of light being reflected on the moon. How much light we see depends on the positions of Earth, moon and sun. The students will continue to work on their moon observation this weekend as an assignment. Next week, we begin prep for our last science unit on seeds.
Technology: The students were introduce to a site called VOKI where you can create an avatar and give it a voice. They absolutely loved experimenting with the figures and backgrounds. It really was a group effort to create their alien and choose a reader. I commend all the teams on their hard work. In reading small groups, the students worked with iPad apps relating to vocabulary development and recording their reading for fluency development. In math workshop small group, students worked on iPad apps to strengthen addition and subtraction as well as problem solving.
Literature: "Pinkalicious-Fairy House," (thanks, Isabella!) "Zoom," "And Then It's Spring," (thanks, Ellie!)
"Pirates Go To School," (thanks, Ellie!) "The Moon Book," "Saving Water and Energy," "What is Global Warming?" "I Always Turn Out the Lights," "Ugh! Don't Be a Litterbug," "Magic School Bus-Get's Cleaned Up," "Communication."
Out of this World Voki Projects!!!!!!! They are the Masters of their Universe!!!!!!
Group 1---Great teamwork and collaboration! Way to go! Zaria, Keyshaun, Noah, Emerson, Sierra and Alexis.
Group 2---Wow! Great ideas and enthusiasm! Super effort! Angus, Lucy, Aidan, Vivian, Will and Ever.
Group 3---Super thinking and creating! Go Ellie, Kanohi, Ivy, Henry,Cobie and Sophie.
Group 4---Great details and teamwork! Yeah Zoie, Asher, Audrey, Lundyn, Amare and Isabella.
Friday, April 19, 2013
UPDATES for 4/15-4/19 2013
**The students have spent a busy week working together on their space stations. They reviewed the prototype drawings they made. They worked with their product manager to select appropriate boxes and began the process of construction. There was lots of conversations/discussions about the where, how and why to put a box one place or another. I observed lots of team collaboration, some compromise and lots of creativity! Some conversation starters I overheard---"Do we want to make it taller (less people inside) or longer?" (it will fit more people inside.) "Do we want a hatch or a door?" "How about a peephole?" "Do we want square windows or circle windows?" Ms. Dennis and I cut and taped where indicated. The students picked their paint colors. 24 students painting at the same time--oh my!!!! They handled it so well. Some paint on hands and arms, but very little paint on the floor or clothes. 98% of the paint went right where it should! The space stations are looking pretty cool!
**A HUGE SHOUT OUT to Angus, Will and alternate, Sierra for their participation in the K-2 Spelling Bee! Two 2nd graders and a 1st grader took top honors but we were so proud of our classmates determination and sportsmanship. Angus and Will received a special ribbon for their participation. Sierra helped set up the lunch area in the auditorium and would whisper, "Ms. Gullo, I know how to spell that one," more than a few times. She was so supportive!!
**The Academic Fair and Egg Drop Contest was awesome. Our class had 9 students with projects and 5 students (with a couple of sibling teams) for Egg Drop. I am so proud of their efforts. At the Academic Fair, we listened to our fellow classmates talk about why the Titanic sank, how birds build nests, how you sew, cats, cats and more cats, how a pyramid was built in ancient Egypt, what the life of a pioneer girl was like, what porcupine quills are made of and how you use your super senses. We saw lots of interesting vehicles for an egg---boxes, lots of cups, parachutes, paper towel rolls, a nerf football, a Yoda doll, tubes etc.
**Our Eagle Wing Lunch (weather permitting) is Thursday, April 25th at Barrie Park from 10:45-12:05 pm. Please don't forget to send in your child's permission slip. I cannot take anyone without it. We could use 1-2 parents to walk with us. Email me if interested.
**Speaking of Earth Day---Student Council has planned some activities to celebrate Earth Week. Monday--Reduce Energy Day: turn off lights and television. Tuesday--Zero Waste Lunch: encouraging students to bring lunches that can be composted or recycled. Wednesday--Walk to School Day: to reduce greenhouse emissions.
**The Irving Book Fair will be Monday, April 22-25 in t.he auditorium A flyer of some of the titles available is in your child's backpack. We will visit the Book Fair as a class on Tuesday afternoon.
**Upcoming Event---Traveling Poets under the direction on Ms. Noonan, will begin traveling on May 3rd and May 10th. Look for information on how this all works soon. It is really something!!!
** In Mr. Packer Math Enrichment this week, Mr. Packer read a story called, "Zoom." The story was a study of pictures within pictures---nothing is ever as it seems. The students looked at the pictures and used their "detective skills" to tell what they thought it was. Very cool book! Lots of amazed students!
** In Friendship Club, Ms. Bell Bey continued her presentation on being a social detective. The adults role played various situations and asked the students to respond. Friendship can sometimes be a tricky thing!
**NO SCHOOL on Thursday, April 26th--Teacher's Institute Day.
**RUN with ME! Join the FUN RUN on Saturday, May 11th at 8:00 am. at Lindberg Park celebrating National Fitness Week. Sign up sheet was in the Tuesday Packet. Let me know if you need sheet. We run rain or shine.
**The Irving Pacers is starting up again on Fridays at lunch beginning the first Friday in May.
This week:
It was truly all about our space stations! Thanks to all who contributed boxes and other cool things. The students really did use their prior and new knowledge of space and space station design. Our room was filled with boxes. Each group received one giant box or 3 medium boxes to begin with. They then decided as a group what other boxes they needed. Cutting out various places on the boxes was my job as well as putting "gorilla tape" to good use to secure all parts. The students went inside and tried them out and proceeded to discuss paint colors. The students began painting on Wednesday. Due to our unexpected rain day on Thursday, they will finish up the painting on Friday morning. Detailing will begin on Monday. If you have a glue gun and want to come and help after 1:30 pm--please do. Station day activities this week included creating star gazers (let's hope for some sun!) completing our moonscapes, rainy day story sequencing--cut/glue/write about it, and rocket conversations--what can you say in your speech bubble?
Reading/Social Studies: The students have nearly completed Unit 8 Plants in our Treasures Reading series. We will tie up any loose ends at the beginning of next week. This week the students read and talked about what grows in a garden. Students thought aloud and accessed prior knowledge about gardens in their backyard and other gardens they know about. The students listened to the trade book, "Sunflower House." The students paid special attention to the beginning, middle and ending. They responded to the literature by making connections in their own lives about the process of growing a sunflower and seeing how big it can get. All students reviewed the target words here, little, said and was. We played "Hands Up and Hands Down" for a fun review. The students continue to review our target sounds Uu and Kk and also the use of ck. The students also reviewed the use of adjectives and created a list of words that would describe a sunflower in their journals. We reread the story and students contemplated aloud clues that helped them to draw conclusions about the story. The students worked in small groups using the retelling cards to retell the story in their own words. Robust Vocabulary included ARRANGE, TEND, BASIC, SENSES, GARDEN. We continue to work in the Haggerty Blue Book on blending, segmenting, addition, deletion and substitution exercises. This week, we also worked on common core standards that pertain to the ability of the student to ask and be able to answer questions about key details in a text. I read aloud the story, The Paper Crane." The students listened and responded using oral story cards to retell and recall details in the story. We created a story board of story element questions--who? what? where? when? why? The students worked in small groups coming up with questions about the story. We revisited the story the next day and students reviewed all the information. On the third day, the students completed a writing prompt where they could write down a question and answer that question in writing. They did this for all five question words. It was awesome to see the progress made from the beginning of the year until now. Our workstations this week included--write about seeds and plants/illustrate, leveled readers/discussion/oral comprehension/fluency check and asking questions, story retelling--completing a story sequence frame with a leveled reader, create a garden map-label and write about it and building sentences using quotation marks.
Math: The students continue to work on story problems in their process journals. Their illustrations of the problem are becoming easier to figure out. They are also beginning to understand the relationship between numbers in a number family and ways to say a number which include addition and subtraction. They continue work on reading and writing 3 digit numbers and working with place value, counting from 0-120, counting on from random number and counting back from a random number.
Writing: The students continue to work on their Shadow paragraph drafts. Our final copies should be finished next week. The students continue to work on refining upper and lowercase letters and placement of words on a given line.
Science: All science time was given to space station creation this week. We have a few more experiments to complete on the moon and that will be done next week.
Technology: No new apps have been used this week. Students continue to made good use of reading, math, vocabulary and science apps to enhance their studies.
Literature: "The Paper Crane," "The Moon Book," "Zoom," "I Ain't Gonna Paint No More," "Hottest, Coldest, Highest, Deepest," "Mars Needs Moms," "Una lazo del la luna," "1000 Facts About Space," "If You Decide To Go To The Moon," "Magic School Bus--Walks on the Moon."
**A HUGE SHOUT OUT to Angus, Will and alternate, Sierra for their participation in the K-2 Spelling Bee! Two 2nd graders and a 1st grader took top honors but we were so proud of our classmates determination and sportsmanship. Angus and Will received a special ribbon for their participation. Sierra helped set up the lunch area in the auditorium and would whisper, "Ms. Gullo, I know how to spell that one," more than a few times. She was so supportive!!
**The Academic Fair and Egg Drop Contest was awesome. Our class had 9 students with projects and 5 students (with a couple of sibling teams) for Egg Drop. I am so proud of their efforts. At the Academic Fair, we listened to our fellow classmates talk about why the Titanic sank, how birds build nests, how you sew, cats, cats and more cats, how a pyramid was built in ancient Egypt, what the life of a pioneer girl was like, what porcupine quills are made of and how you use your super senses. We saw lots of interesting vehicles for an egg---boxes, lots of cups, parachutes, paper towel rolls, a nerf football, a Yoda doll, tubes etc.
**Our Eagle Wing Lunch (weather permitting) is Thursday, April 25th at Barrie Park from 10:45-12:05 pm. Please don't forget to send in your child's permission slip. I cannot take anyone without it. We could use 1-2 parents to walk with us. Email me if interested.
**Speaking of Earth Day---Student Council has planned some activities to celebrate Earth Week. Monday--Reduce Energy Day: turn off lights and television. Tuesday--Zero Waste Lunch: encouraging students to bring lunches that can be composted or recycled. Wednesday--Walk to School Day: to reduce greenhouse emissions.
**The Irving Book Fair will be Monday, April 22-25 in t.he auditorium A flyer of some of the titles available is in your child's backpack. We will visit the Book Fair as a class on Tuesday afternoon.
**Upcoming Event---Traveling Poets under the direction on Ms. Noonan, will begin traveling on May 3rd and May 10th. Look for information on how this all works soon. It is really something!!!
** In Mr. Packer Math Enrichment this week, Mr. Packer read a story called, "Zoom." The story was a study of pictures within pictures---nothing is ever as it seems. The students looked at the pictures and used their "detective skills" to tell what they thought it was. Very cool book! Lots of amazed students!
** In Friendship Club, Ms. Bell Bey continued her presentation on being a social detective. The adults role played various situations and asked the students to respond. Friendship can sometimes be a tricky thing!
**NO SCHOOL on Thursday, April 26th--Teacher's Institute Day.
**RUN with ME! Join the FUN RUN on Saturday, May 11th at 8:00 am. at Lindberg Park celebrating National Fitness Week. Sign up sheet was in the Tuesday Packet. Let me know if you need sheet. We run rain or shine.
**The Irving Pacers is starting up again on Fridays at lunch beginning the first Friday in May.
This week:
It was truly all about our space stations! Thanks to all who contributed boxes and other cool things. The students really did use their prior and new knowledge of space and space station design. Our room was filled with boxes. Each group received one giant box or 3 medium boxes to begin with. They then decided as a group what other boxes they needed. Cutting out various places on the boxes was my job as well as putting "gorilla tape" to good use to secure all parts. The students went inside and tried them out and proceeded to discuss paint colors. The students began painting on Wednesday. Due to our unexpected rain day on Thursday, they will finish up the painting on Friday morning. Detailing will begin on Monday. If you have a glue gun and want to come and help after 1:30 pm--please do. Station day activities this week included creating star gazers (let's hope for some sun!) completing our moonscapes, rainy day story sequencing--cut/glue/write about it, and rocket conversations--what can you say in your speech bubble?
Reading/Social Studies: The students have nearly completed Unit 8 Plants in our Treasures Reading series. We will tie up any loose ends at the beginning of next week. This week the students read and talked about what grows in a garden. Students thought aloud and accessed prior knowledge about gardens in their backyard and other gardens they know about. The students listened to the trade book, "Sunflower House." The students paid special attention to the beginning, middle and ending. They responded to the literature by making connections in their own lives about the process of growing a sunflower and seeing how big it can get. All students reviewed the target words here, little, said and was. We played "Hands Up and Hands Down" for a fun review. The students continue to review our target sounds Uu and Kk and also the use of ck. The students also reviewed the use of adjectives and created a list of words that would describe a sunflower in their journals. We reread the story and students contemplated aloud clues that helped them to draw conclusions about the story. The students worked in small groups using the retelling cards to retell the story in their own words. Robust Vocabulary included ARRANGE, TEND, BASIC, SENSES, GARDEN. We continue to work in the Haggerty Blue Book on blending, segmenting, addition, deletion and substitution exercises. This week, we also worked on common core standards that pertain to the ability of the student to ask and be able to answer questions about key details in a text. I read aloud the story, The Paper Crane." The students listened and responded using oral story cards to retell and recall details in the story. We created a story board of story element questions--who? what? where? when? why? The students worked in small groups coming up with questions about the story. We revisited the story the next day and students reviewed all the information. On the third day, the students completed a writing prompt where they could write down a question and answer that question in writing. They did this for all five question words. It was awesome to see the progress made from the beginning of the year until now. Our workstations this week included--write about seeds and plants/illustrate, leveled readers/discussion/oral comprehension/fluency check and asking questions, story retelling--completing a story sequence frame with a leveled reader, create a garden map-label and write about it and building sentences using quotation marks.
Math: The students continue to work on story problems in their process journals. Their illustrations of the problem are becoming easier to figure out. They are also beginning to understand the relationship between numbers in a number family and ways to say a number which include addition and subtraction. They continue work on reading and writing 3 digit numbers and working with place value, counting from 0-120, counting on from random number and counting back from a random number.
Writing: The students continue to work on their Shadow paragraph drafts. Our final copies should be finished next week. The students continue to work on refining upper and lowercase letters and placement of words on a given line.
Science: All science time was given to space station creation this week. We have a few more experiments to complete on the moon and that will be done next week.
Technology: No new apps have been used this week. Students continue to made good use of reading, math, vocabulary and science apps to enhance their studies.
Literature: "The Paper Crane," "The Moon Book," "Zoom," "I Ain't Gonna Paint No More," "Hottest, Coldest, Highest, Deepest," "Mars Needs Moms," "Una lazo del la luna," "1000 Facts About Space," "If You Decide To Go To The Moon," "Magic School Bus--Walks on the Moon."
Friday, April 12, 2013
UPDATES for 4/8-4/12 2013
**Academic Fair /Egg Drop Contest is this Tuesday, April 16th. Please drop off your Academic Fair projects in the GYM in the morning. Our class will visit the Fair from 10:00-10:30 am. The projects will be on display throughout the day. Students with projects will return in the evening from 6:30-8:00 pm. Students should bring their Egg Drop Vehicles in the morning. The contest will begin at 12:30 out on the black top. Students will drop their vehicle from the 3rd floor window of the school. Please join us if you can. It should be very exciting!!
**The K-2 Spelling Bee is Wednesday, April 17th beginning at 11:00 am. Go Angus, Will and alternate, Sierra!!!! We can spell what we know! We will have a great time and eat our lunch in the auditorium. There will be ribbons for all the participants.
**Our SPACE STATION projects begin Monday!! The students are now in their work groups. They had a chance to exchange ideas and sketch a prototype drawing of their space station. Thanks for all the boxes and cool stuff! I have asked the students not to wear fancy clothes next week. They will wear paint shirts but it could get a little messy! Here's to collaboration, teamwork, compromise and creativity! Stay tuned!
**Student Council sponsored Career Day was very informative. Zaria's mom, Dr. Larnell talked about her job as a professor teaching government. Ellie's mom, Ms. Struckmeyer spoke to the students about her job as a pattern designer. The students really enjoyed it!
**Our field trip to the ADLER PLANETARIUM was awesome! Even though the weather was cold and foggy, we were cozy and warm exploring the different areas of the of the planetarium including the moon wall, the solar system area, the Apollo Mission room and most of all--The Planet Explorers Interactive Room. Many students tried on space gear, helped blast off into space, drove a lunar rover, saw a space toilet and space food and slept in a space bed! Many thanks to our volunteers--C. Nunes, A. Struckmeyer, L. Pointer, D. Chien and N. Johne for their help.
**Our Irving Green Team will have a group art piece at Oak Park's First Annual RE-CREATE ECO ART EXHIBIT going on now thru April 20th. You can view and vote for your favorite project at Visit Oak Park--1010 Lake St. Go Amare and Ivy!!!!!
**Please sign and return the Eagle Wing Field Trip slip in your child's homework folder. Our class earned a field trip to Barrie Park for lunch because they worked as a team to show they knew and understood our Eagle Essentials. Great Behavior!!!!! Our trip will be Thursday, April 25th from 10:45-12:05 pm. I will need 1-2 volunteers to walk with the class. Email if you can.
**Route to Reading Rotation 7 has concluded. You should have received notification indicating your child's skill mastery. Our final Route to Reading Rotation 8 will begin on Tuesday, April 16th. At that time, you will receive notification new skill and teacher.
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey continued working with the students on being a "social detective." How do we react in different social situations??
**In Mr. Packer Math Enrichment, Mr. Packer completed a project with the students on their version of the EST word story.
This week:
It was all about a few things this week. The students are getting excited about the Academic Fair and Egg Drop Contest. There was lots of discussion about their projects and vehicles. I am loving it!! Everything about space continues to be HUGE. Our field trip has fueled more passion about our upcoming space station projects. The students will be using social, analytical, scientific and behavioral skills that they have embraced throughout the year. It is Teamwork with a capital T my friends! They are ready for the challenge. Our station day activities included topographical moonscapes--part 1, pattern block rockets, addition names rockets-vowel + consonants, 3 dimensional structures with marshmallows and toothpicks.
Reading/Social Studies: The students continue to work on Unit 8 Plants in our Treasurers Reading series. They talked about and read about seeds and plants. They accessed prior knowledge from the earlier fall unit we did on apples. The students revisited our apple seed tray. They made connections in their own lives of blowing dandelion seeds everywhere or helping their parents in backyard gardens planting different types of seeds. The students listened to the Big Book story, "Seed Secrets." The story contained ways that seeds travel. The students observed the pictures and tracked the print as I read the story. Our target words for the week are here and was. The students used these and all their other words along with pictures to create sentences with a partner. Our target sound continues to be Short u. We continues to revisit adjectives and how to use them to enhance the way we speak and write. The students took turns recalling events in the story and made a list of how seeds travel. In our additional vocabulary development, the students worked on position words.
The students worked on their white boards with substituting sounds to create new words. They read the decodable story, "A Bud Is Up." They made predictions about story content. The students made a note of the sequential order in planting a seed. They reread the story to a partner to practice their fluency. Our robust Vocabulary this week included NECESSARY, GRADUALLY, SEEDS, OBSERVE. The students are also working on a special story called, "The Paper Crane." They will use this story next week to recall story elements and work on question words. Our workstations included using leveled readers with fluency and comprehension checks, answering and asking who, what, where, when why and how questions about the text, choosing a job with plants picture and using Magnetic Letters app to write 3 sentences about the job and using the Writer's Checklist for feedback and CVC spell down/write down activity.
Math: The students continue to work in their math process journals. Addition and subtraction processes to 10 are becoming more apparent to them. We reviewed time by the hour on an analog clock. The students practiced reading and writing 2-3 digit numbers. They began work on an activity called, "What's My Rule?" using pairs of numbers that are related to each other according to a specific rule. They infer what the rule is by examining pairs of numbers that are related according to the rule and then demonstrate their reasoning by generating additional pairs of numbers that follow the same rule. The students also experimented with creating 3 dimensional structures using marshmallows and toothpicks. We will set up a Structure Museum!
Writing: The students continue to work on refining their writing. They reflected in their journals about their field trip experience. Many students are writing 4 sentences! The students continue to work on beginning paragraphs skills using their shadow pictures. They are currently working on a 5 sentence draft.
Science: The students pondered the question--What is the moon? They compared elements of the daytime and nighttime sky. They discovered that unlike the sun, the moon can be seen in both in the day and at night. The students discussed the terms sunrise and sunset. They examined the moon's surface looking at pictures. In a experiment, the students recreated the surface of the moon using flour, cocoa powder as the surface and dropped marbles to create craters, "seas" (flat dark places) and mountains. Very cool! The students took a look at the different shapes the moon appears to make in the sky at night in the course of a month. It appears that the "phases" repeat themselves like a pattern every month. The students continue to study about space vehicles, space travel and travel to the moon. Next week--let's try some space food and make some star gazers!
Technology: The students continue to use all the apps introduced thus far.
Literature: "The Moon Book," "Eyewitness--The Moon," "What is the Moon Like?" "Finding the Moon," "Riddles About the Universe," "Meggie Moon," "Billy Bean's Dream," "I Want to be an Astronaut," "Moon Buggy," "Space Vehicles," "First to the Moon."
**The K-2 Spelling Bee is Wednesday, April 17th beginning at 11:00 am. Go Angus, Will and alternate, Sierra!!!! We can spell what we know! We will have a great time and eat our lunch in the auditorium. There will be ribbons for all the participants.
**Our SPACE STATION projects begin Monday!! The students are now in their work groups. They had a chance to exchange ideas and sketch a prototype drawing of their space station. Thanks for all the boxes and cool stuff! I have asked the students not to wear fancy clothes next week. They will wear paint shirts but it could get a little messy! Here's to collaboration, teamwork, compromise and creativity! Stay tuned!
**Student Council sponsored Career Day was very informative. Zaria's mom, Dr. Larnell talked about her job as a professor teaching government. Ellie's mom, Ms. Struckmeyer spoke to the students about her job as a pattern designer. The students really enjoyed it!
**Our field trip to the ADLER PLANETARIUM was awesome! Even though the weather was cold and foggy, we were cozy and warm exploring the different areas of the of the planetarium including the moon wall, the solar system area, the Apollo Mission room and most of all--The Planet Explorers Interactive Room. Many students tried on space gear, helped blast off into space, drove a lunar rover, saw a space toilet and space food and slept in a space bed! Many thanks to our volunteers--C. Nunes, A. Struckmeyer, L. Pointer, D. Chien and N. Johne for their help.
**Our Irving Green Team will have a group art piece at Oak Park's First Annual RE-CREATE ECO ART EXHIBIT going on now thru April 20th. You can view and vote for your favorite project at Visit Oak Park--1010 Lake St. Go Amare and Ivy!!!!!
**Please sign and return the Eagle Wing Field Trip slip in your child's homework folder. Our class earned a field trip to Barrie Park for lunch because they worked as a team to show they knew and understood our Eagle Essentials. Great Behavior!!!!! Our trip will be Thursday, April 25th from 10:45-12:05 pm. I will need 1-2 volunteers to walk with the class. Email if you can.
**Route to Reading Rotation 7 has concluded. You should have received notification indicating your child's skill mastery. Our final Route to Reading Rotation 8 will begin on Tuesday, April 16th. At that time, you will receive notification new skill and teacher.
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey continued working with the students on being a "social detective." How do we react in different social situations??
**In Mr. Packer Math Enrichment, Mr. Packer completed a project with the students on their version of the EST word story.
This week:
It was all about a few things this week. The students are getting excited about the Academic Fair and Egg Drop Contest. There was lots of discussion about their projects and vehicles. I am loving it!! Everything about space continues to be HUGE. Our field trip has fueled more passion about our upcoming space station projects. The students will be using social, analytical, scientific and behavioral skills that they have embraced throughout the year. It is Teamwork with a capital T my friends! They are ready for the challenge. Our station day activities included topographical moonscapes--part 1, pattern block rockets, addition names rockets-vowel + consonants, 3 dimensional structures with marshmallows and toothpicks.
Reading/Social Studies: The students continue to work on Unit 8 Plants in our Treasurers Reading series. They talked about and read about seeds and plants. They accessed prior knowledge from the earlier fall unit we did on apples. The students revisited our apple seed tray. They made connections in their own lives of blowing dandelion seeds everywhere or helping their parents in backyard gardens planting different types of seeds. The students listened to the Big Book story, "Seed Secrets." The story contained ways that seeds travel. The students observed the pictures and tracked the print as I read the story. Our target words for the week are here and was. The students used these and all their other words along with pictures to create sentences with a partner. Our target sound continues to be Short u. We continues to revisit adjectives and how to use them to enhance the way we speak and write. The students took turns recalling events in the story and made a list of how seeds travel. In our additional vocabulary development, the students worked on position words.
The students worked on their white boards with substituting sounds to create new words. They read the decodable story, "A Bud Is Up." They made predictions about story content. The students made a note of the sequential order in planting a seed. They reread the story to a partner to practice their fluency. Our robust Vocabulary this week included NECESSARY, GRADUALLY, SEEDS, OBSERVE. The students are also working on a special story called, "The Paper Crane." They will use this story next week to recall story elements and work on question words. Our workstations included using leveled readers with fluency and comprehension checks, answering and asking who, what, where, when why and how questions about the text, choosing a job with plants picture and using Magnetic Letters app to write 3 sentences about the job and using the Writer's Checklist for feedback and CVC spell down/write down activity.
Math: The students continue to work in their math process journals. Addition and subtraction processes to 10 are becoming more apparent to them. We reviewed time by the hour on an analog clock. The students practiced reading and writing 2-3 digit numbers. They began work on an activity called, "What's My Rule?" using pairs of numbers that are related to each other according to a specific rule. They infer what the rule is by examining pairs of numbers that are related according to the rule and then demonstrate their reasoning by generating additional pairs of numbers that follow the same rule. The students also experimented with creating 3 dimensional structures using marshmallows and toothpicks. We will set up a Structure Museum!
Writing: The students continue to work on refining their writing. They reflected in their journals about their field trip experience. Many students are writing 4 sentences! The students continue to work on beginning paragraphs skills using their shadow pictures. They are currently working on a 5 sentence draft.
Science: The students pondered the question--What is the moon? They compared elements of the daytime and nighttime sky. They discovered that unlike the sun, the moon can be seen in both in the day and at night. The students discussed the terms sunrise and sunset. They examined the moon's surface looking at pictures. In a experiment, the students recreated the surface of the moon using flour, cocoa powder as the surface and dropped marbles to create craters, "seas" (flat dark places) and mountains. Very cool! The students took a look at the different shapes the moon appears to make in the sky at night in the course of a month. It appears that the "phases" repeat themselves like a pattern every month. The students continue to study about space vehicles, space travel and travel to the moon. Next week--let's try some space food and make some star gazers!
Technology: The students continue to use all the apps introduced thus far.
Literature: "The Moon Book," "Eyewitness--The Moon," "What is the Moon Like?" "Finding the Moon," "Riddles About the Universe," "Meggie Moon," "Billy Bean's Dream," "I Want to be an Astronaut," "Moon Buggy," "Space Vehicles," "First to the Moon."
Saturday, April 6, 2013
UPDATES for 4/1-4/5 2013
**The students returned well rested and eager to begin the week. We were lucky to have abundant sunshine to continue with our shadows experiments. The weather is slowly warming up! The students are using their daily stretching and yoga poses to get into shape for Friday PACERS which will resume soon.
**Our Spelling Bee Representatives Angus, Will and alternate Sierra have received their spelling list from Mr. Packer. Relax....No worries! "Think about what you know" and "have fun" has been the mantra. We will be cheering them on, on Wednesday, April 17th in the auditorium during the lunch hour. Come join us if you can. It will be exciting !
**Please read the BLUE paper in your child's folder concerning information for our field trip to ADLER PLANETARIUM. It is this THURSDAY, APRIL 11th from 9-1:30 pm. All students are to be in school by 8:00 am. Students and teachers will ride the bus. All parent volunteers will carpool. Thanks to all who volunteered to help. I could only choose 5 parent volunteers. Don't worry...we still have a few more trips to go on. The volunteers for this trip are: A. Struckmeyer, M. Gurgas, L. Pointer, C. Nunes, K. Good. along with Ms. Dennis and myself. Parent Volunteers will get a separate email from me. All students--BAG LUNCH, DRESS for the WEATHER, GYM SHOES and SOCKS! We will be seeing an IMAX movie at 10:00 am. called, "One World, One Sky." From there the groups will see the exhibits, Our Solar System, Shoot for the Moon and Planet Explorers. Planet Explorers is an interactive exhibit that allows only 2 classrooms at a time for 30 minutes. Our selected time is 10:30 am. We are going to have a great time!
**Parent Career Day is Wednesday, April 10th sponsored by Student Council. Go Keyshaun and Ellie!!
**Sign up for the Academic Fair and Egg Drop continues!! I am so excited to hear of the cool projects being worked on by students as we speak! Just a reminder--you need to sign up for the projects on line. Just click on the "click here for assignments" underneath my name and you will see it on the homework page. The Academic Fair and Egg Drop contest in Tuesday, April 16th.
**Please keep sending in GIANT BOXES and other cool things for our Space Station Projects. We are sill in need of boxes the kids can climb in. Be on the look out for them. We have one more week of collection. The week of April 15th-19th, the students will design, create, construct, detail and present! We may need some hot glue volunteers during the detailing process. Stay tuned!
**Green Team reps, Amare and Ivy are working with the rest of the Green Team on a special activity week to recognize Earth Day which is April 22nd. Stay tuned for more info.
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey read a story about being a "social detective." The students are working on how to conduct themselves in all kinds of social situations.
**In Mr. Packer Math Enrichment this week, Mr. Packer read a story containing EST words and the students then created their own page with writing and illustrations.
This week:
It was all about the planets, stars, asteroids, meteors and constellations. The students learned a song about the order of the planets and some interesting facts about each one. We accessed information on our iPads about weather, NASA's space station daily report and information on constellations and space vocabulary. The students are very interested in how constellations were formed and named. We read several books on Greek and Roman mythology and found out some of the stories and names behind the constellations. The students were fascinated by the interesting stories. The students created and named their own constellations. They will be displayed in the hall. Our station day activities included creating constellations, build and count 3 dimensional animals with unifix cubes, solar system book, rainy day story sequencing project.
Reading/ Social Studies: The students began Unit 8 Plants this week in our Treasures Reading series. They began by building background knowledge around how a tree grows. The students talked about Oak Park and how many trees they see daily. Our class took a walk outside with our Tree Finder Book to see if there were any oak trees in the area and what other types of trees were in our school neighborhood. They located maple, oak, ginko, and ash trees. The students understood that a tree is a plant that takes many years to grow. They also understood that a tree comes from a seed. The students listened to the big book story, "Oak Trees." They noted that the book was non fiction, informational or expository. The students responded to the literature expressing that they had seen acorns (the seed) and some students even collected them. Once again they understood that it takes many years for a tree to grow and that some oak trees are 100 years old. Our sight words for the week are little and said. The students reviewed these words along with all of our other sight vocabulary. Students noted that the word said does not sound how it looks. Our target sounds for this week are short u and ck. We reread the big book and students took turns using the retelling cards to retell the story in their own words. The students used their elkonin boxes to blend and segment 4-5-6 phoneme words. The students read the decodable book, "Sad Hen." They made predictions about story content and orally answered comprehension questions about the story. The students took turns reading to a partner and filling out the Reader's Checklist. They used the story elements guide to ask Who, What, Where, When and Why questions about the story. Our Robust Vocabulary for this week included PLANT, GROW, CONCEITED, EQUAL, CHARMING. Our oral vocabulary story, "The Conceited Apple Branch," gave us all a healthy new respect for the dandelion. Ask your child to tell you about the story! The students listened to the poem, "Acorns." They discussed what the author's message was and noted the rhyming pattern. Student small groups used their word and picture cards to create sentences using their new sight words said and little. Like speech bubbles, said tells us who is talking. The students practiced their fluency by reading the paper story, "A Little Acorn." They also observed the use of "quotation marks," which also tells that someone is speaking. Students practiced working with the sound of ck. Workstations this week included leveled reader discussion and completion of the story elements chart, using the app Magic Reading 3 focusing on blending sounds to form short u and ck words, writing 3 sentences about the topic--trees and using the Writer's Checklist, creating a poster about trees and reading/recording fluency checks.
Math: The students worked on writing numbers 0-110. They continue to work on place value. This week the game, "It Takes Two" was introduced focusing on reading and writing 2 digit numbers. Next week, we will add the third digit! The students practiced counting by 2's, 5', and 10's to 100. Students worked on playing the "Disappearing Train" game which helped in the subtraction process. The students worked on building 3 dimensional animal shapes looking at a model. They used unifix cubes. It was interesting to note how students perceived the shapes and the directionality of the unifix cubes to complete the form. Fascinating!!! We will work more on 3 dimensional structures next week. We continue to work in our math journals on illustrating story problems and writing the number sentence.
Writing: The students continue to work on refining their upper and lowercase letter formations. They are beginning to refer to their Writer's Checklist when working on sentences. We continued our discussion on what a paragraph is. This week, the students began a writing project where they will write a small paragraph about their shadow picture. The students spent time examining their photos and generating ideas about what they could write about. As a group, we wrote down the ideas and settled on a few basic questions that each student could answer. The students used that format to begin their writing. They are learning to how to organize their ideas. Their first writing will be in a draft form that they can proofread to make changes or corrections if needed. The students are currently working on their drafts.
Science: The students continue to study shadows. In Experiments 4 and 5, the students observed how a shadow changes places due to the movement of the sun. That is--the suns position in the sky changes due to the rotation of the earth. Vivian was our shadow maker throughout the day. At 9:00 am, we gathered outside to trace the shadow Vivian made as she stood. We marked the place and observed the shadow. The students went back into the room to rough sketch where the shadow was and how it looked. We did the same at 12:00 and 2:45 pm.with Vivian standing in the exact same place. The students sketched the position and shape of the noon and 2:45 pm shadows in their science journal. They reflected their thoughts on the drawing and questions they were thinking about. Many students noticed that Vivian's shadow was long and skinny and right in front of her in the morning, short and wide and more to the left at noon and medium long and way more to the side at 2:45 pm. The concept here is that the earth is moving, not the sun. In Experiment 6, each table of students constructed a sundial using paper, clay and a dowel rod. We located drawings and actual pictures of sundials from the internet. Students learned that sundials were ancient forms of clocks. It is one of the oldest measuring instruments measuring the time of day by casting a shadow on a surface. Each table took their sundial out at 9:00 am, noon and 2:45 pm. The students observed the sundial as if it were a clock and thought about the numbers. In the classroom, the students drew a sketch and made an arrow where the shadow was cast and noted what time that might be. They then sketched a picture of what they do at that time of day. The students wrote about what they observed in their science journal. On Friday, Kanohi brought a plastic cat with an arm that reacted to solar power. More direct light...more wave!!! The students observed the cat wave (medium) powered by lights. We took the cat outside and much faster waving due to the bright sunlight. Pretty cool! We continue in science next week with the study of the moon.
Technology: In reading and math this week, no new apps have been introduced. Student small groups continue to use all previously mentioned apps that enhance and reinforce blending, segmenting, vocabulary development, spelling, reading, phonics and reading fluency recordings, addition and subtraction, number sequence, problem solving, critical thinking, number writing, place value, number order, concepts of more or less and coin recognition. In science, the students explored the app NASA to view pictures of space and spacecraft and get daily news from the Space Station. The students are very interested in looking at weather around the world and are using the app AcuWeather for this. The app Google Earth is also being used by students to locate where they live.
Literature: "Mercury," "Venus," "Earth," "Asteroids, Meteors and Comets," "Jupiter," "Saturn," "Uranus," "Neptune," "Pluto, the Dwarf Planet," "Solar System," "My Big Busy Space Book," "Moon Dogs," "I Like Stars," "Zoo in the Sky," "Sun Dials," "1000 Facts About Space," "Stories of the Stars," "Starry, Starry, Night," "Children's Atlas of the World."
**Our Spelling Bee Representatives Angus, Will and alternate Sierra have received their spelling list from Mr. Packer. Relax....No worries! "Think about what you know" and "have fun" has been the mantra. We will be cheering them on, on Wednesday, April 17th in the auditorium during the lunch hour. Come join us if you can. It will be exciting !
**Please read the BLUE paper in your child's folder concerning information for our field trip to ADLER PLANETARIUM. It is this THURSDAY, APRIL 11th from 9-1:30 pm. All students are to be in school by 8:00 am. Students and teachers will ride the bus. All parent volunteers will carpool. Thanks to all who volunteered to help. I could only choose 5 parent volunteers. Don't worry...we still have a few more trips to go on. The volunteers for this trip are: A. Struckmeyer, M. Gurgas, L. Pointer, C. Nunes, K. Good. along with Ms. Dennis and myself. Parent Volunteers will get a separate email from me. All students--BAG LUNCH, DRESS for the WEATHER, GYM SHOES and SOCKS! We will be seeing an IMAX movie at 10:00 am. called, "One World, One Sky." From there the groups will see the exhibits, Our Solar System, Shoot for the Moon and Planet Explorers. Planet Explorers is an interactive exhibit that allows only 2 classrooms at a time for 30 minutes. Our selected time is 10:30 am. We are going to have a great time!
**Parent Career Day is Wednesday, April 10th sponsored by Student Council. Go Keyshaun and Ellie!!
**Sign up for the Academic Fair and Egg Drop continues!! I am so excited to hear of the cool projects being worked on by students as we speak! Just a reminder--you need to sign up for the projects on line. Just click on the "click here for assignments" underneath my name and you will see it on the homework page. The Academic Fair and Egg Drop contest in Tuesday, April 16th.
**Please keep sending in GIANT BOXES and other cool things for our Space Station Projects. We are sill in need of boxes the kids can climb in. Be on the look out for them. We have one more week of collection. The week of April 15th-19th, the students will design, create, construct, detail and present! We may need some hot glue volunteers during the detailing process. Stay tuned!
**Green Team reps, Amare and Ivy are working with the rest of the Green Team on a special activity week to recognize Earth Day which is April 22nd. Stay tuned for more info.
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey read a story about being a "social detective." The students are working on how to conduct themselves in all kinds of social situations.
**In Mr. Packer Math Enrichment this week, Mr. Packer read a story containing EST words and the students then created their own page with writing and illustrations.
This week:
It was all about the planets, stars, asteroids, meteors and constellations. The students learned a song about the order of the planets and some interesting facts about each one. We accessed information on our iPads about weather, NASA's space station daily report and information on constellations and space vocabulary. The students are very interested in how constellations were formed and named. We read several books on Greek and Roman mythology and found out some of the stories and names behind the constellations. The students were fascinated by the interesting stories. The students created and named their own constellations. They will be displayed in the hall. Our station day activities included creating constellations, build and count 3 dimensional animals with unifix cubes, solar system book, rainy day story sequencing project.
Reading/ Social Studies: The students began Unit 8 Plants this week in our Treasures Reading series. They began by building background knowledge around how a tree grows. The students talked about Oak Park and how many trees they see daily. Our class took a walk outside with our Tree Finder Book to see if there were any oak trees in the area and what other types of trees were in our school neighborhood. They located maple, oak, ginko, and ash trees. The students understood that a tree is a plant that takes many years to grow. They also understood that a tree comes from a seed. The students listened to the big book story, "Oak Trees." They noted that the book was non fiction, informational or expository. The students responded to the literature expressing that they had seen acorns (the seed) and some students even collected them. Once again they understood that it takes many years for a tree to grow and that some oak trees are 100 years old. Our sight words for the week are little and said. The students reviewed these words along with all of our other sight vocabulary. Students noted that the word said does not sound how it looks. Our target sounds for this week are short u and ck. We reread the big book and students took turns using the retelling cards to retell the story in their own words. The students used their elkonin boxes to blend and segment 4-5-6 phoneme words. The students read the decodable book, "Sad Hen." They made predictions about story content and orally answered comprehension questions about the story. The students took turns reading to a partner and filling out the Reader's Checklist. They used the story elements guide to ask Who, What, Where, When and Why questions about the story. Our Robust Vocabulary for this week included PLANT, GROW, CONCEITED, EQUAL, CHARMING. Our oral vocabulary story, "The Conceited Apple Branch," gave us all a healthy new respect for the dandelion. Ask your child to tell you about the story! The students listened to the poem, "Acorns." They discussed what the author's message was and noted the rhyming pattern. Student small groups used their word and picture cards to create sentences using their new sight words said and little. Like speech bubbles, said tells us who is talking. The students practiced their fluency by reading the paper story, "A Little Acorn." They also observed the use of "quotation marks," which also tells that someone is speaking. Students practiced working with the sound of ck. Workstations this week included leveled reader discussion and completion of the story elements chart, using the app Magic Reading 3 focusing on blending sounds to form short u and ck words, writing 3 sentences about the topic--trees and using the Writer's Checklist, creating a poster about trees and reading/recording fluency checks.
Math: The students worked on writing numbers 0-110. They continue to work on place value. This week the game, "It Takes Two" was introduced focusing on reading and writing 2 digit numbers. Next week, we will add the third digit! The students practiced counting by 2's, 5', and 10's to 100. Students worked on playing the "Disappearing Train" game which helped in the subtraction process. The students worked on building 3 dimensional animal shapes looking at a model. They used unifix cubes. It was interesting to note how students perceived the shapes and the directionality of the unifix cubes to complete the form. Fascinating!!! We will work more on 3 dimensional structures next week. We continue to work in our math journals on illustrating story problems and writing the number sentence.
Writing: The students continue to work on refining their upper and lowercase letter formations. They are beginning to refer to their Writer's Checklist when working on sentences. We continued our discussion on what a paragraph is. This week, the students began a writing project where they will write a small paragraph about their shadow picture. The students spent time examining their photos and generating ideas about what they could write about. As a group, we wrote down the ideas and settled on a few basic questions that each student could answer. The students used that format to begin their writing. They are learning to how to organize their ideas. Their first writing will be in a draft form that they can proofread to make changes or corrections if needed. The students are currently working on their drafts.
Science: The students continue to study shadows. In Experiments 4 and 5, the students observed how a shadow changes places due to the movement of the sun. That is--the suns position in the sky changes due to the rotation of the earth. Vivian was our shadow maker throughout the day. At 9:00 am, we gathered outside to trace the shadow Vivian made as she stood. We marked the place and observed the shadow. The students went back into the room to rough sketch where the shadow was and how it looked. We did the same at 12:00 and 2:45 pm.with Vivian standing in the exact same place. The students sketched the position and shape of the noon and 2:45 pm shadows in their science journal. They reflected their thoughts on the drawing and questions they were thinking about. Many students noticed that Vivian's shadow was long and skinny and right in front of her in the morning, short and wide and more to the left at noon and medium long and way more to the side at 2:45 pm. The concept here is that the earth is moving, not the sun. In Experiment 6, each table of students constructed a sundial using paper, clay and a dowel rod. We located drawings and actual pictures of sundials from the internet. Students learned that sundials were ancient forms of clocks. It is one of the oldest measuring instruments measuring the time of day by casting a shadow on a surface. Each table took their sundial out at 9:00 am, noon and 2:45 pm. The students observed the sundial as if it were a clock and thought about the numbers. In the classroom, the students drew a sketch and made an arrow where the shadow was cast and noted what time that might be. They then sketched a picture of what they do at that time of day. The students wrote about what they observed in their science journal. On Friday, Kanohi brought a plastic cat with an arm that reacted to solar power. More direct light...more wave!!! The students observed the cat wave (medium) powered by lights. We took the cat outside and much faster waving due to the bright sunlight. Pretty cool! We continue in science next week with the study of the moon.
Technology: In reading and math this week, no new apps have been introduced. Student small groups continue to use all previously mentioned apps that enhance and reinforce blending, segmenting, vocabulary development, spelling, reading, phonics and reading fluency recordings, addition and subtraction, number sequence, problem solving, critical thinking, number writing, place value, number order, concepts of more or less and coin recognition. In science, the students explored the app NASA to view pictures of space and spacecraft and get daily news from the Space Station. The students are very interested in looking at weather around the world and are using the app AcuWeather for this. The app Google Earth is also being used by students to locate where they live.
Literature: "Mercury," "Venus," "Earth," "Asteroids, Meteors and Comets," "Jupiter," "Saturn," "Uranus," "Neptune," "Pluto, the Dwarf Planet," "Solar System," "My Big Busy Space Book," "Moon Dogs," "I Like Stars," "Zoo in the Sky," "Sun Dials," "1000 Facts About Space," "Stories of the Stars," "Starry, Starry, Night," "Children's Atlas of the World."
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