**Happy New Year and welcome back! Our frigid forecast lead to the closing of our school for 2 days. The students were excited to be back, however. We were inside for lunch recess and enjoyed viewing episodes of "Wild Kratts." Great sharing of Travel Journals to New York, Pittsburgh, California, Belleville and Sheboygan. Even though the temperatures will rise next week--please continue to send snow pants and boots. We may go outside for lunch recess and it will be quite messy and wet. I have 4 pair of extra snow pants in case to lend out. It is really the best way to stay dry. Also---don't forget to send gym shoes. Our gym days are Mondays and Wednesdays.
**Eagle Extras begin on Monday. Participating students will be picked up from our classroom at dismissal.
**Route to Reading Rotation 4 began Tuesday, January 6th. You should have received notification of the skill your child will be working on.
**I will begin Mid Year Assessments next week including DIBELS, Darrell Morris Sound Foundation and mid year assessments in reading, math and writing and some Common Core Formative assessments. I will share all of this with you at Mid Year Conferences.
**You will receive notification on Thursday (1/15) about Mid Year Parent/Teacher Conferences. They will be held on Monday, February 9th, Tuesday, February l0th and Wednesday, February 11th. Please note that Thursday, February 12th and Friday, February 13th school will be in session in the MORNING ONLY. Dismissal will be at 11:00 am. Hephzibah and bus pick up will also be at 11:00 am.
**Our 100th Day of School Celebration is THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 5th from 12:30 until dismissal. I have K. Meier, L. Makonnen and C. Cummings signed up to help so far. We need LOTS of volunteers to help with learning station activities that will focus on the number 100 and counting by 10's to 100. Email me if you can help. It is REALLY FUN! The students will also work on a special 100 item project. This will be sent home with instructions on THURSDAY, January 15th.
**Reading Grandma Mary came to class on Friday to begin her 8th year of listening to young readers. Each student will get to spend some time reading with her every Friday morning from 9:30-11:45 am. We are thrilled to have her!
**No Friendship Club this week. Ms. Bell Bey was absent.
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving this week, Mr. Packer read the student a story about the number 10 and worked on number patterns.
** No School on Friday, January 16th--Teacher's Institute Day.
**No School on Monday, January 19th in observance of M. L. King's Birthday.
**FUTURE FIELD TRIP to Dominican University to see the production of "Click, Clack, Moo!" on Friday, March 6th from 10:00 -12:00 pm.
**Start saving those GIANT BOXES (the ones you can climb in) and other cool stuff for our space station design and construction in APRIL during our SPACE THEME. I cannot store anything now. I will have you start bringing things in after spring break.
This week: It was all about frigid temperatures, snow and sharing their winter break stories. Winter is here! Frostbite was a big topic. The students were interested in weather patterns and looked on Weather Underground. They discovered that we were not the only ones experiencing cold weather. It was 16 degrees in Jacksonville, Florida!!! The students began work on a snowman writing project. They also began their inquiry into what they knew about WATER. Our experiments begin next week. We are lucky to have a Snowshoe Hare visiting our Nature Table this month. We will find out more about him and how he adapts to his environment during the winter. Station Day activities included windsock snowmen, snowflake shape and color by code, counting on with snowmen to solve addition problems and working on the first part of their snowman writing project.
Reading/Language Arts: The students used the short week as a review for all skills related to reading. They will finish Unit 4 Food next week. They reviewed their current sight vocabulary and played, "Hands Up, Hands Down. They worked with partners to create sentences using their sight words, pictures and punctuation marks and recorded their sentences on paper. Whole group lesson focused on MAIN EVENTS in a story using the text, "The Mitten Tree." Students also worked on PROBLEM and SOLUTION in a story using the text, "Yoko." We did some work with nouns and verbs in writing a recipe---What you need--(noun) and what you do--(verb). Students worked on leveled readers naming main events, practicing reading to a partner for fluency and asking and answering questions about a text they read. Students worked on making words, finding CVC words and searching for missing vowel sounds using our latest cool app--Oz Phonics 2. Very fun! They continue to use their elkonin boxes to record the order in which they hear sounds in a 3, 4 and 5 letter words. Thee students selected their own groups and games that focused on letter/sound correspondence, creating and sound blending CVC, CCVC and CVCC words, finding and writing words inside of other words, word family work and spelling their sight words.
Math: The students continue to work on rote counting to 100 and beyond and counting on from a random number. They began work in their new calendar books. The new skills included writing 3 numbers that come before a target number, ways to say a targeted number thru number bonds, strategies for recognizing even and odd numbers, patterns continuation, using ten frames to illustrate a given number and adding using dominoes and dice. Instant recognition is becoming more apparent when using ten frames, dice and dominoes.
Writing: The students continue to work on "Magic C" starting Center Capitals--this week concentrating on the letters S, A, G, I, T, J. They applied what they learned in their orange practice books. The students are also working on proofing their own writing before they come to journal conference with me. Students are working on 1-4 sentences in their journals. They are really looking at where they place their lowercase letters on a given line.
Science: The students began their inquiry and discussion on WATER and their Next Generation Science connection on waters relationship to weather. Stay tuned!!
Technology: The app Oz Phonics was introduced to enhance sound blending, sound foundation and CVC words as a whole group. Next week, I will be introducing another cool app called Learn to Read. It has some really cool activities--build a word, word scramble, find the word, sentence wheel and sentence builder. Add them to your child's tablet or iPad. They are low cost. In math, the students worked on the apps Number Find and Easy Match. They also chose partners and had a Subitize Tree challenge!.
Literature: "The Mitten Tree," "Yoko," "Water," "There was a Cold Lady Who Swallowed Some Snow," "The Snowy Day," "It's Winter," "Thomas' Snowsuit."
Sunday, January 11, 2015
Tuesday, December 30, 2014
UPDATES for 12/15-12/19 2014
**Our week was filled with compliment cards, friendship chains, book buddy projects and song. Our Winter Concert was fabulous! Thanks to Ms. Hiolski and Ms. Freisen for their guidance. Our after the concerts get togethers were full of great treats and crafts. Thanks to our helpers, Ms. Meier and Ms. Pacelli for their organization. The students were delighted to see parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles and brothers and sisters at the concert.
**Our End of the Year Book Buddy get together was awesome! The students shared treats and worked on a getting to know you movie trailer using iMovie. As the students finish the project, they are emailing the trailers to me and I will hopefully email them to you in the new year. Senorita Zaragoza spoke to the students about the festival of Las Posadas. She shared a story and music about the procession in the streets re-enacting Mary and Joseph's search for an inn and the stable that became their room. Evan and his mom presented on the feast of Hanukkah. Evan shared his special menorah and Ms. Frank read a special story. Each student received a Dreidel game. Jeremy and his mom also shared Jeremy's special Noah's Ark menorah. A special thanks to Ms. Frank and Ms. Meier for their time! I presented the origin of Kwanzaa which began in 1966. Students viewed their special candle holder called a kinara. I shared some traditional stories--"The Night Before Christmas", "The Nutcracker" and "The Twelve Days of Christmas."
**Mid Year DIBELS screening will take place the first 2 weeks of January. Route to Reading Rotation 4 will begin on Tuesday, January 6th.
**Vision Screening for Kindergarten students will be held Friday, January 9th in the morning.
**No School--Friday, January 16th-Teacher's Institute Day.
**Mid Year Parent/Teacher Conferences will be held on Monday, February 9th, Tuesday, February 10th and Wednesday, February 11th. You will receive notification of your specific day and time when we return from break.
**Reading Grandma Mary will be returning for her 8th year of hearing budding readers. She will begin coming every Friday morning beginning on Friday, January 9th.
**Classes resume on Monday, January 5th.
**Start saving those GIANT BOXES (the kind you can climb in) and other cool stuff for our space station design and construction in APRIL during our SPACE THEME. I cannot store anything now. I will have you start bringing in things after spring break.
LOOKING AHEAD IN 2015-----We will begin our next cross curricular theme WINTER. We will continue to introduce Next Generation Science strands within our district science model. We will begin our first formal Science Unit--Investigating Water. In the area of reading, the students will continue to focus on sound foundation, sound blending and segmenting/adding/deleting phonemes in 4, 5 and even 6 phoneme words. We will also work on oral and written comprehension, asking and answering questions about a text, comparing texts, reading fluency, vocabulary building, identifying story elements and identifying the authors message. Our Busy Reader Club will begin. I will be sending out more information about this in the new year. In the area of writing, the students will finish uppercase letter formation and will begin formal training in forming lowercase letters. Students will continue to work on sentence structure, inventive spelling, grammar and punctuation and expanding sentence length to include adjectives. In the area of math, the students will continue to work on rote counting to 100 by ones and tens and beyond, writing numbers, demonstrating knowledge of numbers that are greater then and less than, naming pattern block and geometric solid shapes, representing addition and subtraction with objects and mental images, solving story problems using drawings and number work, number bonding to 10 and more work on teen numbers. In the area of science, the students will weave district science and next generation science in the exploration of water and weather patterns. Socially, the students will continue to work on becoming more responsible and independent learners and thinkers and continue to develop positive relationships with their peers and teachers. In the area of technology, the students will continue to use the iPad and internet resources to enhance all areas of their curriculum. WOW! We will be very busy!!
Reading/Language Arts: The students continue to work on Unit 4 Food in our Treasures Reading series. The discussion this week centered around types of food you would have for dinner and if you ever helped make dinner. The students accessed prior knowledge about meals they have helped prepare and special meals coming up for the holidays that they will be a part of. The students listened to the Big Book story, "The Special Sweet Potato Pie." They separated fact from fiction--sweet potatoes are real--but they do not get bigger as they roll down the hill and you CAN make a sweet potato pie. They used the retelling cards to retell the story in their own words. They orally asked and answered questions about the story. Students reviewed their sight word, have and walked their words with a partner. They also reviewed target sounds Cc and Nn. They continue to work on using verbs in their daily speech and in their writing. Robust Vocabulary this week included APPETITE, FEAST, FLAVOR, SPECIAL. The students decided what small group activities they would do for their workstations this week. They formed small groups and worked on a story elements project using the pre decodable story, "I Have," worked on a word building Gingerbread Game, Used Montessori Crossword projected on the screen to take turns segmenting and sound blending 3 and 4 phoneme words and worked on a small group story about their gingerbread scenes they created with foam stickers.
Math: Students worked on a variety of of counting and problem solving activities--creating snowflakes-counting the folds to make and where to cut, playing the Dreidel Game adding and subtracting game pieces depending upon the the spin of the dreidel and making Rudolph using problem solving to figure out where each piece goes.
Writing: The students began work on Magic "C" uppercase letters C, O, Q, and G. They worked on creating a gingerbread person and wrote 1-4 sentences about them using words that describe. They continue to work on reading their writing and are beginning to make their own corrections. The students worked on Growth Mindset and Fixed Mindset thinking while listening to the story of "Rudolph Shines Again." They worked on writing compliment cards choosing one of their classmates that has demonstrated a Growth Mindset--I Can Learn From My Mistakes--I Keep Trying Until I Can--When Other Kids Do Well, I Am Inspired. All students were written about. They are up on our Compliment Tree board. I was very inspired!
Technology: Both small group and whole group used the apps Montessori Crossword and Rocketspeller and Number Find. Book Buddies helped them explore iMovie.
Literature: "Rudolph," "Rudolph Shines Again," "Las Posadas," "The Night Before Christmas," "The Nutcracker," "The Twelve Days of Christmas," "A Kwanzaa Counting Book," "K is for Kwanzaa."
**Our End of the Year Book Buddy get together was awesome! The students shared treats and worked on a getting to know you movie trailer using iMovie. As the students finish the project, they are emailing the trailers to me and I will hopefully email them to you in the new year. Senorita Zaragoza spoke to the students about the festival of Las Posadas. She shared a story and music about the procession in the streets re-enacting Mary and Joseph's search for an inn and the stable that became their room. Evan and his mom presented on the feast of Hanukkah. Evan shared his special menorah and Ms. Frank read a special story. Each student received a Dreidel game. Jeremy and his mom also shared Jeremy's special Noah's Ark menorah. A special thanks to Ms. Frank and Ms. Meier for their time! I presented the origin of Kwanzaa which began in 1966. Students viewed their special candle holder called a kinara. I shared some traditional stories--"The Night Before Christmas", "The Nutcracker" and "The Twelve Days of Christmas."
**Mid Year DIBELS screening will take place the first 2 weeks of January. Route to Reading Rotation 4 will begin on Tuesday, January 6th.
**Vision Screening for Kindergarten students will be held Friday, January 9th in the morning.
**No School--Friday, January 16th-Teacher's Institute Day.
**Mid Year Parent/Teacher Conferences will be held on Monday, February 9th, Tuesday, February 10th and Wednesday, February 11th. You will receive notification of your specific day and time when we return from break.
**Reading Grandma Mary will be returning for her 8th year of hearing budding readers. She will begin coming every Friday morning beginning on Friday, January 9th.
**Classes resume on Monday, January 5th.
**Start saving those GIANT BOXES (the kind you can climb in) and other cool stuff for our space station design and construction in APRIL during our SPACE THEME. I cannot store anything now. I will have you start bringing in things after spring break.
LOOKING AHEAD IN 2015-----We will begin our next cross curricular theme WINTER. We will continue to introduce Next Generation Science strands within our district science model. We will begin our first formal Science Unit--Investigating Water. In the area of reading, the students will continue to focus on sound foundation, sound blending and segmenting/adding/deleting phonemes in 4, 5 and even 6 phoneme words. We will also work on oral and written comprehension, asking and answering questions about a text, comparing texts, reading fluency, vocabulary building, identifying story elements and identifying the authors message. Our Busy Reader Club will begin. I will be sending out more information about this in the new year. In the area of writing, the students will finish uppercase letter formation and will begin formal training in forming lowercase letters. Students will continue to work on sentence structure, inventive spelling, grammar and punctuation and expanding sentence length to include adjectives. In the area of math, the students will continue to work on rote counting to 100 by ones and tens and beyond, writing numbers, demonstrating knowledge of numbers that are greater then and less than, naming pattern block and geometric solid shapes, representing addition and subtraction with objects and mental images, solving story problems using drawings and number work, number bonding to 10 and more work on teen numbers. In the area of science, the students will weave district science and next generation science in the exploration of water and weather patterns. Socially, the students will continue to work on becoming more responsible and independent learners and thinkers and continue to develop positive relationships with their peers and teachers. In the area of technology, the students will continue to use the iPad and internet resources to enhance all areas of their curriculum. WOW! We will be very busy!!
Reading/Language Arts: The students continue to work on Unit 4 Food in our Treasures Reading series. The discussion this week centered around types of food you would have for dinner and if you ever helped make dinner. The students accessed prior knowledge about meals they have helped prepare and special meals coming up for the holidays that they will be a part of. The students listened to the Big Book story, "The Special Sweet Potato Pie." They separated fact from fiction--sweet potatoes are real--but they do not get bigger as they roll down the hill and you CAN make a sweet potato pie. They used the retelling cards to retell the story in their own words. They orally asked and answered questions about the story. Students reviewed their sight word, have and walked their words with a partner. They also reviewed target sounds Cc and Nn. They continue to work on using verbs in their daily speech and in their writing. Robust Vocabulary this week included APPETITE, FEAST, FLAVOR, SPECIAL. The students decided what small group activities they would do for their workstations this week. They formed small groups and worked on a story elements project using the pre decodable story, "I Have," worked on a word building Gingerbread Game, Used Montessori Crossword projected on the screen to take turns segmenting and sound blending 3 and 4 phoneme words and worked on a small group story about their gingerbread scenes they created with foam stickers.
Math: Students worked on a variety of of counting and problem solving activities--creating snowflakes-counting the folds to make and where to cut, playing the Dreidel Game adding and subtracting game pieces depending upon the the spin of the dreidel and making Rudolph using problem solving to figure out where each piece goes.
Writing: The students began work on Magic "C" uppercase letters C, O, Q, and G. They worked on creating a gingerbread person and wrote 1-4 sentences about them using words that describe. They continue to work on reading their writing and are beginning to make their own corrections. The students worked on Growth Mindset and Fixed Mindset thinking while listening to the story of "Rudolph Shines Again." They worked on writing compliment cards choosing one of their classmates that has demonstrated a Growth Mindset--I Can Learn From My Mistakes--I Keep Trying Until I Can--When Other Kids Do Well, I Am Inspired. All students were written about. They are up on our Compliment Tree board. I was very inspired!
Technology: Both small group and whole group used the apps Montessori Crossword and Rocketspeller and Number Find. Book Buddies helped them explore iMovie.
Literature: "Rudolph," "Rudolph Shines Again," "Las Posadas," "The Night Before Christmas," "The Nutcracker," "The Twelve Days of Christmas," "A Kwanzaa Counting Book," "K is for Kwanzaa."
Sunday, December 14, 2014
UPDATES for 12/8-12/12 2014
**The flu, fever and coughs visited out classroom this week. By Friday, we had 7 students out! We kept to our schedule as much as we could. The students were busy practicing songs for the Winter Concert and sharing their winter traditions and learning about the traditions and celebrations of others around the world. Our 19th Annual Gingerbread Cookie Baking was a small affair, but quite spectacular!! The smell of gingerbread filled the school! The students created cookies that were works of art. Lots of details and lots of sprinkles!!! The students worked together to create and share some of the cookies with each other. Tis the season!! A HUGE THANKS to our great volunteers--Lily's Grandma, Ms. Peterson and Trinity and Mr. Hellman and Ms. Dennis. With plenty of dough and sprinkles let over, I have made some dough/sprinkles and baking directions bags for those students who were absent. Let me know if you need to borrow cookie cutters--I have plenty of those too!
**The Trimester 1 Report Card is in your child's home work folder. If you have any questions or would like to meet to discuss the standards grading system---please email me1
**Come One, Come All to the Kindergarten/Grade1 Winter Concert on Wednesday, December 17th in the Irving Auditorium. The concert will be held 2 times--First performance is at 8:15 am----the second performance is at 9:45 am. The concerts will begin promptly! Go early and get a good seat, especially if you are attending the 8:15 concert. Please come back to the room after each performance for a refreshment reception and crafts. It will be a great time to get together with other families to share conversation and community.
**The students were treated to a performance by the World's Smallest Circus (2 people!) on Tuesday. There was plate juggling, acrobatics, silly skits and spinning tops. Very fun! Check out our own Jaylen spinning plates----who knew!!!
**Please let me know if your child is traveling over the winter break. I will prepare a travel journal for them to take on their travels.
**Our class has a SECRET SNOWFLAKE!!!! We are making some surprises for them. Shhhhh!
**The Irving Craft Fair and Cookie Crumble grows more spectacular every year!!! There were so many things to look at and lots of great buys. What fun!!
**School is closed December 20th-January 4th. Classes resume on Monday, January 5, 2015!!
**Route to Reading Rotation 4 will begin later in January. This will give us time at the beginning of January to do midyear DIBELS Assessments.
**This week in Friendship Club, Ms. Bell Bey conducted voting session where the students got to "vote " for what they wanted to do next Friday. It was MOVIE by a small margin. Ms.Bell Bey and I will be looking over appropriate choices.
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving this week, Mr. Packer continued to work with the students on subitizing activities using dots in standard and scattered arrays.
This week:
It continues to be about gingerbread, celebrations and traditions. The students did a little research on how the activity of gingerbread making began and why it is so popular this time of year. Ginger was a valuable spice a long time ago traced back to the Greeks and Romans. A cake like treat was made of ginger. As time went on, Europeans began using flour, ginger and other spices to create cookies, houses and cakes. The students listened to a number of gingerbread stories. They examined characters, setting and main events in the stories. They verbally compared and contrasted the characters and the plot. How did end? (eaten...not eaten.) Who were the characters? (boy, man, baby, girls/boys, fox, wolf, coyote.) What happened in the story? They had loads of fun elbow chatting with each other about their observations. The students read about the Jewish celebration of Hanukkah with all its traditions and symbols. They learned how to play the dreidel game. The students also read about Advent and the story of Christmas with all its traditions and symbols. Students are beginning to catch on to the unifying theme of the use of lights in these winter celebrations--candles, strands of lights on trees, the light of the North Star. Station Day activities for this week included creating a candle with glitter and jewels, color by code menorah, working on our number formation books with forms for 6-9 and creating a "geome-tree" using rectangle and triangles to form an evergreen tree.
Reading/Language Arts: The students began Unit 4 Food in our Treasures Reading series. The unit began with a question about where food comes from. The students accessed prior knowledge about stores, farms, markets and orchards as places where food is found. Some students offered that they had gardens in their back yards in the summer. The students listened to the Big Book story, "Apple Farmer Annie." They listened and discussed where Annie lived and her daily activities as an apple farmer. Students made connections on their fall theme about apples, types of apples and what you can make with apples. Other students talked about the time they went went a farmer's market and bought apples and apple cider. Our target words are to and have. We have added these to our growing number of sight words. Our target letter and sound is Nn. The students reviewed the use of nouns and action words or verbs. Our Robust Vocabulary this week included FARMER, MARKET, INGREDIENTS, COMBINE, NUTRITIOUS. The students used their elkonin boxes to segment and blend 3 and 4 sound words. The students continue their work on recognizing consonant blends and digraphs. The students read their pre decodable story, "Can Nan?" They made predictions about story content. Students answered questions about the events in the story and then practiced reading the story to a partner for fluency development. The students listened to the vocabulary story, "Pizza Please." They had lots of fun activating their own prior knowledge about making their own homemade pizza, comparing and contrasting the ways and ingredients families use to make pizza. Some students had never made pizza but said they ordered it from a pizza place. The students learned that the dough comes from wheat grown on a farm, the sauce from tomatoes grown many places and cheese made from cow's milk. Workstations this week included using leveled readers to chat about story elements, creating word pies using CVC patterns, elbow chatting about the main idea of their selected story and about how foods grow, writing a sentence about what you like to do (action word), draw and label a food you like and write a sentence about it, read it and add to it-write about what could happen next, playing Roll, Write and Read and Feeling Foods--reach your hand in the bag....pull out a food....chat about it.....write about it and walking your words.
Math: The students continue to rote count to 85. They also continue to work on number formation rhymes for 6-9. The students are creating a number formation book for practice. We did a group lesson on counting on from a random number between 0-50 and higher between 50-100! We also played a group game about finding the 3 numbers BEFORE and 3 numbers AFTER a given number. In student workshop this week, students counted gingerbread men and recorded the number, learned to play the "Roll a Gingerbread Man," reviewed teen numbers with ten frames, wrote numbers 0-50, discussed and recorded the numbers that completed their number bond 0-5, reinforced recognition of pattern block shapes and worked with partners on the app Starfall Gingerbread--following and continuing a pattern.
Writing: The students finished up formal instruction on Starting Corner Capitals and began work on Magic "C" Capitals. They applied what they learned in their orange practice books. The students began work on a writing project about a gingerbread person. They are creating their own gingerbread person and are going to describe in writing their creation. The students came up with a list of describing words to use. Stay tuned!!
Technology: In the area of reading, student small groups and individual students used the apps, Montessori Crossword, Spelling Bug and Rocket Speller to listen and record letter sounds to create words (3-4-5 phonemes/sounds) recorded reading with iTalk for fluency, The app Sound Sort continues to assist individual students with sound/symbol connections. In the area of math, whole group instruction continued with the apps Subitize Tree and Number Rack. Students small groups used the apps Number Find and Easy Match for counting and cardinality as well as finding number using base ten strategies. The students partnered up to play Monster Squeeze using numbers 1-30.
Literature: "Hanukkah Counting Book," Diane Goode's "American Christmas Poems," "Counting Lions," "A Picture Book of Hanukkah," "Zero is the Leaves on a Tree," "Bake, Mice, Bake," "The Gingerbread Man," "The Gingerbread Bear," "The Gingerbread Man," "The Gingerbread Baby," "The Gingerbread Cowboy," "The Gingerbread Kid," "The Gingerbread Boy," "The Gingerbread Pirates," "Gingerbread Friends," "Bad Kitty Christmas, " "This is the Star," "Room for a Little One," "Winter Celebration Around the World."
**The Trimester 1 Report Card is in your child's home work folder. If you have any questions or would like to meet to discuss the standards grading system---please email me1
**Come One, Come All to the Kindergarten/Grade1 Winter Concert on Wednesday, December 17th in the Irving Auditorium. The concert will be held 2 times--First performance is at 8:15 am----the second performance is at 9:45 am. The concerts will begin promptly! Go early and get a good seat, especially if you are attending the 8:15 concert. Please come back to the room after each performance for a refreshment reception and crafts. It will be a great time to get together with other families to share conversation and community.
**The students were treated to a performance by the World's Smallest Circus (2 people!) on Tuesday. There was plate juggling, acrobatics, silly skits and spinning tops. Very fun! Check out our own Jaylen spinning plates----who knew!!!
**Please let me know if your child is traveling over the winter break. I will prepare a travel journal for them to take on their travels.
**Our class has a SECRET SNOWFLAKE!!!! We are making some surprises for them. Shhhhh!
**The Irving Craft Fair and Cookie Crumble grows more spectacular every year!!! There were so many things to look at and lots of great buys. What fun!!
**School is closed December 20th-January 4th. Classes resume on Monday, January 5, 2015!!
**Route to Reading Rotation 4 will begin later in January. This will give us time at the beginning of January to do midyear DIBELS Assessments.
**This week in Friendship Club, Ms. Bell Bey conducted voting session where the students got to "vote " for what they wanted to do next Friday. It was MOVIE by a small margin. Ms.Bell Bey and I will be looking over appropriate choices.
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving this week, Mr. Packer continued to work with the students on subitizing activities using dots in standard and scattered arrays.
This week:
It continues to be about gingerbread, celebrations and traditions. The students did a little research on how the activity of gingerbread making began and why it is so popular this time of year. Ginger was a valuable spice a long time ago traced back to the Greeks and Romans. A cake like treat was made of ginger. As time went on, Europeans began using flour, ginger and other spices to create cookies, houses and cakes. The students listened to a number of gingerbread stories. They examined characters, setting and main events in the stories. They verbally compared and contrasted the characters and the plot. How did end? (eaten...not eaten.) Who were the characters? (boy, man, baby, girls/boys, fox, wolf, coyote.) What happened in the story? They had loads of fun elbow chatting with each other about their observations. The students read about the Jewish celebration of Hanukkah with all its traditions and symbols. They learned how to play the dreidel game. The students also read about Advent and the story of Christmas with all its traditions and symbols. Students are beginning to catch on to the unifying theme of the use of lights in these winter celebrations--candles, strands of lights on trees, the light of the North Star. Station Day activities for this week included creating a candle with glitter and jewels, color by code menorah, working on our number formation books with forms for 6-9 and creating a "geome-tree" using rectangle and triangles to form an evergreen tree.
Reading/Language Arts: The students began Unit 4 Food in our Treasures Reading series. The unit began with a question about where food comes from. The students accessed prior knowledge about stores, farms, markets and orchards as places where food is found. Some students offered that they had gardens in their back yards in the summer. The students listened to the Big Book story, "Apple Farmer Annie." They listened and discussed where Annie lived and her daily activities as an apple farmer. Students made connections on their fall theme about apples, types of apples and what you can make with apples. Other students talked about the time they went went a farmer's market and bought apples and apple cider. Our target words are to and have. We have added these to our growing number of sight words. Our target letter and sound is Nn. The students reviewed the use of nouns and action words or verbs. Our Robust Vocabulary this week included FARMER, MARKET, INGREDIENTS, COMBINE, NUTRITIOUS. The students used their elkonin boxes to segment and blend 3 and 4 sound words. The students continue their work on recognizing consonant blends and digraphs. The students read their pre decodable story, "Can Nan?" They made predictions about story content. Students answered questions about the events in the story and then practiced reading the story to a partner for fluency development. The students listened to the vocabulary story, "Pizza Please." They had lots of fun activating their own prior knowledge about making their own homemade pizza, comparing and contrasting the ways and ingredients families use to make pizza. Some students had never made pizza but said they ordered it from a pizza place. The students learned that the dough comes from wheat grown on a farm, the sauce from tomatoes grown many places and cheese made from cow's milk. Workstations this week included using leveled readers to chat about story elements, creating word pies using CVC patterns, elbow chatting about the main idea of their selected story and about how foods grow, writing a sentence about what you like to do (action word), draw and label a food you like and write a sentence about it, read it and add to it-write about what could happen next, playing Roll, Write and Read and Feeling Foods--reach your hand in the bag....pull out a food....chat about it.....write about it and walking your words.
Math: The students continue to rote count to 85. They also continue to work on number formation rhymes for 6-9. The students are creating a number formation book for practice. We did a group lesson on counting on from a random number between 0-50 and higher between 50-100! We also played a group game about finding the 3 numbers BEFORE and 3 numbers AFTER a given number. In student workshop this week, students counted gingerbread men and recorded the number, learned to play the "Roll a Gingerbread Man," reviewed teen numbers with ten frames, wrote numbers 0-50, discussed and recorded the numbers that completed their number bond 0-5, reinforced recognition of pattern block shapes and worked with partners on the app Starfall Gingerbread--following and continuing a pattern.
Writing: The students finished up formal instruction on Starting Corner Capitals and began work on Magic "C" Capitals. They applied what they learned in their orange practice books. The students began work on a writing project about a gingerbread person. They are creating their own gingerbread person and are going to describe in writing their creation. The students came up with a list of describing words to use. Stay tuned!!
Technology: In the area of reading, student small groups and individual students used the apps, Montessori Crossword, Spelling Bug and Rocket Speller to listen and record letter sounds to create words (3-4-5 phonemes/sounds) recorded reading with iTalk for fluency, The app Sound Sort continues to assist individual students with sound/symbol connections. In the area of math, whole group instruction continued with the apps Subitize Tree and Number Rack. Students small groups used the apps Number Find and Easy Match for counting and cardinality as well as finding number using base ten strategies. The students partnered up to play Monster Squeeze using numbers 1-30.
Literature: "Hanukkah Counting Book," Diane Goode's "American Christmas Poems," "Counting Lions," "A Picture Book of Hanukkah," "Zero is the Leaves on a Tree," "Bake, Mice, Bake," "The Gingerbread Man," "The Gingerbread Bear," "The Gingerbread Man," "The Gingerbread Baby," "The Gingerbread Cowboy," "The Gingerbread Kid," "The Gingerbread Boy," "The Gingerbread Pirates," "Gingerbread Friends," "Bad Kitty Christmas, " "This is the Star," "Room for a Little One," "Winter Celebration Around the World."
Sunday, December 7, 2014
UPDATES for 11/24-11/25 and 12/1-12/5 2014
**WOW!! Busy. Busy. I will back track a little to 11/24. The students heard last minute details about their trip to Brookfield Zoo. We read information on other types of Bears. The students chatted about their question for their research project. The students worked on their writing pieces for Polar and Black/Brown Bears. What do we know now? They chose the stories for read aloud and decided what other activities to do in their workstations. In the afternoon, the students had a great time investigating the animal track stamps courtesy of the Field Museum. Each child chose an specific animal track and stamped their paper. They then wrote about where their animal tracks were going. Totally cute!! They are up in our classroom. Come and check them out!
**11/25--FIELD TRIP to BROOKFIELD ZOO!! It was super chilly but we dressed warmly and had an absolutely fabulous time. A HUGE THANKS to Ms. Frank, Ms. Cummings, Ms. Matta and Ms. Connelly for braving the elements to help out. Hamill Play Zoo had face painting, dramatic play at the vet's office, craft, a cool chicken and bunny to pet and plants to water. Students saw bison, penguins, snakes to name a few. We had an indoor lunch and traveled to our Bear Class. Our docent, Jim was the best! The students got to examine black bear and polar bear fur and see how many students it took end to end to equal the size of a grizzly bear. They learned many more interesting facts about bears. We toured the Bear Grotto and saw a sleeping brown bear up close and personal as well as a polar bear fluffing up his bed of straw. It felt so good to get back on the warm bus. Back at school, the students reflected in their journal about their experience and then topped it off with Art Class with our beloved Ms. Tague.
**The Frosty Fun Friday Jam was a hoot!! Lots of students rocking out to the tunes spun by by our own DJ Mick. There were some very cool moves by our own Jaylen and the newest addition to our classroom---Ashton. Room 110 had some great representation. Hope everyone had a blast. I did!
**We are ready for Room 110's Annual GINGERBREAD BAKING!! It's an 18 year tradition! It's Thursday, December 11th form 12:30-2:55 pm. A BIG SHOUT OUT to our volunteers Ms. Frank, Ms. Meier, Ms. Peterson, Ms. Ferrigno, Mr. Hellman, Tate's Grandma and Lily's Grandma. It is a bit messy and dusty so DO NOT come dressed in your best. Students with long hair--please wear a pony tail or up. We will be caring and sharing our cookies with our tablemates. We will get some of our own and get some of theirs too.
**Report Cards go home on Friday, December 12th. Please read the information included to better understand the grading system. Lexia reports will also be included as well as any goal updates by specialists your child may be seeing in the area of speech and language or Tier 3 intervention for reading readiness. The main idea to remember for our report card system is that it is a growth model of progress toward an end of the year goal. If you should have any questions after reviewing it, please email me.
**Route to Reading Rotation 3 had concluded. Route to Reading Rotation 4 will begin on Tuesday, January 6, 2015!!
**Our WINTER CONCERT is fast approaching. Please join us for Kindergarten/Grade 1 Concert on Wednesday, December 17th. The students will perform twice--once at 8:15 and again at 9:45 am in the Irving Auditorium. We will have a reception in our classroom after both concerts. Come join us for some refreshments.
**The Irving Cookie Crumble and Craft Fair is Saturday, December 13th from 9:00-1:00 pm. Stock up on those holiday treasures. Our own Green Team will be selling some nature art.
**Take a look at the cool programs offered by after school Eagle Extras. The brochure is in your child's homework folder.
**We have begun our cross curricular unit on Celebrations and Traditions. If you have a particular holiday or winter tradition you would like to share with the class--email me and we can set it up. Kindergarten students LOVE to have their parents come to the classroom!!
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey had an awesome and heartfelt sharing and discussion about staying safe at school, at home and in our community and what you can do if you do not feel safe. Being a Social Detective was part of the spotlight. The students remembered that if you do the EXPECTED (pay attention, treat others with respect) others will think nice thoughts about you. If you do the UNEXPECTED (bully, bother, hit) others may not want to be around you.
**In Mr. Packer Problem solving this week, Mr. Packer worked with the students on subitizing skills, symmetry and number recognition using dots. Very cool!!!
**School is closed for Winter Break--December 20th-January 4th. Classes resume on Monday, January 5th.
This week:
It was all about traditions and celebrations. The students talked about what a tradition was--activities that are done routinely at about the same time every year and can be passed down thru generations. I spoke about my family tradition of making ravioli and my school tradition of making gingerbread with my students at this time of year. The students made connections in their own lives and related activities that they do every year at this time. Station day activities included using pattern blocks to build using teen numbers, ten frame activities with teen numbers, writing a caption for their Bear Art Projects made in Ms. Tague's class and taking the subitize challenge with a partner.
Reading/Language Arts: The students completed Unit 3 Transportation in our Treasures Reading series. The students built background knowledge about the different ways wheels are used to move people and things around. They worked on their listening comprehension while listening to David Shannon's story, "Duck on a Bike" read both in English and in Spanish. Students identified the characters and the plot (what is happening in the story.) They took a closer look at the way the story was organized (a beginning, a middle and an end) and responded to the story by discussing the connections that can be made from the story to their daily lives. (I can ride a bike. I see kids riding bikes in my neighborhood.) The students reviewed target sounds Tt and Short i and used their elkonin boxes and cubes to segment and blend 3 and 4 letter words. Lots of discussion on nouns and action words. The students worked with partners to create noun/verb sentences using picture cards. The students were introduced to Consonant Blends and Consonant Digraphs. Do you know the difference? They are learning to. Robust vocabulary for this week included ADVENTURE, WHEE:LS, ATTACH, HAUL, MASSIVE. The students read their pre decodable story, "I See A Truck Go," and made predictions about story content. The students listened to the thinking story, "Timimoto" and discussed the storyteller's message. Workstations this week included recording of level reader reading using iTalk and evaluating how they sounded, creating sentences using words Go and See, read it and add to it activity, sounds match, air, land and water vehicles graph and compare and asking and answering questions about a trip you might like to take.
Math: The students continued work on counting to 75, sequencing what comes before and after a random number, working on teen numbers 11-19 and the idea that a teen number is 1 group of ten (1 complete ten frame) and so many ones (how many on the new ten frame.) The students worked on a shape review project with shapes-circle, oval, trapezoid, hexagon, square, rectangle and triangle counting the side and corners (vertices) using the app Doodle Buddy. The students are working in their new calendar books on recording numbers, sequencing numbers, counting on from a random number, using tally marks to show how many and the idea of number bonds--ways to say a number--ie: 4 and 4 is a way to say 8. Are they other ways to say 8? 3 and 5 6 and 2 etc.
Writing: The students have completed their Starting Corner Capital and applied what they learned in their orange practice books. They continue to work on sentence structure, spacing of words in a sentence, where to put lowercase letters, punctuation and beginning a sentence with a capital letter. The students are working at adding more details to their sentence.
Technology: Students participated in whole group work using the app Montessori Crossword on the projector to strengthen blending and segmenting skills and the app Sound Sort to strengthen automaticity of sound to symbol. Student small groups used iTalk to record and listen to their reading for fluency and clarity. Students are continuing to record their story sentence for our talking book on Sonic Pics. In math, students worked with a partner on the app Subitize Tree to challenge each other to strengthen subitizing/counting skills. Doodle Buddy was used by individual students to create their shape and record their name for the sides and corners project.
Literature: "Duck on a Bike," Poems--"My Bike," "Riding the Subway Train," "Celebrations Around the World," "Which Animals Travel in the Fall?" "Animal Homes," "If You Had Animal Hair," "Adding with Animals," "Animals in Winter."
**11/25--FIELD TRIP to BROOKFIELD ZOO!! It was super chilly but we dressed warmly and had an absolutely fabulous time. A HUGE THANKS to Ms. Frank, Ms. Cummings, Ms. Matta and Ms. Connelly for braving the elements to help out. Hamill Play Zoo had face painting, dramatic play at the vet's office, craft, a cool chicken and bunny to pet and plants to water. Students saw bison, penguins, snakes to name a few. We had an indoor lunch and traveled to our Bear Class. Our docent, Jim was the best! The students got to examine black bear and polar bear fur and see how many students it took end to end to equal the size of a grizzly bear. They learned many more interesting facts about bears. We toured the Bear Grotto and saw a sleeping brown bear up close and personal as well as a polar bear fluffing up his bed of straw. It felt so good to get back on the warm bus. Back at school, the students reflected in their journal about their experience and then topped it off with Art Class with our beloved Ms. Tague.
**The Frosty Fun Friday Jam was a hoot!! Lots of students rocking out to the tunes spun by by our own DJ Mick. There were some very cool moves by our own Jaylen and the newest addition to our classroom---Ashton. Room 110 had some great representation. Hope everyone had a blast. I did!
**We are ready for Room 110's Annual GINGERBREAD BAKING!! It's an 18 year tradition! It's Thursday, December 11th form 12:30-2:55 pm. A BIG SHOUT OUT to our volunteers Ms. Frank, Ms. Meier, Ms. Peterson, Ms. Ferrigno, Mr. Hellman, Tate's Grandma and Lily's Grandma. It is a bit messy and dusty so DO NOT come dressed in your best. Students with long hair--please wear a pony tail or up. We will be caring and sharing our cookies with our tablemates. We will get some of our own and get some of theirs too.
**Report Cards go home on Friday, December 12th. Please read the information included to better understand the grading system. Lexia reports will also be included as well as any goal updates by specialists your child may be seeing in the area of speech and language or Tier 3 intervention for reading readiness. The main idea to remember for our report card system is that it is a growth model of progress toward an end of the year goal. If you should have any questions after reviewing it, please email me.
**Route to Reading Rotation 3 had concluded. Route to Reading Rotation 4 will begin on Tuesday, January 6, 2015!!
**Our WINTER CONCERT is fast approaching. Please join us for Kindergarten/Grade 1 Concert on Wednesday, December 17th. The students will perform twice--once at 8:15 and again at 9:45 am in the Irving Auditorium. We will have a reception in our classroom after both concerts. Come join us for some refreshments.
**The Irving Cookie Crumble and Craft Fair is Saturday, December 13th from 9:00-1:00 pm. Stock up on those holiday treasures. Our own Green Team will be selling some nature art.
**Take a look at the cool programs offered by after school Eagle Extras. The brochure is in your child's homework folder.
**We have begun our cross curricular unit on Celebrations and Traditions. If you have a particular holiday or winter tradition you would like to share with the class--email me and we can set it up. Kindergarten students LOVE to have their parents come to the classroom!!
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey had an awesome and heartfelt sharing and discussion about staying safe at school, at home and in our community and what you can do if you do not feel safe. Being a Social Detective was part of the spotlight. The students remembered that if you do the EXPECTED (pay attention, treat others with respect) others will think nice thoughts about you. If you do the UNEXPECTED (bully, bother, hit) others may not want to be around you.
**In Mr. Packer Problem solving this week, Mr. Packer worked with the students on subitizing skills, symmetry and number recognition using dots. Very cool!!!
**School is closed for Winter Break--December 20th-January 4th. Classes resume on Monday, January 5th.
This week:
It was all about traditions and celebrations. The students talked about what a tradition was--activities that are done routinely at about the same time every year and can be passed down thru generations. I spoke about my family tradition of making ravioli and my school tradition of making gingerbread with my students at this time of year. The students made connections in their own lives and related activities that they do every year at this time. Station day activities included using pattern blocks to build using teen numbers, ten frame activities with teen numbers, writing a caption for their Bear Art Projects made in Ms. Tague's class and taking the subitize challenge with a partner.
Reading/Language Arts: The students completed Unit 3 Transportation in our Treasures Reading series. The students built background knowledge about the different ways wheels are used to move people and things around. They worked on their listening comprehension while listening to David Shannon's story, "Duck on a Bike" read both in English and in Spanish. Students identified the characters and the plot (what is happening in the story.) They took a closer look at the way the story was organized (a beginning, a middle and an end) and responded to the story by discussing the connections that can be made from the story to their daily lives. (I can ride a bike. I see kids riding bikes in my neighborhood.) The students reviewed target sounds Tt and Short i and used their elkonin boxes and cubes to segment and blend 3 and 4 letter words. Lots of discussion on nouns and action words. The students worked with partners to create noun/verb sentences using picture cards. The students were introduced to Consonant Blends and Consonant Digraphs. Do you know the difference? They are learning to. Robust vocabulary for this week included ADVENTURE, WHEE:LS, ATTACH, HAUL, MASSIVE. The students read their pre decodable story, "I See A Truck Go," and made predictions about story content. The students listened to the thinking story, "Timimoto" and discussed the storyteller's message. Workstations this week included recording of level reader reading using iTalk and evaluating how they sounded, creating sentences using words Go and See, read it and add to it activity, sounds match, air, land and water vehicles graph and compare and asking and answering questions about a trip you might like to take.
Math: The students continued work on counting to 75, sequencing what comes before and after a random number, working on teen numbers 11-19 and the idea that a teen number is 1 group of ten (1 complete ten frame) and so many ones (how many on the new ten frame.) The students worked on a shape review project with shapes-circle, oval, trapezoid, hexagon, square, rectangle and triangle counting the side and corners (vertices) using the app Doodle Buddy. The students are working in their new calendar books on recording numbers, sequencing numbers, counting on from a random number, using tally marks to show how many and the idea of number bonds--ways to say a number--ie: 4 and 4 is a way to say 8. Are they other ways to say 8? 3 and 5 6 and 2 etc.
Writing: The students have completed their Starting Corner Capital and applied what they learned in their orange practice books. They continue to work on sentence structure, spacing of words in a sentence, where to put lowercase letters, punctuation and beginning a sentence with a capital letter. The students are working at adding more details to their sentence.
Technology: Students participated in whole group work using the app Montessori Crossword on the projector to strengthen blending and segmenting skills and the app Sound Sort to strengthen automaticity of sound to symbol. Student small groups used iTalk to record and listen to their reading for fluency and clarity. Students are continuing to record their story sentence for our talking book on Sonic Pics. In math, students worked with a partner on the app Subitize Tree to challenge each other to strengthen subitizing/counting skills. Doodle Buddy was used by individual students to create their shape and record their name for the sides and corners project.
Literature: "Duck on a Bike," Poems--"My Bike," "Riding the Subway Train," "Celebrations Around the World," "Which Animals Travel in the Fall?" "Animal Homes," "If You Had Animal Hair," "Adding with Animals," "Animals in Winter."
Sunday, November 23, 2014
UPDATES for 11/17-11/21 2014
**We were super busy this week! There were final assessments and summatives to mark the end of our first trimester of learning. Our cross curricular theme-Bears is winding down. We chatted about our upcoming field trip. We also formulated our question for our research projects. It was also a week of reflection for the students and myself. We all thought about what we were thankful for. The students and I are thankful for a number of things, the most important being family. I am particularly thankful for my student's dedication to their learning. Our class is thankful for our volunteer, Ms. D., who works tirelessly with individual students and small groups. Our class is thankful for each other and the great and meaningful interactions we have together. I am also thankful for the great support and help from my kindergarten families. You truly make a difference. Please enjoy your family time together as I will.
**No School-November 26th-28th--Thanksgiving Holiday.
**Our Brookfield Zoo FIELD TRIP is TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 25th. Please read the note that went home in your child's homework folder. BAG LUNCH and DRESS for the WEATHER. It looks like a pretty chilly forecast. We may shorten the duration of our stay at the zoo and find an inside space to eat lunch. We will have fun!!!!
**"Hibernation Day" was awesome!! We were cozy in our jammies with our blankeys and stuffed animals. We read about how different animals hibernate. The students helped me create a Venn diagram that compared Brown/Black Bears with Polar Bears. We also read about other kinds of bears. The students enjoyed a great picnic with their kindergarten friends in the kindergarten hallway. They enjoyed making butter from cream in our liquids to solids impromptu science lesson and created "Bear Paw" snacks that looked and tasted yummy with the butter.
**The "Turkey Trot" was fun! We made signs to cheer our Book Buddies on. The weather was frosty, but the students were dressed warmly and had extra blankets as they watched the race and cheered.
**Check your child's homework folder for their RESEARCH ASSESSMENT. Each student came up with a question they want to find out more about. They worked on special research vocabulary. Suggestions and guidelines are also enclosed. The project is due Thursday, December 11th.
**Route to Reading Rotation 3 will conclude December 4th.
**The 5th Grade is sponsoring "Frosty Fun Friday Dance" on Friday, December 5th. More info is coming soon!
**Kindergarten-Grade 1 WINTER CONCERT is DECEMBER 17th in the Irving Auditorium. It will be performed twice--First Time at 8:15 am and repeated again at 9:45 am. There will be some kind of reception for family and friends. I will be speaking with room parents. Stay tuned for more details.
**REPORT CARDS go home on Friday, December 12th.
**CALLING ALL COOKS!!!! Room 110's Annual Gingerbread Cookie Baking and Sharing is Thursday, December 11th beginning at 1:00 pm until dismissal. So far, I have no one volunteering to help, but I am hopeful!! It is really very fun! No experience needed. You bring the cookie sheets, rolling pins and man/woman power.....I will bring the dough, sprinkles and aprons. I need at least 3-4 volunteers.
**Come to the Irving Annual Handmade Craft Fair on Saturday, December 13th from 9-1pm in the mini gym and hallways. Stock up on those handmade holiday gifts.
**We will begin our next cross curricular theme--Celebrations and Traditions after Thanksgiving. Please think about coming to speak about your family celebration or tradition at holiday time. Students love to help in the planning and presentation. We recently had Tate and his Dad, Joel speak and share about their tradition of nature hikes and bird watching. Totally cool!!!
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey continued her unit on friendship using the art of conversation and how to really listen to someone and respond.
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving this week, the students finished up a project using visual imagery and perception to create a picture using Alphabet letters and dots.
**School is closed December 22nd -January 2nd for Winter Break.
This week: It was all about research basics for little ones!! Ms. Noonan worked with the students on the question--What is research? The students worked on thinking about a question about something they wanted to find out more about and then discussed how you might find a source to help you answer the question. The major topic is: BEARS. The students worked in class on special research vocabulary and examples. I can't wait to see the results. The students also continued work on their talking book project. They practiced reading their story page and then recorded it onto the iPad. We have had some absences but hope to have the story posted for you soon. It is pretty cute!! We are almost at the end of our Bear Unit. It has provided lots of activities and opportunities for growth in math, reading, writing and science. Our station day activities this week included think, create, count and record pattern block activity, building pattern block turkeys, color by code (number/color word) turkey, liquid to solid cream to butter and counting to form the toes on our bear paw snack.
Reading/Social Studies: The students continue to work in Unit 3 Transportation in our Treasures Reading series. The students built background knowledge on their travels near and far. They listened to the Big Book story, "On the Go." They observed how people travel from one place to another and the vehicles they used. We looked up each country on our world map. The students asked and answered questions about the types of vehicles used in other countries. In their comprehension study, the students compared and categorized the types of travel and vehicles. The sight words go and see were reviewed. The students worked on their target sounds Tt and short i. They continued to review the use of action words in texts. Our Robust Vocabulary this week included TRAVEL, JOURNEY, PREPARE, RELAX, FAMILIAR. The students used their elkonin boxes to segment and blend 3 phoneme words. They read their pre decodable story, "Go, Go, Go." They reviewed what a comma was and how it is used. They made predictions about story content and elbow chatted about characters, setting and main events. During an interactive writing exercise, the students made pop up signs using the word "Go" to help cheer on their Book Buddies in the Turkey Trot. The students listened to two poems about transportation--"The Bike," and "Riding the Subway." They noticed the rhyming pattern in both and tracked the words as I read them. They made connections in their own lives about riding their bikes and traveling on a subway. The students also worked on a common core assessment comparing two characters from two different stories. This week the students worked to complete the workstation rotation from last week.
Math: The students continue to work on rote counting to 75 and beyond. The students are really getting the hang of ten frame use and counting by tens. They worked with partners on counting and cardinality activities representing a group of objects with a written number. Students also continued to work with pattern block shapes building, counting and recording number. The students combined counting and recognizing color words during color by code exercises. Workstations this week included sorting and classifying by common attributes, writing numbers from 0-20, working with teen numbers using tally marks and ten frames (how many complete ten frames....how on the new ten frame) and counting on from a given number.
Writing: The students are working on formation of Starting Corner Capital letters H, K, L, U, V. They used their mini boards and applied what they learned in their orange books. The students wrote1-3 sentences about what they knew about Brown/Black and Polar Bears. from their study of bears. The students are working hard to begin with a capital letter, name and tell and space between words in a sentence and have an ending mark. Some students are beginning to add more details to their sentences. I love when I hear them reading back their own writing as they begin work on self editing. This week, one of the occupational therapist, Ms. Ilis came to observe student grasp and control of their pencil and markers, writing posture and proper tripod grasp. She gave support and reinforcement to individual students.
Technology: In reading, student small groups and individuals used the apps Dolch Words, ABC Magic 5 and Magnetic ABC's HD to practice sight words and short i words. Students continued to use iTalk to record reading fluency. In math whole and small groups, students used the apps Subitize Tree, Monster Squeeze, Easy Match and Number Find to assist in strengthening the concepts more/less/equal to, visual counting, number representation, 1 and 2 digit number recognition. Students continue to use Sonic Pics to record their sentences for our talking book. Students are beginning another project on shapes using Doodle Buddy.
Literature: "Desert Homes," "Hibernation Station," "Hibernation," "Panda Bear, Panda Bear, What Do You See?" "Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You See?" "Baby Bear, Baby Bear, What Do You See?" "Squirrels," "Tree Homes," "Underground Homes," "Who Lives Here?" "Eyes on Nature: Bears," "Follow the Polar Bears," "Polar Bears and Penguins," "Little Polar Bear," "Polar Bears."
**No School-November 26th-28th--Thanksgiving Holiday.
**Our Brookfield Zoo FIELD TRIP is TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 25th. Please read the note that went home in your child's homework folder. BAG LUNCH and DRESS for the WEATHER. It looks like a pretty chilly forecast. We may shorten the duration of our stay at the zoo and find an inside space to eat lunch. We will have fun!!!!
**"Hibernation Day" was awesome!! We were cozy in our jammies with our blankeys and stuffed animals. We read about how different animals hibernate. The students helped me create a Venn diagram that compared Brown/Black Bears with Polar Bears. We also read about other kinds of bears. The students enjoyed a great picnic with their kindergarten friends in the kindergarten hallway. They enjoyed making butter from cream in our liquids to solids impromptu science lesson and created "Bear Paw" snacks that looked and tasted yummy with the butter.
**The "Turkey Trot" was fun! We made signs to cheer our Book Buddies on. The weather was frosty, but the students were dressed warmly and had extra blankets as they watched the race and cheered.
**Check your child's homework folder for their RESEARCH ASSESSMENT. Each student came up with a question they want to find out more about. They worked on special research vocabulary. Suggestions and guidelines are also enclosed. The project is due Thursday, December 11th.
**Route to Reading Rotation 3 will conclude December 4th.
**The 5th Grade is sponsoring "Frosty Fun Friday Dance" on Friday, December 5th. More info is coming soon!
**Kindergarten-Grade 1 WINTER CONCERT is DECEMBER 17th in the Irving Auditorium. It will be performed twice--First Time at 8:15 am and repeated again at 9:45 am. There will be some kind of reception for family and friends. I will be speaking with room parents. Stay tuned for more details.
**REPORT CARDS go home on Friday, December 12th.
**CALLING ALL COOKS!!!! Room 110's Annual Gingerbread Cookie Baking and Sharing is Thursday, December 11th beginning at 1:00 pm until dismissal. So far, I have no one volunteering to help, but I am hopeful!! It is really very fun! No experience needed. You bring the cookie sheets, rolling pins and man/woman power.....I will bring the dough, sprinkles and aprons. I need at least 3-4 volunteers.
**Come to the Irving Annual Handmade Craft Fair on Saturday, December 13th from 9-1pm in the mini gym and hallways. Stock up on those handmade holiday gifts.
**We will begin our next cross curricular theme--Celebrations and Traditions after Thanksgiving. Please think about coming to speak about your family celebration or tradition at holiday time. Students love to help in the planning and presentation. We recently had Tate and his Dad, Joel speak and share about their tradition of nature hikes and bird watching. Totally cool!!!
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey continued her unit on friendship using the art of conversation and how to really listen to someone and respond.
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving this week, the students finished up a project using visual imagery and perception to create a picture using Alphabet letters and dots.
**School is closed December 22nd -January 2nd for Winter Break.
This week: It was all about research basics for little ones!! Ms. Noonan worked with the students on the question--What is research? The students worked on thinking about a question about something they wanted to find out more about and then discussed how you might find a source to help you answer the question. The major topic is: BEARS. The students worked in class on special research vocabulary and examples. I can't wait to see the results. The students also continued work on their talking book project. They practiced reading their story page and then recorded it onto the iPad. We have had some absences but hope to have the story posted for you soon. It is pretty cute!! We are almost at the end of our Bear Unit. It has provided lots of activities and opportunities for growth in math, reading, writing and science. Our station day activities this week included think, create, count and record pattern block activity, building pattern block turkeys, color by code (number/color word) turkey, liquid to solid cream to butter and counting to form the toes on our bear paw snack.
Reading/Social Studies: The students continue to work in Unit 3 Transportation in our Treasures Reading series. The students built background knowledge on their travels near and far. They listened to the Big Book story, "On the Go." They observed how people travel from one place to another and the vehicles they used. We looked up each country on our world map. The students asked and answered questions about the types of vehicles used in other countries. In their comprehension study, the students compared and categorized the types of travel and vehicles. The sight words go and see were reviewed. The students worked on their target sounds Tt and short i. They continued to review the use of action words in texts. Our Robust Vocabulary this week included TRAVEL, JOURNEY, PREPARE, RELAX, FAMILIAR. The students used their elkonin boxes to segment and blend 3 phoneme words. They read their pre decodable story, "Go, Go, Go." They reviewed what a comma was and how it is used. They made predictions about story content and elbow chatted about characters, setting and main events. During an interactive writing exercise, the students made pop up signs using the word "Go" to help cheer on their Book Buddies in the Turkey Trot. The students listened to two poems about transportation--"The Bike," and "Riding the Subway." They noticed the rhyming pattern in both and tracked the words as I read them. They made connections in their own lives about riding their bikes and traveling on a subway. The students also worked on a common core assessment comparing two characters from two different stories. This week the students worked to complete the workstation rotation from last week.
Math: The students continue to work on rote counting to 75 and beyond. The students are really getting the hang of ten frame use and counting by tens. They worked with partners on counting and cardinality activities representing a group of objects with a written number. Students also continued to work with pattern block shapes building, counting and recording number. The students combined counting and recognizing color words during color by code exercises. Workstations this week included sorting and classifying by common attributes, writing numbers from 0-20, working with teen numbers using tally marks and ten frames (how many complete ten frames....how on the new ten frame) and counting on from a given number.
Writing: The students are working on formation of Starting Corner Capital letters H, K, L, U, V. They used their mini boards and applied what they learned in their orange books. The students wrote1-3 sentences about what they knew about Brown/Black and Polar Bears. from their study of bears. The students are working hard to begin with a capital letter, name and tell and space between words in a sentence and have an ending mark. Some students are beginning to add more details to their sentences. I love when I hear them reading back their own writing as they begin work on self editing. This week, one of the occupational therapist, Ms. Ilis came to observe student grasp and control of their pencil and markers, writing posture and proper tripod grasp. She gave support and reinforcement to individual students.
Technology: In reading, student small groups and individuals used the apps Dolch Words, ABC Magic 5 and Magnetic ABC's HD to practice sight words and short i words. Students continued to use iTalk to record reading fluency. In math whole and small groups, students used the apps Subitize Tree, Monster Squeeze, Easy Match and Number Find to assist in strengthening the concepts more/less/equal to, visual counting, number representation, 1 and 2 digit number recognition. Students continue to use Sonic Pics to record their sentences for our talking book. Students are beginning another project on shapes using Doodle Buddy.
Literature: "Desert Homes," "Hibernation Station," "Hibernation," "Panda Bear, Panda Bear, What Do You See?" "Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You See?" "Baby Bear, Baby Bear, What Do You See?" "Squirrels," "Tree Homes," "Underground Homes," "Who Lives Here?" "Eyes on Nature: Bears," "Follow the Polar Bears," "Polar Bears and Penguins," "Little Polar Bear," "Polar Bears."
Sunday, November 16, 2014
UPDATES for 11/3-11/7 and 11/11-11/14 2014
**I am watching the snow fall as I update all of you on the past two weeks of fun and learning. Due to the exceptionally chilly weather, PACERS was cancelled and will resume in the spring. Please make sure your child is dressed for the weather. We will be going outside for lunch recess and want to make sure everyone stays warm. Hats/hoods are a must! If your child is wearing boots, make sure to send gym shoes for gym days. Thanks!
**Our 50th day in school sure was fun! Bobby socks, ponytails and fancy skirts, blue jeans, slick back and tees. So cool! The students compared and contrasted the 1950's and the present via a Venn diagram. They enjoyed dancing to music of the 1950's. These kids sure can move!!! Students worked on math and literacy stations surrounding the number 50. The countdown continues. Only 50 more days until our 100th day celebration!
**It was BIRDWATCHING 101!! While I attended a seminar on Lexia Core 5, Tate and his dad, Joel, did a presentation on nature walks and birdwatching which is something special they do as a family. The students were excited to tell me about where to watch birds, the equipment needed and to show me the bird case that showcased birds in our area. My sub, Ms. Grogan took pictures. Thanks to Tate and his dad, Joel for a great presentation. If you would like to present to the class on a special tradition or celebration your family has...just sign up on the Sign Up Genius. December is our Celebrations and Traditions month. Think about it!!!!
**Our Kindergarten Classes will have a special "HIBERNATION DAY" on Friday, November 21st. Students can wear their pajamas, bring a teddy bear or favorite stuffed animal or blankey. We will eat our lunch teddy bear "picnic" style in the kdg hallway and make a "beary" special bear snack during station day. I will send out a hard copy reminder.
**Our BROOKFIELD ZOO TRIP is Tuesday, November 25th. All money and permission slips need to be in ASAP! ALL STUDENTS must bring a BAG LUNCH with name on it and DRESS FOR THE WEATHER!! Students and teachers ride the bus. All volunteers will carpool. Thanks to S. Connelly, C. Goldbeck, S. Matta, D. Frank and C. Cummings for volunteering their time to come on the trip. If there is anyone else interested in coming, let me know. I will send a separate info sheet to volunteers with particulars. We will be leaving Irving at 9:30 and will return by 2:00 pm. Our trip includes a classroom experience and tour of the Bear Grotto, picnic lunch and time on your own to see other exhibits.
**It's the TURKEY TROT race for a Turkey on Thursday, November 20th at 2:00 pm. Grades 3-5 will participate. We will make signs and cheer them on. Who will win a turkey??!!
**The 5th Grade is sponsoring "Frosty Fun Friday Dance" on Friday, December 5th from 6-8 pm in the gym. More info is coming this week. Stay tuned.
**Come to the Irving Annual Handmade Craft Fair on Saturday, December 13th from 9-1pm in the mini gym and hallways. Stock up on those handmade holiday gifts.
**Trimester 1 ends on Friday, November 21st. Report cards go home on Friday, December 12th.
**Route to Reading Rotation 3 began this week. You should have received notification of the skill your child will be working on.
**Speaking of Traditions and Celebrations--CALLING ALL COOKS! We need several volunteers for Room 110's Annual Gingerbread Cookie baking on Friday, December 11th beginning at 1:00 pm until dismissal. No experience necessary. Roll out, create, decorate, bake and share. Email me if interested. I will provide the dough, sprinkles and aprons......you provide the baking sheets, rolling pins and man/woman power. It's really fun!!!!!
**SAVE the DATE! Our Winter Concert featuring Kindergarten and First Grade is Wednesday, December 17th. Due to the size of our auditorium, it will be held twice--first performance is at 8:15 am. and the second performance is at 9:45 am. It's going to be great!!
**In Friendship Club, the past weeks have continued to focus on Friendship.
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving, the students have been working on a thinking project using the text, "Clifford's ABC's." The students needed to think about incorporating a letter into a picture they created. They are quite interesting!!!
**No School--Wednesday, November 26th, Thursday, November 27th and Friday, November 28th in observance of Thanksgiving.
The past 2 weeks: It was all about BEARS! The students listed what they knew about bears. They gathered information from books and the internet about characteristics that all bears share. The students were excited to learn that humans share something in common with bears--they are both mammals. The students found out that the black bear is the most common bear in North America. They read about where they are found, their habitats, characteristics and food. Our nature table has a black bear skull and jaw bone, black bear fur and claw and some other interesting artifacts courtesy of the Field Museum. The students noticed that black bears have smaller paws and claws than brown bears. They continued their fact finding to learn more about brown/grizzly bears. They noted similar habitats and food. They learned the term--omnivores--eating both plants and animals. BrainPop Jr. provided the students with some cool movies about hibernation and bears in action with their young and catching fish. What powerful claws!!! Next week--polar and other bears. The students began working on an author/illustrator study of Bill Martin Jr and Eric Carle. They make a great team! The students are using their own writing, illustrating and speaking to produce a group version of the "Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See?" story. Each are contributing a page. Stay tuned!!! Station day activities for the past 2 weeks include sequencing the growth of a bear, pattern block bear build, count, record, number sequence activities 0-20, sponge painted bears/action sentence, building an animal habitat-bear cave--mixed media, yes/no bears--answering questions without speaking and shape review color by code--human habitat.
Reading/Language Arts: Week 1--The students have completed Unit 2 Friends in our Treasures Reading series. The students listened for a second reading to the trade book, "Simon and Molly plus Hester." They asked and answered questions and responded to the literature by making connections in their own lives. They discussed the problem the characters had in the story and what the solution was. The students reviewed all their sight vocabulary thus far and played "Hands Up, Hands Down." They practiced writing their words and using them in oral sentences. The students reviewed target sounds Pp, Mm, Tt, Ss and used their sound (elkonin) boxes to mark where they heard the target sound--at the beginning or at the end of the word. They reviewed what a noun was and looked for them in their story. In phonemic awareness, the students continued to categorize and blend 3 phonemes (individual sounds) to create words. The students read the pre decodable story, "We Like Sam." They made predictions about story content, elbow chatted with a partner about characters and setting and recalled an event from the story. The students listened to the thinking tale, "The Little Red Hen." The students listened to fluent reading and reoccurring phrases and once again thought about the problem and solution of the story. They worked to sequence the events in the story. Workstations included leveled reading/discussion of story elements, word building using the ed family, word search short e words, beginning and ending sound sort, creating speech bubbles around what 2 friends might say to one another, walk your words ...write your words, creating CVC words.
Week 2--The students began work on Unit 3 Transportation in the Treasures Reading series. The students discussed what is meant by transportation--a way to move people and things from one place to another. They brainstormed ways they get around and discussed forms of transportation that move fast and slow. They listened to the Big Book story, "A Bus for Us." After listening to the story, the students asked and answered questions about key details in the story. The students worked on words that show ACTION. The students took turns using the retelling cards to retell the story to their group. The students made connections in their own lives about various vehicles showcased in the story. The sight words go and see were introduced. Our target sounds for the week were Tt and Short i. Robust Vocabulary this week included TRANSPORTATION, VEHICLE, RAPIDLY, GLIDE, CONTINUE. The students worked with partners on their fluency reading aloud their pre decodable story, "I See Sam." Students are beginning to be more observant of how they read aloud. Is is choppy or smooth? Do they speak clearly? Can others hear them? Do they stop at the period? I began recording students reading using the app iTalk. I would play the tape back and as a group we would comment on the student reader. Workstations this week included leveled readers story discussion and fluency check, "How do you go to school?--graph and compare, write about a vehicle, spinning words--turn the wheel-make a real word/sort and write by beginning sound, story connection--after reading the story-What would you want the character Tig to see in Oak Park--write and illustrate and read it and add to it.
Math: The students worked on rote counting to 50, finding the missing number and choosing the number that comes before and after a given number. They continue to work on teen numbers in their ten frames. Learning stations included tracing/writing numbers to 50, playing the game "Race to 50," Top It using numbers 1-50, greater and less then using random numbers, reviewing positional concepts, counting quantities to 30 and continuing the subitize challenge using the app Subitize Tree.
Writing: The student have finished learning their Frog Jump Capitals and are continuing to practice their letters. We will begin work on Starting Corner Capitals next week. The students have started writing and illustrating in their new Yellow Journals. We are moving to lined paper with places to put uppercase and lowercase letters. Their new journal also contains all the upper and lowercase letters and all their sight words for reference. Students are beginning to use more lowercase letters and are really starting think about where on the line the letters go. They are using inventive (phonetic ) spelling and working towards more consistency in using a capital letter at the beginning of their sentence, spacing between words and having an ending mark. They are also working on reading their writing before they come to conference with me. All students are working on their talking book project. It should be ready for you to hear and see before Thanksgiving!
Technology: In the area of reading, student small groups used the apps iTalk to work on fluency, Magnetic ABC'S HD to create sentences using sight words, i Write Words to practice letter formation and Montessori Crossword to enhance phonemic awareness skills. In the area of math, student small groups used the apps, Top It for greater/less/ compare, Monster Squeeze for sequencing. Whole group enjoyed the apps, FireFinger for sight word practice, Subitize Tree for internalizing/visualizing number, Number Rack for problem solving and Butterfly Math for counting/adding and subtracting numbers. BrainPop Jr. and Watch/Know/Learn were great visuals to gather facts about bears. The app Sonic Pics is being used to create the student talking book.
Literature: "Amazing Bears," "Bears," "Black Bear Cub," "Day in the Life of Baby Bear," "Bears in the Forest," "Every Autumn Comes the Bear," "Maybe a Bear Ate It," "Sleep Big Bear, Sleep," "Time to Sleep," "Brave Bear," "Animal Homes," "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" "Chipmunk at Hollow Tree Lane," Osos Negros."
**Our 50th day in school sure was fun! Bobby socks, ponytails and fancy skirts, blue jeans, slick back and tees. So cool! The students compared and contrasted the 1950's and the present via a Venn diagram. They enjoyed dancing to music of the 1950's. These kids sure can move!!! Students worked on math and literacy stations surrounding the number 50. The countdown continues. Only 50 more days until our 100th day celebration!
**It was BIRDWATCHING 101!! While I attended a seminar on Lexia Core 5, Tate and his dad, Joel, did a presentation on nature walks and birdwatching which is something special they do as a family. The students were excited to tell me about where to watch birds, the equipment needed and to show me the bird case that showcased birds in our area. My sub, Ms. Grogan took pictures. Thanks to Tate and his dad, Joel for a great presentation. If you would like to present to the class on a special tradition or celebration your family has...just sign up on the Sign Up Genius. December is our Celebrations and Traditions month. Think about it!!!!
**Our Kindergarten Classes will have a special "HIBERNATION DAY" on Friday, November 21st. Students can wear their pajamas, bring a teddy bear or favorite stuffed animal or blankey. We will eat our lunch teddy bear "picnic" style in the kdg hallway and make a "beary" special bear snack during station day. I will send out a hard copy reminder.
**Our BROOKFIELD ZOO TRIP is Tuesday, November 25th. All money and permission slips need to be in ASAP! ALL STUDENTS must bring a BAG LUNCH with name on it and DRESS FOR THE WEATHER!! Students and teachers ride the bus. All volunteers will carpool. Thanks to S. Connelly, C. Goldbeck, S. Matta, D. Frank and C. Cummings for volunteering their time to come on the trip. If there is anyone else interested in coming, let me know. I will send a separate info sheet to volunteers with particulars. We will be leaving Irving at 9:30 and will return by 2:00 pm. Our trip includes a classroom experience and tour of the Bear Grotto, picnic lunch and time on your own to see other exhibits.
**It's the TURKEY TROT race for a Turkey on Thursday, November 20th at 2:00 pm. Grades 3-5 will participate. We will make signs and cheer them on. Who will win a turkey??!!
**The 5th Grade is sponsoring "Frosty Fun Friday Dance" on Friday, December 5th from 6-8 pm in the gym. More info is coming this week. Stay tuned.
**Come to the Irving Annual Handmade Craft Fair on Saturday, December 13th from 9-1pm in the mini gym and hallways. Stock up on those handmade holiday gifts.
**Trimester 1 ends on Friday, November 21st. Report cards go home on Friday, December 12th.
**Route to Reading Rotation 3 began this week. You should have received notification of the skill your child will be working on.
**Speaking of Traditions and Celebrations--CALLING ALL COOKS! We need several volunteers for Room 110's Annual Gingerbread Cookie baking on Friday, December 11th beginning at 1:00 pm until dismissal. No experience necessary. Roll out, create, decorate, bake and share. Email me if interested. I will provide the dough, sprinkles and aprons......you provide the baking sheets, rolling pins and man/woman power. It's really fun!!!!!
**SAVE the DATE! Our Winter Concert featuring Kindergarten and First Grade is Wednesday, December 17th. Due to the size of our auditorium, it will be held twice--first performance is at 8:15 am. and the second performance is at 9:45 am. It's going to be great!!
**In Friendship Club, the past weeks have continued to focus on Friendship.
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving, the students have been working on a thinking project using the text, "Clifford's ABC's." The students needed to think about incorporating a letter into a picture they created. They are quite interesting!!!
**No School--Wednesday, November 26th, Thursday, November 27th and Friday, November 28th in observance of Thanksgiving.
The past 2 weeks: It was all about BEARS! The students listed what they knew about bears. They gathered information from books and the internet about characteristics that all bears share. The students were excited to learn that humans share something in common with bears--they are both mammals. The students found out that the black bear is the most common bear in North America. They read about where they are found, their habitats, characteristics and food. Our nature table has a black bear skull and jaw bone, black bear fur and claw and some other interesting artifacts courtesy of the Field Museum. The students noticed that black bears have smaller paws and claws than brown bears. They continued their fact finding to learn more about brown/grizzly bears. They noted similar habitats and food. They learned the term--omnivores--eating both plants and animals. BrainPop Jr. provided the students with some cool movies about hibernation and bears in action with their young and catching fish. What powerful claws!!! Next week--polar and other bears. The students began working on an author/illustrator study of Bill Martin Jr and Eric Carle. They make a great team! The students are using their own writing, illustrating and speaking to produce a group version of the "Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See?" story. Each are contributing a page. Stay tuned!!! Station day activities for the past 2 weeks include sequencing the growth of a bear, pattern block bear build, count, record, number sequence activities 0-20, sponge painted bears/action sentence, building an animal habitat-bear cave--mixed media, yes/no bears--answering questions without speaking and shape review color by code--human habitat.
Reading/Language Arts: Week 1--The students have completed Unit 2 Friends in our Treasures Reading series. The students listened for a second reading to the trade book, "Simon and Molly plus Hester." They asked and answered questions and responded to the literature by making connections in their own lives. They discussed the problem the characters had in the story and what the solution was. The students reviewed all their sight vocabulary thus far and played "Hands Up, Hands Down." They practiced writing their words and using them in oral sentences. The students reviewed target sounds Pp, Mm, Tt, Ss and used their sound (elkonin) boxes to mark where they heard the target sound--at the beginning or at the end of the word. They reviewed what a noun was and looked for them in their story. In phonemic awareness, the students continued to categorize and blend 3 phonemes (individual sounds) to create words. The students read the pre decodable story, "We Like Sam." They made predictions about story content, elbow chatted with a partner about characters and setting and recalled an event from the story. The students listened to the thinking tale, "The Little Red Hen." The students listened to fluent reading and reoccurring phrases and once again thought about the problem and solution of the story. They worked to sequence the events in the story. Workstations included leveled reading/discussion of story elements, word building using the ed family, word search short e words, beginning and ending sound sort, creating speech bubbles around what 2 friends might say to one another, walk your words ...write your words, creating CVC words.
Week 2--The students began work on Unit 3 Transportation in the Treasures Reading series. The students discussed what is meant by transportation--a way to move people and things from one place to another. They brainstormed ways they get around and discussed forms of transportation that move fast and slow. They listened to the Big Book story, "A Bus for Us." After listening to the story, the students asked and answered questions about key details in the story. The students worked on words that show ACTION. The students took turns using the retelling cards to retell the story to their group. The students made connections in their own lives about various vehicles showcased in the story. The sight words go and see were introduced. Our target sounds for the week were Tt and Short i. Robust Vocabulary this week included TRANSPORTATION, VEHICLE, RAPIDLY, GLIDE, CONTINUE. The students worked with partners on their fluency reading aloud their pre decodable story, "I See Sam." Students are beginning to be more observant of how they read aloud. Is is choppy or smooth? Do they speak clearly? Can others hear them? Do they stop at the period? I began recording students reading using the app iTalk. I would play the tape back and as a group we would comment on the student reader. Workstations this week included leveled readers story discussion and fluency check, "How do you go to school?--graph and compare, write about a vehicle, spinning words--turn the wheel-make a real word/sort and write by beginning sound, story connection--after reading the story-What would you want the character Tig to see in Oak Park--write and illustrate and read it and add to it.
Math: The students worked on rote counting to 50, finding the missing number and choosing the number that comes before and after a given number. They continue to work on teen numbers in their ten frames. Learning stations included tracing/writing numbers to 50, playing the game "Race to 50," Top It using numbers 1-50, greater and less then using random numbers, reviewing positional concepts, counting quantities to 30 and continuing the subitize challenge using the app Subitize Tree.
Writing: The student have finished learning their Frog Jump Capitals and are continuing to practice their letters. We will begin work on Starting Corner Capitals next week. The students have started writing and illustrating in their new Yellow Journals. We are moving to lined paper with places to put uppercase and lowercase letters. Their new journal also contains all the upper and lowercase letters and all their sight words for reference. Students are beginning to use more lowercase letters and are really starting think about where on the line the letters go. They are using inventive (phonetic ) spelling and working towards more consistency in using a capital letter at the beginning of their sentence, spacing between words and having an ending mark. They are also working on reading their writing before they come to conference with me. All students are working on their talking book project. It should be ready for you to hear and see before Thanksgiving!
Technology: In the area of reading, student small groups used the apps iTalk to work on fluency, Magnetic ABC'S HD to create sentences using sight words, i Write Words to practice letter formation and Montessori Crossword to enhance phonemic awareness skills. In the area of math, student small groups used the apps, Top It for greater/less/ compare, Monster Squeeze for sequencing. Whole group enjoyed the apps, FireFinger for sight word practice, Subitize Tree for internalizing/visualizing number, Number Rack for problem solving and Butterfly Math for counting/adding and subtracting numbers. BrainPop Jr. and Watch/Know/Learn were great visuals to gather facts about bears. The app Sonic Pics is being used to create the student talking book.
Literature: "Amazing Bears," "Bears," "Black Bear Cub," "Day in the Life of Baby Bear," "Bears in the Forest," "Every Autumn Comes the Bear," "Maybe a Bear Ate It," "Sleep Big Bear, Sleep," "Time to Sleep," "Brave Bear," "Animal Homes," "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" "Chipmunk at Hollow Tree Lane," Osos Negros."
Sunday, November 2, 2014
UPDATES for 10/27-10/31 2014
**Our 50th Day of School is WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 5th! We will be half way to 100! The students will be comparing and contrasting the dress, technology and food of the 1950's to the present. This Wednesday, we will mark the day by dressing up like the 50's, having a sock hop and working on math learning stations surrounding the number 50. The students can dress up like up the 50's on Wednesday. It can be as simple as a white tee shirt and jeans, letter sweaters/jackets, slicked back hair, ponytails and poodle skirts if you should have one.
**PICTURE RETAKE Day is MONDAY, NOVEMBER 3rd. in the morning.
**Halloween was cold and blustery but did not prevent us from having lots of fun! The students were transformed into super heros, knights, princesses, owls, mermaids and more. Was that a skeleton or a teacher?? We feasted on fruits and veggie snacks. Our day was also deemed "Walker Day" in honor of our fellow classmate Walker who is moving to Michigan. We will really miss him. Thanks to all of you who came to join us or provided goodies for us. A special shout out to our room moms!
**Slightly Spooky Story Night was a huge success and lots of fun. Mr. Sak, Ms. Noonan, Ms. Durham and myself had a great time reading silly, slightly spooky and out of this world stories. Thanks to all who came out to hear us. A SPECIAL THANK YOU for those who bought books for our classroom! THANK YOU!!!!!
**Author Eileen Christelow read from her most recent book and shared with the students how she gets her ideas for her stories and how she drew the monkey for her "Five Little Monkeys" story. It was a great experience for the students.
**Our own Nurse Jamie did an hand washing demonstration and experiment with the students. She discussed the importance of washing your hands super well to get off all the germs. She suggested singing or humming the Happy Birthday Song 2 times making sure to scrub top, bottom and between fingers. Students experimented with using a "special" liquid on their hands and shaking hands with a friend. The friends put their hands under a black light and.......ooooooh germs showed up like a powder. The students washed their hands...singing their song and put their hands back under the light. How well did they wash their hands?? Did the powder show?? Pretty cool and surprising!
**Student Council reps, Ethan and Lily have worked on the Stand Up for Cancer project. The photos are posted and the students will vote via money in the jar of their favorite pose next week. All funds raised will go toward the Stand Up for Cancer project.
**Green Team reps Evan and Atessa worked on a video at their Green Team meeting on recycling used water color markers and saving the earth.
**On Monday, we will begin our next cross curricular theme-BEARS. We will become bear experts. Our field trip will have special classroom experience. We will turn our nature table into a bear artifacts table courtesy of the Field Museum. We will be linking our study of bears to the common core standards.
**Each student received an Irving School Student Directory. It is in your child's homework folder.
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey began a unit on Friendship. What does it take to be a good friend?
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving this week, Mr. Packer read the story "Ten Black Dots" by Donald Crews and then had the students use one black dot and design a picture around it. Way cool!!!
**NO SCHOOL--Monday, November 10th in observance of Veteran's Day.
**NO SCHOOL-Wednesday, November 26th, Thursday, November 27th and Friday, November 28th in observance of Thanksgiving.
**Permission slips for our field trip to BROOKFIELD ZOO will be sent out this week. Come join us on Tuesday, November 25th from 9:00-1:30 pm.
**CALLING ALL COOKS!!! We will need several volunteers for our annual Gingerbread Cookie Baking on Thursday, December 11th all afternoon. No experience necessary. Roll out, create, decorate, bake and share. Email me if interested. I will provide the dough, sprinkles and aprons.....you provide the baking sheets, rolling pins and man power.
**SAVE THE DATE! Our WINTER CONCERT featuring Kindergarten and First Grade is Wednesday, December 17th. Due to the size of our auditorium, our concert will be held twice--first performance is at 8:15 am--the second repeat performance is at 9:45 am. The students are already practicing!!
This week:
It was all about bats! We took the fright out of these amazing creatures. The students listened to informational texts as well as fiction texts on bats. BrainPop Jr. had a great bat fact video and quiz. They viewed bat skeletons in diagram form and learned about bat habitats, bat physiology and bat diets. Ask your child what a mammal is. The students learned that humans and bats have something in common--we are both mammals. Students sought information about bat types, bat characteristics (super long fingers and a thumb) and baby bats (they are pink and called pups.) The students also read about and viewed a human skeleton. Who has more bones--a baby or a 5-6 year old? Students delighted in feeling for their bones and checking out different texts about bone structure.
Reading/Language Arts: The students continue to work to complete Unit 2 Friends in our Treasures Reading series. This weeks lessons centered around friends who solve problems together.
The students listened to the trade book story, "Simon and Molly Plus Hester." They asked and answered questions about the text and responded to the literature by making connections in their own lives. The students discussed the story elements of problem and solution. They continued to work on reviewing their sight vocabulary. They practiced writing them and using selected words in oral and written sentences. The students reviewed the target sounds Pp and Ss and used their sound boxes to mark where they heard the target sound---at the beginning or at the end of a selected word. The students took turns retelling the trade book story using the retelling cards. In phonemic awareness activities, the students categorized and blended 3 phoneme (individual sounds) to create words. The students read their pre decodable story, "I Like, We Like." They made predictions about story content and practiced reading to a partner. Our Robust Vocabulary this week included PROBLEM, SOLVE, GRATEFUL, THOUGHTFUL, INCLUDE. The students thought about what the author's message could be in the Haitian read aloud tale, "The Turtle and the Sheep." What was the lesson in the story? Workstations this week were a continuation of last weeks work with a couple of new items. Students drew a picture of themselves happy and sad and then write about when they felt that way, leveled reader fluency practice and discussion about story element/comprehension, rainbow word family writing and activities--Pumpkin Nonsense words, Bat Race-reading at family words, making CVC words with leaves and Rock, Paper, Scissors--sound match.
Math: The students worked on rote counting to 50 in preparation for our celebration next Wednesday. How many ten frames do you need to make 50. How many sets of tally marks? Our group leaf collection helped the students develop categorizing skills. Each student took the leaves out of their bags and added them to the growing collection. They agreed to group and label the leaves by color. Check out our photo! The students continue to work on recognizing pattern block shapes and using the shapes to create a design depending upon the number of blocks. (ie-Can you create a design with 7 shapes.?..9 shapes?) it was a game week in their math workstations--Spin and Color the pumpkins (matching numbers 1-12,) Roll, Color and Count apples (counting and comparing numbers-greater than/less than,) Skeleton Game (counting/following directions,) Plus One game--adding one to a number. Whole group enjoyed the subitize challenge using the app Subitize Tree and working on problem solving using the app Number Rack.
Writing: Students have completed work on their Frog Jump Capitals. They applied what they learned about formation in their orange practice book. In Writer's Workshop, the students continue to work on writing a naming and telling sentence, using more word details, labeling pictures, using spaces between words and beginning with a capital letter and ending with a period. Next week, we will be working on a writing summative writing piece for common core.
Technology: New apps for whole group instruction included Subitize Tree and Number Rack for math. The students delighted in setting their sight words on "fire" using the app Fire Finger to reinforce sight word recognition and writing. The app iTalk was used to record readers and played back so they could hear their reading.
Literature: "Bones," "Bats-Strange and Wonderful," "Skeleton for Dinner," "Fantastic Bats," "Popcorn," "Skeletons," "Amazing Bats," "Little Red Bat," "Bats Big Game," "Your Skeleton," "Skeleton Cat," "Wacky Animal Facts," "Black Out," "Skeleton Meets Mummy," "If Kids Ruled the World."
**PICTURE RETAKE Day is MONDAY, NOVEMBER 3rd. in the morning.
**Halloween was cold and blustery but did not prevent us from having lots of fun! The students were transformed into super heros, knights, princesses, owls, mermaids and more. Was that a skeleton or a teacher?? We feasted on fruits and veggie snacks. Our day was also deemed "Walker Day" in honor of our fellow classmate Walker who is moving to Michigan. We will really miss him. Thanks to all of you who came to join us or provided goodies for us. A special shout out to our room moms!
**Slightly Spooky Story Night was a huge success and lots of fun. Mr. Sak, Ms. Noonan, Ms. Durham and myself had a great time reading silly, slightly spooky and out of this world stories. Thanks to all who came out to hear us. A SPECIAL THANK YOU for those who bought books for our classroom! THANK YOU!!!!!
**Author Eileen Christelow read from her most recent book and shared with the students how she gets her ideas for her stories and how she drew the monkey for her "Five Little Monkeys" story. It was a great experience for the students.
**Our own Nurse Jamie did an hand washing demonstration and experiment with the students. She discussed the importance of washing your hands super well to get off all the germs. She suggested singing or humming the Happy Birthday Song 2 times making sure to scrub top, bottom and between fingers. Students experimented with using a "special" liquid on their hands and shaking hands with a friend. The friends put their hands under a black light and.......ooooooh germs showed up like a powder. The students washed their hands...singing their song and put their hands back under the light. How well did they wash their hands?? Did the powder show?? Pretty cool and surprising!
**Student Council reps, Ethan and Lily have worked on the Stand Up for Cancer project. The photos are posted and the students will vote via money in the jar of their favorite pose next week. All funds raised will go toward the Stand Up for Cancer project.
**Green Team reps Evan and Atessa worked on a video at their Green Team meeting on recycling used water color markers and saving the earth.
**On Monday, we will begin our next cross curricular theme-BEARS. We will become bear experts. Our field trip will have special classroom experience. We will turn our nature table into a bear artifacts table courtesy of the Field Museum. We will be linking our study of bears to the common core standards.
**Each student received an Irving School Student Directory. It is in your child's homework folder.
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey began a unit on Friendship. What does it take to be a good friend?
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving this week, Mr. Packer read the story "Ten Black Dots" by Donald Crews and then had the students use one black dot and design a picture around it. Way cool!!!
**NO SCHOOL--Monday, November 10th in observance of Veteran's Day.
**NO SCHOOL-Wednesday, November 26th, Thursday, November 27th and Friday, November 28th in observance of Thanksgiving.
**Permission slips for our field trip to BROOKFIELD ZOO will be sent out this week. Come join us on Tuesday, November 25th from 9:00-1:30 pm.
**CALLING ALL COOKS!!! We will need several volunteers for our annual Gingerbread Cookie Baking on Thursday, December 11th all afternoon. No experience necessary. Roll out, create, decorate, bake and share. Email me if interested. I will provide the dough, sprinkles and aprons.....you provide the baking sheets, rolling pins and man power.
**SAVE THE DATE! Our WINTER CONCERT featuring Kindergarten and First Grade is Wednesday, December 17th. Due to the size of our auditorium, our concert will be held twice--first performance is at 8:15 am--the second repeat performance is at 9:45 am. The students are already practicing!!
This week:
It was all about bats! We took the fright out of these amazing creatures. The students listened to informational texts as well as fiction texts on bats. BrainPop Jr. had a great bat fact video and quiz. They viewed bat skeletons in diagram form and learned about bat habitats, bat physiology and bat diets. Ask your child what a mammal is. The students learned that humans and bats have something in common--we are both mammals. Students sought information about bat types, bat characteristics (super long fingers and a thumb) and baby bats (they are pink and called pups.) The students also read about and viewed a human skeleton. Who has more bones--a baby or a 5-6 year old? Students delighted in feeling for their bones and checking out different texts about bone structure.
Reading/Language Arts: The students continue to work to complete Unit 2 Friends in our Treasures Reading series. This weeks lessons centered around friends who solve problems together.
The students listened to the trade book story, "Simon and Molly Plus Hester." They asked and answered questions about the text and responded to the literature by making connections in their own lives. The students discussed the story elements of problem and solution. They continued to work on reviewing their sight vocabulary. They practiced writing them and using selected words in oral and written sentences. The students reviewed the target sounds Pp and Ss and used their sound boxes to mark where they heard the target sound---at the beginning or at the end of a selected word. The students took turns retelling the trade book story using the retelling cards. In phonemic awareness activities, the students categorized and blended 3 phoneme (individual sounds) to create words. The students read their pre decodable story, "I Like, We Like." They made predictions about story content and practiced reading to a partner. Our Robust Vocabulary this week included PROBLEM, SOLVE, GRATEFUL, THOUGHTFUL, INCLUDE. The students thought about what the author's message could be in the Haitian read aloud tale, "The Turtle and the Sheep." What was the lesson in the story? Workstations this week were a continuation of last weeks work with a couple of new items. Students drew a picture of themselves happy and sad and then write about when they felt that way, leveled reader fluency practice and discussion about story element/comprehension, rainbow word family writing and activities--Pumpkin Nonsense words, Bat Race-reading at family words, making CVC words with leaves and Rock, Paper, Scissors--sound match.
Math: The students worked on rote counting to 50 in preparation for our celebration next Wednesday. How many ten frames do you need to make 50. How many sets of tally marks? Our group leaf collection helped the students develop categorizing skills. Each student took the leaves out of their bags and added them to the growing collection. They agreed to group and label the leaves by color. Check out our photo! The students continue to work on recognizing pattern block shapes and using the shapes to create a design depending upon the number of blocks. (ie-Can you create a design with 7 shapes.?..9 shapes?) it was a game week in their math workstations--Spin and Color the pumpkins (matching numbers 1-12,) Roll, Color and Count apples (counting and comparing numbers-greater than/less than,) Skeleton Game (counting/following directions,) Plus One game--adding one to a number. Whole group enjoyed the subitize challenge using the app Subitize Tree and working on problem solving using the app Number Rack.
Writing: Students have completed work on their Frog Jump Capitals. They applied what they learned about formation in their orange practice book. In Writer's Workshop, the students continue to work on writing a naming and telling sentence, using more word details, labeling pictures, using spaces between words and beginning with a capital letter and ending with a period. Next week, we will be working on a writing summative writing piece for common core.
Technology: New apps for whole group instruction included Subitize Tree and Number Rack for math. The students delighted in setting their sight words on "fire" using the app Fire Finger to reinforce sight word recognition and writing. The app iTalk was used to record readers and played back so they could hear their reading.
Literature: "Bones," "Bats-Strange and Wonderful," "Skeleton for Dinner," "Fantastic Bats," "Popcorn," "Skeletons," "Amazing Bats," "Little Red Bat," "Bats Big Game," "Your Skeleton," "Skeleton Cat," "Wacky Animal Facts," "Black Out," "Skeleton Meets Mummy," "If Kids Ruled the World."
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