It’s the most wonderful time of the year

As you hum the song in your head let’s think back over the past very busy month.

November brought our class a first look into character study in our Reading Workshops.  We learned how to identify character’s inside and outside characteristics.  In mathematics it brought the beginning of our addition and subtraction along with patterns and a closer look at the hundreds chart and all the patterns found within.

November also has brought one of our most challenging writing units thus far.  Realistic fiction. At this age, children like to write about themselves and their experiences; and trying to get them to write about someone else it tough at times.  We are taking this unit slow and will continue to delve down deeper into it over this next coming month too.

In science, the solar system has brought lively conservation into the classroom.  We are becoming quite the little astronomers and science buffs about our planets.  On Tuesday we will visit Star Lab to sit under the inflatable planetarium and learn more about our constellations.

Thanksgiving was extra hands-on this year with the learning of the Mayflower.  We actually have two direct descendants of the Pilgrims that traveled on the Mayflower. Evan L. and J.T. are many generations removed but their ties lead directly back to two men that sailed on the ship.  The students and I thought that was really cool.

As you can tell November was a busy month…. Things to look forward to in the month of December….

Santa gets stuck in a chimney, All iwant for Christmas lists, gingerbread making and decorating, and much , much more.

So much to learn in so little time…….

In class this week we have focused on Thanksgiving and the how it all began. We have been reading a book called If you sailed on the Mayflower in 1620.  This book spurred great discussions about the difference between now and then.  Also what we would bring on the Mayflower if we were one of the special Pilgrims.  Did you know there were 102 pilgrims plus 33 sailors?  There was even a baby born on the voyage! His name was Oceanus remind your child of the name. If they can come back to school on Monday and tell me the name of the child born on the ship they will get a surprise.

This story has led to many great realistic fiction stories the children have been writing.  We have imagined ourselves as a passenger on the ship.  We have thought about how the Native Americans felt and thought when the Mayflower came to shore, and what it must have been like to build everything from the ground up.

In math we have been working on improving our math fluency.  We are working on math fact families and patterns within the 120s chart.

In Science we are learning a song about the planets.  We are learning solar system facts daily.

So much to do and learn in a half day schedule. We are busy, busy, busy.  I look forward to meeting each one of you at conference time.  I also thank those of you I have met already during conferences.

Since next week will be a short week there will be no blog post. Have a great Thanksgiving.

A Week of Clean up

What a week. This has been a busy week.  We made up some lost time with Thursday and Friday and to be honest with you… it was good.

 

Here is what has been happening in class:

We finished up on our Units in reading and writing.  Letters and work samples went home describing what we had worked on in the month of October.  Also our story sticks went home.  We used these sticks in class to help retell our stories we read from our seat sacks.  They are visual reminders to recall: setting; characters, problem, 3 details from the beginning, middle and end of the story, and how the problem was resolved.  Please use this when read to/with your child at home.  This also aids in increasing their reading comprehension.

In the next two months we are going to work on Character study in Reading and Realistic Fiction in writing.

We completed our A-Z handwriting morning work booklet.  You can tell from the beginning of the book to the end how your child’s handwriting has become stronger and neater.

We are beginning a new unit in Math.  We are going to start focusing on patterns in numbers (odd, even, skip counting with 2,5, 10, etc.) and noticing patterns all around us in our environment. Also I will be sending home a game called Shake and take.  This game is to help with your child’s math fluency (aka math facts).  In first grade, the new Common Core Standards stresses first grade students know their math facts from 0-20 in addition and subtraction.  We will start small and every couple of weeks I will send home more cards to add to the game to play at home.

Our class is going to outer space this month too.  At the end of our month we are going to partner up with Mrs. Hoffman’s class for a Planet Day celebration.  Also our class will go under the stars in our Star Lab when it visits our school.

Did you know…. We can get 2 cents for each and every candy wrapper you turn into Terracycle.  It does not matter the size of candy wrapper.  So when you are done eating all your Halloween candy… send the empty wrappers in to me.. all the money raised goes to the Lumberton PTA.