Weekly Update, September 10 - 14

Hello Super First Graders and Stupendous First Grade Families!

Reminders:
*The ice cream social is this Thursday, September 13 from 6:30 - 7:30.
*Our zoo field trip is Thursday, September 27. Please have your child wear our green class t-shirt (your child will receive his/her t-shirt soon). Please send in a completely disposable lunch with your child.

We had a fun day learning about the grain food group to kick off our science study on nutrition! Today in guided reading, writing and science, we learned about grains and the kinds of foods that are in the grain group. We even learned a fun song to sing to help us remember the foods in the grain group. Kids - can you remember the song and sing it for your parents? This week we are going to be restaurant owners! We will create our own menu with foods from each group. Today we completed the grain portion of the menu. This week we will learn about vegetables, fruits, meats and dairy, and each day we will complete a new section of the menu.

The kids loved centers today! The centers for the week include:
1. Listening - The children listen to More Spaghetti, I Say! They complete a story map with the name of the book, characters, setting, their favorite part and any new words they learned.
2. Science - The children complete a food group graph. Students group the foods from their dinner into the correct food groups. Students answer questions about the food groups.
3. Writing - The children choose from a word bank of different foods to complete a story about lunch. The children write about the lunch.
4. Math - The children work to figure out how many ways they could order ice cream. There is a plain cone or a sugar cone, and there is mint, blueberry and grape ice cream. The children work to put different scoops on different cones to figure out how many choices there are in all.
5. Reading - The children learned how to play spill and spell. Letter dice are "spilled" onto the table and they spell as many words as they can make before the timer runs out. This was a lot of fun for them!

We practiced our spelling words. The children came home with Rainbow Words and they are due tomorrow. This week we are working on the in family. There are also three tricky homophones: are, hour and our. Because there is only room for 10 words, the children can write these on the back of their Rainbow Words.

This week in reading we are continuing to focus on independently using reading strategies. It is so neat to watch the kids use these strategies on their own! We are continuing to work on "tricky" letters and pairs, such as tricky c, bossy r and vowel combinations. The kids have made SO much progress in reading!

In math we made a bread glyph.  We will collect the data tomorrow.  We are continuing our work on finding ways to make 5. We are also practicing the strategy of counting on, to help increase fluency in adding. Children will work with a variety of manipulatives to help see and understand numbers and increase number sense.

Have an A+ week!
Mrs. Johnston

Weekly Update, September 4 - 7

Hello Spectacular First Graders and Super 1st Grade Families!

Welcome back from the long weekend! I hope everyone had a great time and enjoyed the extra day off. I was SO impressed with what a wonderful job the children did today (especially after being gone an extra day!). The kids were so focused and worked so hard. Way to go!!!

This week we are doing a social studies, guided reading and writing unit on mapping. Today we learned what maps are and how they help us. We went on a search of the room to find the map in our room! Kids - see if you can find a map at home! Tell someone at home how maps help us. Tomorrow we will be learning about the elements of a map and on Thursday and Friday we will be creating a class map.

The children are really doing well working in centers. The centers for the week include:
1. Listening - The children are listening to "A Bargain For Francis.” They complete a sequencing page to practice identifying what happens in the beginning, middle and end of the story.
2. Science - The children are working with texture words. There are eight cards with texture words (bumpy, smooth, rough, etc.) and the children need to find items in our room that match those textures.
3. Writing - The children are writing about the best birthday party ever. They get to pretend that they can plan their perfect birthday party; they write all the details down for their special party.
4. Math - The children are working with unifix cubes. They explore different ways to make 5 and then write the addition sentences down for their findings.
5. Reading - The children explored the bee quiet corner to learn how to find books at their “just right” level.

In reading we are working on understanding and independently using reading strategies. We are continuing our work with sequencing.

We practiced our new spelling words. The children came home with Rainbow Words for homework and they are due tomorrow. This week we are working on the ap family. The children learned about homophones and what it means for words to be homophones (two or more words that sound the same, the words are spelled differently and the words mean different things). This week's ap family words include the homophones rap and wrap.

Today in math we did a house glyph. The kids are really getting great at following multi-step directions and correctly completing their glyphs. During the week, the children will practice collecting data from the glyphs in small groups. This will help them work on the skill of collaboration!

Reminders for the week:
1. Kids - please bring your homework folder to school every day. Remembering to bring your homework folder helps you follow our class rule of being responsible.
2. Library is on Wednesday.
3. Our zoo field trip is Thursday, September 27. If you would like to come on the trip, please let me know!

Have an A+ week!
Mrs. Johnston