End of March

This last week before spring break we went to the computer lab and played two math games: Save The Whale and Shark Numbers. Both were a big hit and helped us practice important skills of finding numbers that add up to ten and understanding the place value in two and three digit numbers. We also practiced our typing skills.

We celebrated the writing we have been doing this year with a special celebration, too! Thanks to all the families who came to hear our authors read their work. We also enjoyed two birthdays this week!

In reading we continue to work on retelling what we have learned in nonfiction books and building up our stamina to read independently for ten minutes. In science we have been observing our bulbs growing and went outside to inspect crocus and daffodil bulbs planted in the ground. We have also been learning about how the seasons are based on the tilt of the Earth towards/away from the sun. We even learned about the perspective that makes it look like the sun is rising/setting up/down even though the Earth is revolving horizontally.

Have a great break! Regular school resumes on Tuesday, April 13.

The most recent pictures have been added to the slideshow in the last post:

late March

This month we have been working on retelling a story we have read without looking at the pictures in the book. Students took home a reading strategies card that had sequencing words like "first, next, then, finally..." on them to help them practice at home. We are just starting to use this strategy to organize the events/information in a book to help us remember what we have read in nonfiction books now.

Students have also been using laptops in the library to find information through online databases like go.grolier.com We have also been making comments about what we are learning in science and practicing reading our writing on this voicethread when we go to the computer lab:

March

We are studying light in science right now. Here are some links to websites we used this week:

What produces light?

Light and shadows:


Earth, sun and moon:

February

What a crazy month with many, many snow days and still snow on the ground! We celebrated the 100th day of school and learned a lot about retelling a story using details and telling things in order from the beginning to the end. We have also been learning a lot about shapes and weight.

I Heart Writing Day has been rescheduled for Thursday, March 25th. Families are invited to school that morning for coffee in the Parent Center and then a chance to hear their student read a story/poem they have been writing in the classroom. Invitations and reminders will go home soon.

Enjoy all the pictures of students who lost teeth, experiments with water, reading and math centers, and even the snow on the playground!

January 25 - 29

We started this week off with a power outage! We were still able to start our day normally and went into the hall where we read books to a Kindergarten class and we talked a lot about what needs/doesn't need power. Later in the week we read a book about electricity.

In reading we have been talking about having mental images when we read, and how students may have different mental images because they have different schema or background knowledge. We also talked about how our mental images may change as we read because we get more information from the story and new ideas. Next month we will focus on retelling a story with a beginning, middle, and end. It can be hard for some first graders to distinguish between the main events to retell, versus every detail they can remember.

In writing we have been working on writing instructions for how to log on/off the computers in our computer lab so that other first graders who have never used the computers will know what to do. Having that audience in mind really helped students give more detailed steps. We have also begun to prepare for our school-wide writing day in mid February when we will share a piece of our writing with families and a buddy class!

In math we set aside some measurement activities and have been busy counting all the coins that families have sent in for the Haiti fundraiser. So far we have counted $37.75 and there are many more pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters more to go! Thank you for your generosity. We divided the pennies up into groups of ten to make the counting go faster. You can see many of them in the slideshow. Next week we will be using scales to compare weights and we will celebrate the 100th day of school on February 4th.

Here are some students working with Spanish/English puzzle vocabulary cards at a reading center:

January 18 - 22

Hear students reading this poem! (recorded independently during reading centers)



This week in reading we focused on looking at the end of words, especially finding endings like "s," "ing" and "ed." We practiced changing word wall words with these endings (play, plays, playing, played) and finding these word endings in poems and books. We also studied these word chunks: ug (rug, hug, bug), et (pet, jet, set), and ip (ship, lip, flip). We also did an assessment to see how many of the 100 first grade words students could read and write on their own.

We wrote directions for how to play a board game from the Strategies Lab and lists of what we noticed are on the coins at each table and our new name plates. We also received our new agendas for 2010 and wrote directions for what to do with them each morning when we come in the classroom.

In math we reviewed working with numbers 1-100 by making puzzles out of a 10x10 number grid, coloring in a number grid by 2s and 3s, and playing more than/less than number games. We also reviewed coin values and features, and worked on measuring length with nonstandard units (cubes, tiles, dominoes...).

When we went to the library students used laptops to access the Grolier online database. See hand-out sent home on Friday for student login information. Enjoy these pictures from the week!



Please remember there is no school on Monday, February 1. Thank you!