Genius Hour and More
This week you will be receiving a note home with a log in sheet specific to your child's account on SeeSaw. We use this site every week to showcase our learning in action! It is so fun watching these kiddos get on every week and sharing their learning with one another, as well as with you at home.
This past Friday, we took some time to show what we have been learning in our Reading Knowledge (literacy) block. We have spent the past few weeks learning about various fables and folktales. One characteristic of these stories is that they often have personification within them. This is when an animal in a story talks or acts like a person...we have talked about it a lot and your child should be able to tell you exactly what it means! Below is a compilation of most of the videos made this week. They are so fun and I love the creativity that was made in these videos.
If your child's video isn't on here (some had to be remade due to technical difficulties so they are not in this video) then make sure to sign in to your child's SeeSaw account so that you can check it out!!! The best part is, you will be able to view every entry your child makes and comment back to them...as well as have some specific examples of their learning that you can talk to them about!
When you sign in to the account you will also see some very creative artwork created by your child for their first entry. We kicked off genius hour with a fun lesson about being unique, being capable of anything if you put your mind to it and the importance of perseverance (something we work SO hard on all year). You can listen to the story we heard here:
Tuesday was our first day of Library for the year and we were SO excited to be able to go and relearn expectations for the library so that we can be STARs each week while we check out books.
We are extremely blessed to have an amazing librarian, Mrs. Loper, who donates so much of her own time to help us here at school. She is always on top of things, sharing stories and lessons, and making sure we have opportunities to read books that go with the lessons we are learning in the classroom. She ROCKS!!! She also lets 1st graders check out 2 books (we were pretty excited to find this out)!!
I have been very impressed with everyone's hard work and focus when it comes to math so far this year. Although, not everyone enjoys every part of our math lessons... like exercising while counting :) for example...they are really working hard. We have been working on adding and subtracting within 10 and as you will notice from their work coming home, they are doing a very good job! We are focusing our attention on whether each equation has a + or - symbol and then using various strategies we are learning to help solve them!
We have been focusing on short vowels in skills, which is an important skill to have as we are developing our skills as readers. We do various learning tasks during our literacy block to help with learning, practicing and remembering each letter sound/code and are working hard to apply those skills when reading whole words!
We are about to begin a new unit in knowledge about the human body...so stay tuned to hear your child tell you lots of interesting facts about your various body systems (digestive, muscular, skeletal, etc.).
As the fall weather has finally arrived, we decided to take a slight break between our Knowledge units to complete a fun fall writing and drawing project to add some pizazz to the hallway. We all drew squirrels and wrote about everything we LOVE about fall....we are 'Nutty for Fall!'
We are making sure to work hard to use our first grade writer's checklists while completing writing tasks. This means that we are trying our best to use CAPITALS at the beginning of sentences, ending marks.!? at the end, finger spaces between each word and our very best handwriting so that others can read what we write!
Show and Tell has been a HUGE hit this year. These firsties are so excited to share their special things from home with the class.
It is so fun seeing their excitement and pride in the things that they bring to share about - we have seen skeletal systems of animals, a chrysalis, favorite toys, and so much more. It can, however, get in the way of learning tasks when friends bring items throughout the week and try to share/tell about them during the day. I have decided that we will set aside a special amount of time on Fridays so that every week, friends may bring an item to tell about if they choose. If we get to a point where the majority of kids are bringing items then we will come up with an actual schedule of when to bring items per week....but as of now it is working with friends bringing things on Fridays as is. This is NOT a mandatory thing that I am expecting students to bring each week, it is completely optional and will simply be offered as a fun sharing time!
We have received our second Book of the Month book, thanks to our generous sponsors!! This month's book is The Legend of Spookly the Square Pumpkin. Some of our friends have decided to keep their new book at school, in their book boxes, so if you haven't seen your child's book come home that is why!
Thanks to our friend Hans and his mom for sending in a couple of Chrysalis that they found at their home. We were able to witness the hatching of and set free a beautiful monarch butterfly this week!
Upcoming Dates/Volunteers Needed:
(Click here to view all dates on the homepage)
*Next week is Book Fare - we will have a preview day on Monday and then students may bring money in any time Tuesday-Friday to purchase books. The book fare will be open during Parent Teacher conferences on Thursday evening so you may visit with your child then too!
*Early Dismissal - Wednesday at 1:15 and Thursday at 12:10
*Parent-Teacher Conferences - Thursday afternoon/evening
*Late Start Monday - October 21st. School will begin at 10:05
*Boo Grams - First Grade sells Boo Grams (little halloween notes with a treat) every year and the time is fast approaching. The dates we will be selling boo grams are October 28th, 29th, 30th and 31st. We will need parent volunteers (1 or 2 from each first grade class) for each of those days to help sell boo grams to students and then attach the boo (stickers, pencils, stencils, etc.) to each gram and sort them by grade/teacher. Volunteers would need to be at school by 11:35 to begin selling Boo Grams and then stay until around 12:45 to work on sorting grams and attaching the treats. If you know you are available for any, or all :), of these dates/times please let me know. I will also have a sign up sheet available next week at parent teacher conferences! Your involvement and commitment to your child's school experience is so appreciated! We use all of the money made from this fundraiser to help purchase materials for our classroom. In past years we have been able to buy word building mats (we use these once or twice every week), Osmo kits for literacy and math stations, supplies for special art projects as well as items for Space Station Day, and so much more! Your participation is key in these learning opportunities being available for us throughout the year and for future classes to experience as well!
