A Fabulous Full First Week in First!

We are having a blast! 

Your children are wonderful!

This week the kids have finished up telling us their favorite activities from the summer. "Our Cool Slices of Summer" bulletin board is now complete. Please come in to take a look. Your children are quite the artists.

We have also started our first full week of a routine for our morning work. The routine looks like this:

My Thoughts Are In My Journal Monday
Together We Fix It Tuesday
What I Know about Math Wednesday
Thinking About Spelling Thursday
Fabulous End To The Week Friday

On Mondays your child will complete a journal entry. On Tuesdays he/she will read a sentence(s)-correct the sentence-illustrate the sentence-have a friend check their sentence. Wednesdays will be a review of the math concept we are covering for the week. Once spelling tests begin, your child will review their spelling words on Thursdays mornings; until then we are using our word wall, freinds names and our Writing Words Book for some sight word review. Friday mornings will be something fun and different for your child to celebrate a fabulous end to our week!

Ms. Lorfing leads the class in some stretching before getting down to business!

Monday morning we reviewed our CLASSROOM EXPECTATION CONTRACT that we had created the previous Friday. We also introduced our new behavior system that we use within our classroom.  A note should have come home to you on Thursday regarding this system. The children think the chart looks like a ladder so that is its new name: Our Classroom Ladder. We love this system because it has a major positive component to it. 

Our Classroom Expectations

Our Classroom Ladder

Please take a look at the pictures below. They include our mornings of literacy learning. Your children have completed a Time Capsule which lists some of their favorite things, what they are excited to learn in first grade and 3 goals they have for themselves this year. We will collect their time capsules and hide them away until the end of the year. They have also illustrated their very own classroom book! After reading The Night Before First Grade, the students shared how they felt the night before coming to first grade and illustrated their sentence. We brought in the iPads Wednesday and introduced two logical thinking apps-FLOW and Sticker Sudoku-you should have seen their brains working. They have participated in a Handwriting Without Tears (for those of you who are new, this is the program we use to teach handwriting) lesson and are now familiar with the first grade level workbook. They have also completed a guided lesson and become familiar with their new phonics book! We have been very busy and your children are moving right along.

Ms. Lorfing reads The Night Before First Grade

Maya and Sophie work on their very first classroom book!

HWT (Handwriting Without Tears)

FLOW

Sticker Sudoku

In social studies Ms. Lorfing introduced the children to Sean Covey's Seven Habits of Happy Children.  We will incorporate the seven habits throughout the year. Habit #1: Be Proactive/You're In Charge. We also use The Important Book by Margaret Wise Brown (author of Good Night Moon) to talk about the importance of each and everyone of us as individuals.  The students are making a classroom IMPORTANT book. Each child will write and illustrate a page that talks about all the reasons they are important. They also experienced a lesson on goal setting as Ms. Lorfing guided them in coming up with 3 goals they have for the school year.

 We completed a review of repeating patterns and have also introduced growing patterns to the children in math. The were given manipulatives to create many different patterns this week. Mrs. Waller read Stuart J. Murphy's book, BEEP BEEP, VROOM VROOM! for a review of this concept. Rooster's Off To See The World by Eric Carle, was also used to help children understand the concept of a growing pattern.  We will use literature in math and social studies often. This helps the children make connections to their own world and help cement future connections as well.

Sofia works on a repeating pattern, little does she know, it is a growing pattern as well!

Carter and Oscar share their LEGO pattern!

Jackson helps build our pattern!

Look closely, the orange is growing! John and Lamar are a great addition to St. Paul's!

Naomi and Lily work hard to create a challenging money pattern!

Charlotte determines if the pattern is growing or repeating during our pattern scavenger hunt.

We are constantly assessing your children as we monitor the collaborative work taking place in the classroom. The children do not know it.....but they are being assessed, even in the first week of school. 

Thank you for returning your questionnaires about your children so promptly. This really helps us as we get to know your children. We also had your children fill out a survey entitled: HOW DO YOU LIKE TO LEARN?.  The children had to answer YES or NO to statements like: I work best when it is quiet, I can work when there is noise in the classroom, I like to learn by moving around, I like to work with a group or a partner, I like to work alone, etc.  This tells more about the way each individual child likes to learn and will help guide us as we plan our lessons.

The children visited the computer lab for the first time today.  Ms. Lorfing and Mrs. Wyllie introduced the kids to ABCya.com and they played MOON PATTERNS and COUNTING FISH.  Computer Lab is tool we use to reinforce concepts that are being taught in our classroom. 

Hands-On  Science was explosive!  What happens when gas builds up inside a small space? Ask your children all about it! We had a BLAST !

John helped Mrs. Waller place the Alka-Seltzer tablet in the film canister......

 The canister was on the ground.....?????

REMINDERS:

• Lower School Student Commitment due Monday, August 26th
• No school Monday, September 2nd-LABOR DAY
• Lower School curriculum night is Thursday, September 5th @ 6:00 pm.
• Please continue to help your child remember to wear the appropriate shoes for P.E. days: Tuesday and Fridays
• Also continue to help encourage your child to bring a snack every day. We appreciate it!

We have had a great week! We hope you have a great weekend and enjoy your time with these precious children. See you back here on Monday!

Sara and Carey