Myself, Others and a Caring Community!

What a great week of learning and FUN in 1st grade!  One thing these fabulous first graders have been doing since the beginning of the year is learning the "Pledge of Allegiance" and the song, "My Country, Tis of Thee".  We stand and salute the flag in our classroom every morning to recite and sing both.  We thought you'd like seeing them show how much pride and respect they have for our country by watching them in action with the video below.

ENJOY!

 

One skill we focused on in language arts was compound words.  Mrs. Waller shared a fun rap song that showed putting the 2 words together to make each new word.  Then, the class had the chance to come up to the board and put together their own words.  They are pros!!

compound words

Another focus we had this week was the short "i" vowel.  Ms. Lorfing gave the class sounds and they built words using only the sounds she gave.  Then, we "stretched" out the word using our pretend rubber bands.

Everyone loved using their own white boards and expos to make "in" words.

Jackson is making compound words by finding the matching halves of the eggs.

Emma is reviewing -ap, -ag, -and, & -at words with the pom pom toss activity.

Lamar loves stretching those arms and legs while building words!

Sophie is using an ipad app called Cimo Spelling.  This words on spelling site words.

Mrs. Waller is working in a guided reading group.

John and Oscar loved listening to the book, "Miss Nelson Has a Field Day"!

The class read "The Big Hit" on Starfall.com to focus on the short "i" words.

Sofia can read aloud quietly using the "telephone"

Writing our phone numbers and showing pictures of family and friends in our theme notebooks.

Kate the orange while she made the word "ate".

Eli read sentences and then decided if it was an asking or telling sentence.

This small reading group used their white boards to record words from their reading.

This team worked well together as they tallied in groups of 5!

In math this week we had a lot of fun working together in cooperative groups.  We're learning that with teamwork, everyone achieves more!  The class focused on making sure to tally in groups of 5 and crossing that last tally across to make 5.  We played a fun tally game where each small group took turns making a tally and the goal was to see how many groups of 5 they could make before the buzzer sounded.  As each round concluded the teams worked on strategies to help them go faster during the next round.

Another focus was on reviewing even and odd numbers.  We read a book called, "Even Steven and Odd Todd" and then played the Even/Odd game.

Jackson is using the abacus to add.

As we work on addition skills we use our number lines to help us.  This reinforces the accuracy as well as seeing the process it takes to add one number to another.  This helps to improve our number sense abilities as a whole.  Using the abacus is another way we add numbers together. 

Jake is using his froggie number line to add.

Problems our class said we should work on solving.

In social studies we worked on teamwork as well.  We read a story called "The Gigantic Turnip".  In this story the farmers could not get the huge turnip out of the ground so they called on the farm animals to help.  It took everyone working together including the smallest animal of all, the mouse, to finally solve their problem.  We, as a class, brainstormed problems we have in our class and ways we can solve them. 

As part of our theme, myself others and a Caring Community we decided in TNT (try new things) we would use the kid friendly version of "The Cup Song" from the movie, "Pitch Perfect" to teach the kids how to do the rhythm of the song using the cups.  It is a very complicated rhythm to learn but everyone persevered and we are amazed at the end result! Since we are still in the practicing phase of this we are not quite ready to record a video but it is our goal to share this with you next week! 

In the computer lab this week we had the opportunity to try a program called Kidspiration.  We used this program to make a Venn Diagram to compare and contrast dogs and cats.  The class did a great job practicing their keyboard skills by typing out words and then moved them around on the screen into the correct circles.  We printed them off and sent them home so please ask to see these neat creations!

 In Hands-On-Science, the scientists experimented with a paper clip, a bowl of water, a pencil eraser and one piece of tissue paper.  Ask your child if they were able to get their paper clip to float.......we learned about surface tension and the cohesion of water molecules, while having a blast!

REMINDERS!!! 

Tuesday, Sept. 17th is PICTURE DAY ! Please have your child bring in their picture pass if you ordered online or other payment.

COMING UP! 

O.T. screenings- Monday 9/23 and Tuesday 9/24

Speech screenings- Wednesday 9/25 and Thursday 9/26

If you are interested in O.T. screenings we have the forms in our classroom.  Please let us know if you would like us to send a form home. 

If you are interested in a speech screening you should have received a form in the mail.  Please send it to us and we will deliver to the front office.  

Have a beautiful weekend with your family and friends!  We are having so much fun with your children and always anticipate seeing their sweet smiles return to us on Monday!

Sara and Carey