HOORAY FOR THE U.S.A.!
Well, it is finally here.....and the children are so excited! We were so happy to see them walk into the room Tuesday morning. It is such a special time of year for us. The kids always amaze us with how much the have learned and grown since the start of the year.....we are ready to soar! So much to do and learn in the second half of first grade and we are ready to hit the ground running.
We started the week together with Mrs. Sansale and Miss O'Connor's class as we introduced our new theme and began learning our HOORAY FOR THE U.S.A.! songs.
Your children are quite the performers! The program is going to be a
hit. We have continued guided reading and our independent work with our
tic-tac-toe boards. The children have written their very first entry in
their JUMBO JOURNAL and are keeping track of their entries with a TABLE
OF CONTENTS. At the end of the year, this journal will be filled with
entries from their study of the U.S.A. as well as Australia. Take a look
at the pictures below....we are having a blast!
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| Our first journal entry.... |
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| Phonics book work with long "a"/bossy "e" |
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| ABC order with American words! |
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| Presidential facts.... |
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| Listening Center....SACAGAWEA |
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| Book in a bag and guided reading continue! |
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| U.S.A. puzzles! |
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| Bossy "e" work with Mrs. Waller |
In math this week we have been reviewing the concept of place value as well as addition and subtraction. Mrs. Waller has also introduced the students to our study of money. We have so many exciting hands-on activities planned that the children can use to study money....we are excited to get started this semester!
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| KNOCK OFF THE CLOCK....roll the dice, add the two numbers or subtract the two numbers; you may then choose to knock either the sum or the difference off the clock. The first to knock off all the numbers is the winner! |
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BUILD IT, MAKE IT, BREAK IT
The students play on teams, each player rolls the die, they collect the number of unifex cubes they land on...when all players reach the finish, they stop, build groups of ten and count the left over ones...the person with the biggest number wins! |
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| Collecting cubes.... |
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| Building groups of TEN! |
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| Our money word bank.... |
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| The Harry S. Truman table works to create sentences about money from the money word bank....this allows the teacher to assess how much they already know about money! |
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| 100 pennies = $1.00 |
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| 20 nickels = $1.00 |
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| 4 quarters = $1.00 |
In social studies, Ms. Lorfing has introduced the study of America. The children are learning about the first 13 colonies any how they became states. They will learn about the Revolutionary War, westward expansion, the many monuments of the United States and much, much more!
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| What do we know about America? The children use the words from the projector to come up with true sentences about America! Your children are learning to work so well in small groups. What a great, collaborative class! |
With the cold weather comes many times when we need to get our wiggles out. Ms. Lorfing found a great resource for teachers to use in the classroom. It is like having our very own xBox 360, without actual avatars. We can ZUMBA, dance and even race each other in the 100 m dash. Take a look below....if it doesn't get warmer any time soon, we may be visiting this resource often!
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| ZUMBA! We also ran the 400m hurdles! |
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| A new Game- TENZI....they had fun! |
TNT was such a fun time for us this week. We used this time for the big reveal of the famous Americans. We presented each famous American on the projector and then revealed the famous first grader who would represent this person in the program and research this person over the next few weeks. It was like Christmas all over again. WOW! Each child was so excited for their peers and so grateful for the famous American they received. What amazing children!
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| The excitement builds.... |
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| CELEBRATION! |
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| BLURRY...but had to post, so much fun! |
In Hands-On Science this week we created our very own puppets as we explored the world of shadows! Take a look below! We also visited ABCya.com and played LEARNING COINS and MONEY BINGO. If you have time to visit this website over the weekend and play these games, they are an excellent resource when you are learning about money!
SPELLING WORDS
Phonics Skills: long vowel "e" and "i" with silent e
Words: like, twice, kite, nine, time, side, theme, eve, these, here
Challenge Words: country, stripes, colonies, scene
Don't forget to surprise your teachers!
REMINDERS
TODAY: end of the 2nd quarter!
TODAY-paper doll project will come home-please see the pictures below for examples of some of the past famous American dolls!
Monday, January 19th-NO SCHOOL in honor of MLK
Wednesday, January 21st-paper dolls are due back at school
Thursday, February 5th-HOORAY for the USA! program @ 9:15 in the north MPR
COINS NEEDED!
****OPTIONAL: if you have any spare change that we could use here at school we would love it if you could send it in with your child. We have a lot of plastic money to use, but it is always better to have the real thing! Pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters!
PAPER DOLL EXAMPLES
....please let us know if you have any questions!
What a great week...so much energy! Enjoy the weekend....hopefully you can get outside. See you Monday!
Love,
Sara and Carey
Well, it is finally here.....and the children are so excited! We were so happy to see them walk into the room Tuesday morning. It is such a special time of year for us. The kids always amaze us with how much the have learned and grown since the start of the year.....we are ready to soar! So much to do and learn in the second half of first grade and we are ready to hit the ground running.
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