This week in First grade...

Sept. 29-Oct.3

Wow!  September is almost over!!  My favorite time of the year is here!! October is one of my favorite months in First grade!  We have so many awesome learning opportunities planned!  As we are wrapping up assessments this week we will begin homework!  Each child will come home with a canvas bag.  It will contain a note about homework, a reading log, one book on their individual instructional level, a comprehension exercise and math homework!  Homework will come home on Mondays and will be due on Fridays.

We are so proud of Olivia C. for being our first LEAD Owl!  

Our featured Leader of the Week this week is Ashish!  He demonstrates leadership on a daily basis!  He helps his friends remember our classroom expectations and he always does his personal best!  I'm so honored to have so many amazing boys and girls in my class!

IMPORTANT REMINDERS

Monday: First day of First grade Homework DUE Friday Tuesday, Sept. 30: Picture day! Please wear your most beautiful smile to school!
Tuesday: Tuesday folders come home. Please return signed Tuesday folders on Wednesday morning.

Friday: Library Day! All library books are due by Friday morning at 8:00.  Homework due.

Saturday, October 4th is the Bike Rodeo!

 Here is what we will be doing this week:

READING
This week we will learn a new comprehension strategy and that is making predictions.  Reading is thinking.  As we start to read a story, we will look at the picture on the front cover, read the title and try to guess what the story is about based on the title and the picture.  When we read stories, we stop from time to time and predict what might happen next.  Sometimes our predictions are correct and sometimes they are not.  We will learn how to use all the clues in the story and things being said so far, to make the best prediction possible.

WRITING
We will continue writing stories about our lives.  Last week we learned how to "zoom in" on one thing and write about a small moment in time, something in our life that happened over a small few minutes.  This week, we will practice stretching one small moment across several lines or several pages.  We will read stories or part of stories that have those moments in them and see how famous authors stretch a small moment over few pages.

MATH
Last week we explored the number line/number track and looked at specific numbers and pointed to "one more" or "one less". This week we will take that knowledge and move on to addition. The strategies that we work on is "Count On Addition Strategies for Basic Facts". It is essential that all students are able to successfully calculate both mentally and with paper and pencil their basic facts. Count On strategies include Count On 1 (+1 facts), Count on 2 (+2 facts) and Count on 0 (+0 facts).  This week we will focus on Count On 1 and turn around strategy.  If 12+1=13 then 1+12 is also 13.  We will apply this Count On 1 strategy in problem solving.

SCIENCES
This week in science we will learn about weather. Weather is what is happening in the atmosphere at a certain time.  Temperature ,wind and precipitation are all parts of weather.  There would be no weather without the sun.  The sun's heat causes clouds, winds, and precipitation to form. We will learn about different kinds of weather such as sunny, warm, cold, calm,windy,rainy,icy and learn how to use a thermometer to measure temperature. 

THANK YOU! Thank you! THANK YOU!

 Thank you, Tonyia Cone for stuffing the folders, and being willing to help in the classroom.  Thank you to Evan Cone for coming in and listening to our budding authors!  Thank you also to Tonyia, April Lambert and Melissa Castellani for helping us get geared up for Homeroom duties and parties!  They had AMAZING ideas! Your helping hands and hearts are greatly appreciated!

This week in First grade...

Sept. 22-26

Thank you to everyone who has signed up for Fall Conferences.  We will be setting goals for your child during this time.  It is such an important part of being partners in your child's education.  I look forward to meeting with all of you!


EDUCATION GO GET IT WEEK

This week is Education Go Get It Week.  Education Go Get It Week provides students with information about higher education options.
Monday: Students and families can learn about colleges and majors at Round Rock High School.  6:00-8:00 pm (note came home Friday)
Tuesday: A career riddle will be broadcast on the announcement 
Wednesday: Students will dress up in " what they want to be when they grow up" outfits.
Thursday: Teachers will share information about the college they attended.
Friday: Students and staff will wear college shirts to school.


IMPORTANT REMINDERS
Tuesday: Tuesday folders come home. Please return signed Tuesday folders on Wednesday morning.
Wednesday, Sept.24th; Early Release Day.  Dismissal is at 12:45.

Friday: Library Day! All library books are due by Thursday morning at 8:00.

 Here is what we will be doing this week:

READING
This week we will learn about fiction and the elements of fiction. We will learn about the setting; the place and time where the story takes place, the main characters;the important people or animals that do or say important things in the stories, and the plot which is a series of important events in the stories.  We will learn that just like the stories we write, fictions have also a  beginning, middle and ending.  We will also discuss the author's purpose in writing fictions.

WRITING
We will continue writing stories about our lives.  This week we will learn how we can "zoom in" and write about a small moment in time with details.  Our job from here on is to discover those small moments in our lives.  A small moment happens over a few short seconds or minutes.  For example, it could be about a moment that I was riding my bike and I fell into a mud puddle and hurt my knee, or about a time that we were in the car, coming back home and we had to stop the car in the middle of the street, because a deer was standing there and wouldn't move.  We will learn how we can expand our small moment with details and write it over a few lines.  We will also use our fingers and tell our small moments across our hand so we can record the beginning, the middle and the end of our small moments.

MATH
So far, we have been working on place value.  The children have learned that the place of a digit in a number matters and depending on its place a digit can represent tens, or ones.  This week we will learn about decomposing numbers and describing the numbers in expanded form.  For example, 34 is actually 30 and 4 and 52 is 50 and 2.  We will also compare numbers using number line and review the vocabulary, greater and less than.  for example, looking at a number line, what number is one less than 17? or 16 is one less than what number? We will apply our knowledge of number line and number comparison to solve everyday math problem.

SOCIAL STUDIES

This week we will learn about our great state of Texas!  We will discuss our state patriotic symbols such as Texas flag, Texas pledge and  and Alamo. Our motto is friendship.  We will also learn about the leaders in our state and community.

This week in First grade...

Sept. 15-19

 We had a lovely time at Parent Orientation last week! Please remember if you have any questions to let me know. I have looked over the results of the Homework Survey and it looks like we will go with Homework goes home on Mondays back on Fridays. We will have a mix of teacher selected (on level) texts, self selected texts to keep interests high and one week out of the month we will have "online" homework through Raz-Kids! I will send more out about that later.

 We are finishing assessments this week and probably next week! Each Reading Assessments takes a minimum of 20-30 minutes per student. These assessment results are part of what we use to write goals for the students at conferences. September 24th is an Early Release Day. I will send out a Sign-Up Genius for conference sign up later this week! Conferences will begin on September 24th and hopefully we can get everyone scheduled for times the two weeks after that!

Looking for fun Reading Apps at home...Check out the Reading Rainbow App.  Today I set ours up for Lily and we were able to download 5 books for free!  It is a subscription based program but it looks awesome and Lily likes it already!


 IMPORTANT REMINDER
Tuesday: Tuesday folders come home. Please return signed Tuesday folders every Wednesday morning.
Friday: Library Day. Your child will be able to check out two books from the library this week. All library books are due by next Friday morning at 8:00. Our Library Orientation is this week!

 Here is what we will be doing this week:
 READING This week in reading we will practice “read to someone”. Read to someone will help us to be a better reader, practice our fluency and mostly it is lots of fun. We will learn how to sit closely to our partner, so our elbows and knees touch. This close proximity will allow us to read with quiet voice such as only our partner can hear us and not the rest of the class. It would also allow both of us to see the words and the pictures. There are two ways to read to someone. One way is to take turn reading a paragraph or a page and the other is to do choral reading, where both partners read together.

HOW CAN YOU SUPPORT YOUR CHILD'S LEARNING AT HOME? Spicewood Spring public library has a variety of "I read, you read" books, where there is a harder paragraph for the parent to read and an easier one for the child to read. But you can practice partner reading with almost any book, as long as it is a good fit book for your child.

 WRITING This week in writing we will continue working on our stories. The children have done a great job illustrating and writing about some real events in their lives. We will learn how to write in complete sentences. A complete sentence is a complete thought that tells who or what the sentence is about, and what happened. It starts with a capital letter and ends with a punctuation mark. We will also learn how writers write with a beginning, middle and an ending. Once we finish writing our stories, we will re-read our stories to make sure our stories make sense.

 HOW CAN YOU SUPPORT YOUR CHILD'S LEARNING AT HOME? Please encourage your child to form the letters correctly. Almost all of the letters in alphabet start from the top to the bottom. Some children have the habit of forming the letters from the bottom to the top and this will affect their handwriting as well as speed in writing. Also please have your child practice writing their names neatly starting with capital letter and then lowercase letters. If you need double lined paper at home, please let me know, I'll be happy to give you some.

 MATH We will continue our unit on place value. We will use number tracks and make numbers using our 10 sticks (10 blocks) and ones. We will emphasize that the place of a digit in a number matters. Depending on where the digit is, in tens place or in ones place, the digit has a different value (example: compare 17 and 71). Last week we worked with teen numbers. This week we will work with 2 digit numbers greater than teens. When studying 24, we will see that 2 is 2 sets/groups of 10 which makes twenty and the 4 is just four ones. When comparing the numbers, we will think about both tens and ones in a number. 24 is greater than 22. The number of 10 sticks are the same but the ones are not. 24 has 4 ones and 22 has only 2 ones. We will emphasize the vocabulary such as greater than, less than, before and after.

 HOW CAN YOU SUPPORT YOUR CHILD'S LEARNING AT HOME? continue counting with beans, macaronis, pennies, buttons, or anything similar. Have your child count the items. Your child can put the items in groups pf 2 and count by 2, or groups of 5 and count by 5 or groups of 10 and count by 10. Let your child practice that 34 is 3 sets/groups of 10, therefore it is 30 and 4 ones. Compare the numbers. Ask your child to show you one more, or greater than the number. Or one less than the number.

 SOCIAL STUDIES This week we will learn about Freedom, Liberty and various United States symbols. We will read, learn and write facts about the Liberty bell, the United states Flag, and our National Anthem. Wednesday is Constitution Day. We will discuss what is constitution and what is a right. The constitution lets the people of the United States know how they will be governed and what rights they have as American citizens.

 THANK YOU! Thank you for stuffing the folders, and being willing to help in the classroom or outside the classroom. Every little bit helps to create a great partnership!

Homework Survey

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This week in First grade...

September 8-12

Writing Workshop:  
We will be focusing on writing about what we know.  The students have been thinking about personal experiences so that they are able to write interesting, detailed stories.  We will also talk about how authors think about their story, then draw it, and then add words.  We will also learn about saying a word and listening for the sounds, then writing the letters they hear. 

Reading Workshop:  
We will learn about stamina, and we will talk about how we can build our stamina in reading so that we reach 30 minutes of silent reading.  Throughout the year, your child will be picking their own books to read during Read to Self and Read to Someone.  Because of this, we will learn what Good Fit books are and how to recognize if a book is a Good Fit for you.  Every day, I will meet with either individual students or groups of students.  We will discuss why these reading conferences are important, and will learn silent signals the students can use so the conferences are not interrupted.  Lastly, we will talk about the importance of respecting everyone's reading time, and using kind reminders when we are being disturbed.

Word Study: 
This week, we will begin review what we know about words.  We will review what a syllable is, a vowel and a consonant.  We will review kindergarten sight words and place them on the word wall. 

Science:
We will begin by thinking about what a scientist is and does.  We will brainstorm different jobs that use science.  We will begin learning about how to use our science notebooks.  We will talk about what they are for and why they are important to scientists.  We will discuss science safety, and we will even do our first experiment.

Math:
We will continue to count using groups.  We will explore placement of digits in numbers and how the value of the number is affected by the placement of the digits.  We will use magnetic ten frames to help us build numbers.  We will learn to compare teen numbers.  We will apply all of this knowledge in problem solving activities.  We will also learn how to construct a tally chart. 

Habit #3:  Begin with the End in Mind
I plan ahead and set goals.  I look for ways to be a good citizen.

Reminders:
*Specials- PE on Tuesday, Thursday, Friday
**Wear tennis shoes for sure on these days!!!!
*Send blue folders back every day.
*Send a healthy snack with your child every day.  We will eat snack at 10:30

Dates to Remember:
September 8:  Open House 6:30-7:00
September 24:  Early Release Day dismissal @12:45

This week in First grade...

Sept. 2-5

We had a great start to a new school year last week! We learned about many school and classroom procedures and expectations. Throughout the week, we reviewed cafeteria expectations, recess and hallway, before and after school procedures. Thank you for sending back all of the forms that came home last week and this week!

As part of building a happy, strong and successful community in our classroom and school, we will work on the 7 Habits of Happy Kids.  These 7 habits promote independence, interdependence, and continuous improvement in individuals' lives. Last week we learned Habit #1: Be Proactive.  We learned that we are each in charge of our own choices!  This week we will learn Habit #2!  The habits are listed in your child's Take Home Folder/Agenda!

Thank you all for sending the "Me" bags on Friday.  We had so much fun learning about one another, our favorite sport, toys to play with, families, friends and pets! The kids did a great job standing and talking in front of the class!


IMPORTANT REMINDERS:
Monday, Sept. 8th: Parent Information Night 6:30 pm in our classroom.  (Room 306)
Hope to see you all then!
Tuesday: Tuesday folders come home.  Please sign and return the folders the next day.
Tuesday, Thursday and Friday: P.E. days.  Please have your child wear tennis shoes.

This week:

READING

We will learn how to read independently to ourselves for a few minutes at a time. Each day we read for a longer period to build up our stamina. We will learn that strong readers read every day. A picture is worth a thousand words and we can read the pictures as well and retell the story through pictures.  We will talk about our favorite reading memory, when reading felt so good to us.  The children will practice using the classroom library correctly and responsibly.

WRITING

We will begin our first lesson: Introducing the writing tools (papers, pencils, markers and crayons, tape, glue, scissors), and resources such as the alphabet charts, first grade words,  and the prints around the classroom. . I will first model how to brainstorm, sketch, and write about my story, something that I know and care about. The children will then begin writing a true story about themselves, something that they have experienced and has happened to them.


MATH:

Numbers represent different and specific quantities.  This week we will explore a manipulative called Math Rack to learn about numbers. At this age some children count individually and some can count by 5 or 10's.  If asked to show 6 with beads, some children count one by one and some can show 6 in one move. Our goal this week and forward is to push children to use the benchmarks of 5 and 10 to determine the total amount of beads vs. counting one by one.  When asked to show 6, one efficient way would be showing a 5 and 1 more. 

SOCIAL STUDIES:

This week we will be discussing rules, and laws at school, home and in our community. What is the difference between a rule and a law? Why do we need rules and laws? We will also talk about positive and negative consequences. 

THANK YOU!

Thank you for being willing to help in the classroom or outside the classroom. Your helping hands and hearts are greatly appreciated!  We will have a brief Parent Volunteer Orientation the week of September 15.  After that meeting I will send out a sign up!