This week in First Grade...

December 12-15

We have made it halfway through First grade! Time sure does fly! We have so many fun things planned this week! I can't wait for the kiddos to come home and tell you all about it!

Monday (12/12): Menu Homework only this week!
Tuesday (12/13): Tuesday Folders will go home.  Please unload them and return them Wednesday.
Wednesday (12/14): First grade Celebrates Reading Day
Thursday (12/8): Winter Party 1:15pm-2:15pm
Friday (12/9): No School! See you on January 3rd!

Looking Ahead: 

Friday, January 6th: Fairy Tale Parade

This week in Reading Workshop...

We will begin reading Fables.  We will discuss the differences and similarities between Fairytales, Folktales and Fables.  We will learn that Fables usually are short, have animals as characters and have a moral.  We will read different Fables this week.

               First grade Fairy Tale Parade

First Grade will be having a Fairy Tale Parade on Friday, January 6th  at 8:30am to celebrate the end of our Fairy Tale Unit.  Please have your child come to school dressed as their favorite fairy tale character.  Your child may wear their costume over their clothes.  Please do not go out and buy a costume for your child.  You and your child can make a homemade mask and/or costume with items you have at home.  This should be fun….not stressful!

Also, if you can, please have your child’s snack reflect what he/she dressed up as.  For example, if your child is dressed as Snow White, send apple slices for her.  If he is dressed as the wolf from Little Red Riding Hood, maybe send cookies with him. 

The parade will start at 8:30am and we will walk all around the school.  We would love for you to come and cheer us on!  

This week in Writer's Workshop...

We are going to wrap up our unit on Imaginary Stories.  The boys and girls have been hard at work writing stories.  We are working on revising our stories by adding describing words.  We are also editing our stories by making sure we have a capital letter at the beginning of our sentences and a period at the end. 

This week in Math...

We will explore graphing! We have some fun activities planned! We will collect data on some gingerbread men then graph our results.  We will also survey our friends on their favorite winter activity and make a graph to represent those results also! 

This week in Social Studies...

We will continue our study of cultures and celebrations around the world.  Last week we learned about Hanukkah, Christmas and Diwali.  This week we will travel the world and learn about their celebrations.  We will create a mini book to write about our learning of these traditions.

*If your family celebrates a special holiday that is not noted above please email me.  We want to learn all about the celebrations of the students in our class.

A note for Parent Helpers...

On Wednesday and Thursday the students will be rotating classrooms.  We will be in our own classroom until 8:30am.  You are still welcome to come but please feel free to take some extra time for yourself this week! 

This week in First grade...

December 5-9

We had a great time on our Field Trip last week! Make sure you check our Bloomz site to see a few pictures I posted.  My students were divided into six groups! We learned a lot about animals and had fun too!

Welcome to our new student Esha! We are happy to have you here at Caraway!

Reminders:
**Caraway Book Fair: Open Tuesday-Friday!**
Monday (12/5): Homework Folder (Book and a Menu) will come home.
Tuesday (12/6): We will go to the Book Fair today.  Children will be allowed to purchase.
                           Tuesday Folders will go home.  Please unload them and return them Wednesday.
Wednesday (12/7): Deadline to turn in the Science Fair Form
Thursday (12/8): International Festival 6pm-8pm
Friday (12/9): Return Homework Folder

Looking ahead...
12/15: Winter Party
12/16: Student Holiday

This week in Reading Workshop...
We had a lovely week reading Fairy Tales last week.  We learned the Elements of a Fairy Tale and we looked for them as we read different stories together.  This week we are excited to move on to Folktales.  We will discover the differences between Folktales and Fairytales. Fun Fact: Did you know that Fairytales are a type of Folktale? We will learn that Folktales have characters that are animals which act like humans, they teach a lesson or a moral and they do not have magic.

This week in Writer's Workshop...
We will wrap up our work on writing imaginative stories.  Most of the students have written a story with characters like themselves and a friend.  Then they added an element from our Fairy Tale list.  As writers we know that it's easiest to write about things we know.  It sure is fun to see how they put a little twist in their stories!

This week in Science and Social Studies...
We will wrap up our unit on Rocks and Soils this week.  Then we will move on to our Social Studies unit on Celebrations in our Community.  We will read and learn all about the different celebrations the boys and girls enjoy during the year.  I will be asking the students to give me more information about what holidays are special to them, then we will "travel" around the world to "visit" different countries and learn about their culture and traditions! This is a really fun unit for the students!

This week in Math...
We will continue our unit on Addition and Subtraction.  We will practice strategies to help us understand the basic idea of subtraction (Whole minus a part equals a part).  We will be problem solvers and work on solving word problems that have a part missing.  We will continue to relate subtraction to addition and use addition to help us solve subtraction problems.

**Science Fair**

I would like to encourage each student in my class to participate in the Science Fair.  I will have a Lunch Bunch with the students who participate so we can talk about their project! This is a fun incentive for kids!

There is an awesome resource that the kids can use to help them find a project that lays it out in a way that the kids can do them with little to no involvement from the parents. sciencebuddies.org

Things that are different this year with the science fair…

-Judging will occur during the school day - so kids do not have to hang out in shear boredom to be interviewed (if they choose to be have their project judged) 

-Scores will be tallied and kids will find out at Science Night who the winners are in an awards presentation. 

-Parents and Students will have the opportunity to see all the projects during Science Night

-If we have enough participation we would like to have the classes review portions of the projects and then award a KIDS choice winner (this is separate from the regular judging). 

The Deadline to turn in the Science Fair Form is Wednesday, December 7th.