We have a month worth of learning under our belts. Much of the time is spent learning routines and procedures which will help our learning throughout the year. One area where we had to build stamina was independent reading. When we are all reading together, we managed 15 minutes without a disruption. Our rule is to choose a spot and stay there until the Daily 5 round is done. During this time I work with small reading groups.
I used to read the dictionary too!
We have added, Work on Writing and Work on Words to our Daily 5 choices.
I use Reading A-Z in my classroom because I think it is important to meet children where they are in their reading. I use it for students who are not quite ready for early chapter books and also for high interest non-fiction. If you see these books come home, children should read them 3 more times (less for longer books.) Children can read with you or to siblings or even to a pet!
Please return the books the following week.
We have lots of help in our class this year. Mrs. Franklin and Ms Erica come in to help us with our literacy studies.
We do small group for math as well. Everyone is good in math, but some of us ( I am raising my hand) need more time than others. All of our groups work on the same concepts, but at a slightly different pace. A recent lesson was learning how to input data into a calculator. We had a prior discussion about computers and how they only know what we tell them. This lesson was a great follow up. We easily saw 'garbage in-garbage out' and why it is important to follow steps for success.
I know many parents get frustrated with new ways of doing math, but math has shifted from just knowing an answer (although that is still important) to mathematical thinking and being able to share your thinking with others. So while we are learning our facts we may say.... 7 +6 =?
I know 7+3=10 so I take 3 away from 6, I get 10 and add 3 more and have 13.
Or
I know 6+6 is 12 and 1 more is 13.
We play a lot of games to practice those facts. Playing a game allows the learning to happen in a relaxed state.
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We have our specialists first thing in the morning. PE is great because it really wakes us up for the rest of the day. In addition to getting the children active and learning about their heart rates, the children are currently learning about the muscles in their bodies with Mr Kirby.
Mrs. Ridge is our librarian and we visit her on Friday mornings. We love checking out books that we can read in class and share at home. There is a Book Fair in the library during Parent Conference week. The Fair helps to support new book purchases for our library. We hope you can participate.
A special thank you to Maria Theresa Correll who brought in and sliced a variety of apples for us to try to celebrate Johnny Appleseed's birthday. I added a little honey for dipping so the children could try this traditional Rosh Hashana tradition.
As you can see the children did not care for the apples at all.
We did an art and writing piece, saluting apples as well. You may take your child's art piece from the bulletin board during Parent conferences.
One last thing, a quick look at our chart. You may have heard your child say I leveled up! or I got to the top of the chart! We all start at green every morning..."ready to learn." When you make good choices and have great ideas, you level up. Leveling down may mean you were making choices which do not help our learning environment. But you can always change your mind, do better, and move back up.
That wraps up our month. Please remember that this Friday is a Teacher In-Service day, with no school for children. The following week is 1/2 Day with 12:35 dismissal for Parent conferences.
Enjoy the rest of your weekend. Go Hawks!
