Week of November 16-20, 2009

We had a fun week incorporating Thanksgiving themes into our curriculum. During Writer's Workshop we wrote about things that we are thankful for on feathers and added them to our turkey in the classroom. We realized we have lots to be thankful for! In math, we practiced addition and subtraction skills using a turkey, a pilgrim family and the Mayflower that use a color code for the answers. Of course, we are reading lots of Thanksgiving stories. During Reader's Workshop we are also using a collection of Mercer Mayer stories to help us understand how authors use problems and solutions to make their stories interesting. During our study of the past, we looked at how our clothes and toys have changed over time. We are enjoying My First Little House Books based on Laura Ingalls Wilder's series to learn about lifestyles during pioneer times. The Book Fair was also a big highlight of the week!

No Interruptions Please!

We have been working together as a class to not interrupt each other while someone else is talking, including the teacher! Many of our first graders will interrupt me when I am talking to another child or talk to someone else while I am talking to the group. It is disruptive and is getting in the way of our teaching and learning. It would be most helpful to me if you could practice this with your child at home, perhaps at the dinner table or other times when you are in conversation with other people and your child is present. This is an important life skill that your children are capable of learning and it takes practice and consistency. I am sure that if we work together on this, we will solve this problem quickly.

Writing Partners

In Writer's Workshop, we worked with partners to help us review and edit a story. We discovered that is really helpful to read a story aloud to a friend and hear questions and comments to help us make our stories better. We also helped each other check correct spelling of words that are on our word wall and remember to begin our sentences with capital letters and to include correct punctuation.

Save the Turkeys!

Thanks to our 1st and 5th graders, a few lucky turkeys will not be the main course for Thanksgiving dinner! Students worked together to devise clever disguises for their turkeys so they wouldn't be caught and cooked. Some of our turkeys were disguised as hippies, rock stars, hunters and space aliens. Our turkeys have much to be thankful for!

Toys from the Past: Ms. Miknis

To enhance our study of the past and present, Ms. Miknis, our Gifted and Talented Resource teacher, came to our class to help us think about how toys have changed over time. She showed us pictures of toys that children used to play with and we realized some of those toys are still around today like jacks and pick-up sticks. We recorded our observations about the toys by noting something we liked, didn't like and what surprised us. Ms. Miknis will visit us throughout the year and, as she says, "encourage us to think about things in different ways."

Week of November 9 - 13, 2009

We started two new units this week. In social studies we are talking about how people's lives were different in the past compared to how they are in the present. Ms. Blaine in the library helped kick off our unit last week by reading a story about a one-room school house. We also learned that at one point in our history everyone wore hats. The timelines that we sent for homework last week helped us understand the difference between past and present. We are using the Little House on the Prairie children's stories to learn about life "back then." Ask your child how Laura celebrated her birthday and how our birthday celebrations are the same as and different from hers. This week we will learn about clothing, transportation and toys from the past. In this week's homework, we are asking that your child interview a primary resource from the past, preferably a grandparent or someone from that generation. These will be due back the Monday after Thanksgiving. We are hoping this will give you plenty of time as well as access to older relatives during the holiday. In math we started Unit 2: Shapes and Patterns. (See below.) Remember to visit pearsonsuccess.net to get an idea of what we are doing and to support your child's learning in math.

H1N1 Vaccination

The H1N1 vaccination was available to our class on Thursday. This was a very big event in the lives of our children-- whether they got the vaccination or not! It gave us a chance to review ways to keep ourselves healthy (wash hands regularly and cover your cough) and to comfort and encourage each other as the anticipation grew. It went very smoothly and once it was over we were back to normal very quickly. Many thanks to all the parents who helped out in the classroom and the clinic that day.

Classroom Issue Bin

We have a Classroom Issue Bin that is part of our exemplary project called Project Quest. It is a classroom management program that we use schoolwide. Lessons have included learning about the multiple intelligences we share and ways to get along with each other. The Classroom Issue Bin is posted in our classroom. If a student has an issue that involves either feelings or learning, he or she writes it down and posts it on the issue bin. We have a community meeting about the issue and decide how to solve the issue as a class. We don't name names, just behaviors. Issues that have been posted include an instance when a friend wouldn't share a manipulative and a friend was bothering another during a work time.

New Math Unit: Shapes and Patterns

Making designs with pattern block shapes is great fun! The challenge is to fill in a predetermined design with pattern blocks. We learned that there is more than one way! We are using our spatial intelligence, problem-solving skills, addition and subtraction skills and our creativity.

Week of November 2 - 6, 2009

This week we continued our practice in writing about small moments in our lives during Writer's Workshop. This is hard to do and your children are getting better and better at it! During Reader's Workshop we focused on story structure including the elements of setting and characters. As you are reading with your child, be sure to ask about these story elements. We used the folktale The Little Red Hen to introduce robust vocabulary. These are words to enrich our vocabulary but we are not expected to be able to spell them. Each week we will add to our robust vocabulary using different texts. Also, we acted out The Little Red Hen to help us remember story sequence and characterization. In Math Workshop we are wrapping up the first unit by continuing our practice of breaking numbers apart in different combinations. Our next unit will focus on shapes and patterns. We finished our science unit: What Does a Scientist Do? On Monday, we will start our social studies unit: Past and Present. This unit will continue until Thanksgiving Break.

Author Visit: Laurie Keller

The highlight of our week was Laurie Keller's visit to Jamestown's Library. We spent time beforehand with Ms. Blaine in coming up with questions to ask Ms. Keller and how we would behave while she was here. Finally, the big day arrived on Wednesday! Ms. Keller told us about herself and where she does her writing. She also showed us a movie based on the book, Do Unto Otters: A Book About Manners. She showed us how to draw an otter and different expressions for Arnie the Donut.

Week of October 26-30, 2009

We had lots of fun this week using Halloween stories, songs and games to further our literacy, math and science skills. Our very first Publishing Party was a great success and we were all proud of our stories and excited to share them with the group. We have also enjoyed reading each other's stories during independent reading time. We started a new unit in Writer's Workshop called "Small Moments" which is helping us stretch out our story ideas into more parts. We made Pumpkin Glyphs about ourselves and we are having fun figuring out who is who according to clues. Measuring different objects using non-standard units to measure with was lots of fun, especially when we could eat one of our units! (See below.) Many thanks to all the parents who helped in the classroom during the week and for making our Halloween Party and Parade exciting and fun!

Herb Sachets with our Buddies

Our 5th Grade Buddies shared herbs from their garden with us to make sweet-smelling sachets. A few weeks ago the 5th graders picked rosemary, oregano and lemon balm and hung it to dry in their classroom. We helped crush the herbs and together we made sachets. The classroom smelled delicious!

Measuring with Bats and Candy Corns?

We practiced our measuring skills throughout the week using non-standard units of measurement. We made our own bat measuring tape and measured a variety of classroom items including each other. We also used candy corn to estimate and measure distances between two points on a recording sheet. Our small pumpkins helped us measure girth, height and weight. We made an amazing discovery that surprised many of us--pumpkins float!

Halloween Party

We had a fun party and parade on Halloween. We were visited by witches, monsters, genies, cats, super heros and our very own Abraham Lincoln! Parents provided us with a delicious lunch and we decorated cookies. After the parade we had a mummy relay race with several mommy mummies!