Weekly Update

Dear families,
I hope you have all had a great week.  I have already posted many times this week with pictures from special events so I hope you have the opportunity to scroll down and check out older posts, as those include pictures.  Thank you (and have fun)

In the last few weeks, the students have been busy working on their small moment stories in Writer's Workshop, stories that tell a very specific personal narrative of something that already happened to them.  Some students have worked on stories about a first bike ride or a trip to the ocean, while others have worked on stories about  losing a first tooth.  Throughout this writing process, the students learned how to effectively add details to words and pictures, by using colors, labels, action words and adjectives to name a few.  The students have editing partners and they check each others' writing pieces before handing them in to me.  They check to make sure the writing makes sense and is grammatically correct.  This week, we started creating covers for these stories.  We began by previewing covers made by already established authors.  We looked at their covers and discussed what we noticed about the colors, the text and the layout.  We discovered that authors select titles that connect with the plot and they also have pictures that match the stories.  We also discovered that authors are very creative in the actual layout of their book covers.  For examples, some titles are in bubble letters and some titles are written diagonally across the page.  We cannot wait to show you our covers and books.  

Reader's Workshop was short this week due to our 4Winds class and another science class taught by Ms. Dani.  I hope you get a chance to scroll down on this blog and read more about our 4Winds class and look at some pictures.  Thank you parent volunteers for making these terrific classes available to our students.  Ms. Dani continued our work on scientific observations.  The students learned about different kinds of leaves and used their science journals to record their observations.  Here is a Voicethread highlighting their learning.

In math, first grade mathematicians continued working on number sense and fluency.  Please visit our 1st grade blog for more updates and pictures.

Lastly, I wanted to remind you all to sign up for our parent-teacher conferences.  I have linked the sign-up wiki in the sidebar of this blog.  Please let me know if you need any help or if the times do not work for you. 

Regards,
Maria

4winds

Today, we had another 4winds class.  We learned about seeds.  First, we watched a puppet show about seeds.  Then, we went outside searching for different kinds of seeds.  We discovered that some seeds stick to other things, such as our jackets and shoes.  We also discovered that some seeds fly easily in the wind.  Lastly, we returned to our classroom and dissected Lima beans.

Crazy Hair Day

Here are some pictures from Allen Brook's Crazy Hair Day.  Play the guessing game and see if you can iedntify all of your friends.

Voting on our favorite pumpkin book

The students are learning about the upcoming election and we have talked about how people vote for many different things in society, not just a president.  In first and second grade, for example, we vote for how to celebrate our filled buzzy jar, tweetable moments and favorite books.  People vote in many different ways too.  Sometimes, we show our opinions in tallies, sometimes in graphs, and sometimes in ballots.  In first and second grade, we also use Voicethread to share our opinions, such as in this reading response.  Click here to listen to our favorite pumpkin book.

These are some pictures of a the written response we also did.  The pumpkins turned out great.

Learning buddies

We met with our learning buddies again today.  We discussed how we can use kind words and compliments when we read books together.  We will remember this when we star at blogging together later this week.

Sorting objects

1st grade mathematicians continued to sort objects in our class this week.  They learned that mathematicians sometimes organize their sorts into neat piles, or columns, to compare their sorts.  We started by neatly organizing our objects.  Here is an example.  Can you see what attribute these mathematicians used? Next week, we will start to graph our objects.

Reading buddies

Today, we met our learning buddies again.  We read the book Jessica by Kevin Henkes and talked about what good friends do.

Weekly update

We had another fantastic week of learning this week, with many new learning opportunities.

We had our first 4 winds class earlier this week.  The theme this year is life cycles.  This week we learned about the life cycles of diffent insects through a puppet show and interactive puzzles.  We also went outside to look for bugs, which we collected in small jars with magnifying glasses, allowing us to act as scientists. 

We also and an additional science class this week.  We used our scientific observation skills, carefully studying the seeds from a sunflower.  The students used our science journals and used their words and pictures to describe what the seeds looked like.

This week in writing, the students continued working on their beginning, middle and end stories.  They were also partnered IP with a friend, who will act as their editor, helping them get ready for publication.

In reading, the students met in small guided reading groups.  Thy also continued their work on various reading responses, which included activities for sequencing stories.  The students also learned how to effectively visualize what they are reading.  They learned that visualizing is like creating a small movie I side your mind to help you make sense of a story.  For example, the students used watercolors to show aspects of the story Owl Moon by Jane Yolen.

Have a great weekend.
Maria

Guest reader

We had another guest reader join our classroom.  This time, Ms. Caitlin visited us and read a book by Jim Arnovsky. 

Learning buddies

We had another meeting with our learning buddies from Ms. Davison's class today.  We call ourselves learning buddies now, because we are doing so much more than jut read books together.  We use twitter together and we also podcast together.  Later this week and next,  we will start blogging together.....just another way we connect with each other.

Science observations

Today, we observed the center of a sunflower, filled with dried petals and seeds.  We used our senses and tried to use our words and pictures to described what we saw.  We started by reading a nonfiction book about different kinds of seeds.  Then, we discussed what scientists do when they work.  We learned that scientists use labels, and carefully choose their words, often using words that are very specific.  We used our science journals to help us record our observations.

Weekly Update

Dear Families,
It is getting cold out there! We have recess outside everyday (except for when it is raining or the weather gets too cold in the winder-time) so please remember to send your child to school with appropriate clothing.  Thicker jackets, fleece shirts and sweatshirts are great for outdoor play.  Your child can always keep extra clothing in his/her locker.  Some families also keep an extra pair of sneakers in their for PE days or rainy days.  Thank you.

This week, all students participated in various podcasting ventures in our reader's workshop.  We had the help of Ms. Wright and Ms. Davis, who visited our classroom to help get us going.  Podcasting helps us focus on our fluency when we're reading.  The students record their reading and listen carefully after the recording has finished.  The students then reflect on the reading and sets a new personal goal for future reading.  A goal might be to pay closer attention to punctuation and make sure the reading briefly pauses, so it sounds more fluent overall.  Another goal might be to slow down. While speed is important in reading, we do not want to read too fast as our overall comprehension will be affected.  Podcasting also helps us share our learning with you at home and with friends around the world as we can record our thinking and discoveries. For the last couple of weeks, the students have explored various reading responses in our reader's workshop.  Last week, we discussed how we can write and draw book recommendations to other friends in our classroom.  We also learned to share our thinking about books in our reading journals. In these journals we share specific ideas and thoughts, guided from our reading groups.  We can also share our reading responses through various digital tools, such as Voicethread.  Voicethread is an online platform tat allows students to use their voice, their words, or their drawings to exporess an idea or understanding.  It also allows other students and people to comment on our Voicethread.  It is a terrific communication tool and we use it often in our classroom.  This week, we created 2 different ones and we have embedded them here for you to see.  We hope you enjoy listening to the students' thoughtful ideas and responses.

Here is the link for our Voicethread on meeting with our Reading Buddies.


Here is the link for our Voicethread on how we can be safe, kind and responsible at ABS.


In writer's workshop, the students continued writing their small moment stories by adding more details to their words and their pictures.  The students also learned to carefully re-read their own writing pieces and make changes to their spelling or overall struture.  Next week, the students will be partnered up with an editing buddy, a friend who will help with revision.  We are so excited as we are getting closer to publication.

Have a great day tomorrow and weekend.

Maria

Ms. Birdsall visiting

Ms. Birdsall, our school technology specialist, visited our classroom and talked about how we can use email and be safe, kind and responsible at the same time.  She read two books to is and then we broke into small groups, discussing what it looks like and sounds like when we are safe, kind and responsible on our email.  We learned that we should only use email for our learning and only with people we know.  We also learned that we should only use kind words.  Thank you Ms Birdsall for visiting us today.