Family Newsletter

Dear Families,

We had another fun and learning filled week at school.  Read on to learn more about our exciting week together at ABS!

Harvest Soup:
Our annual Harvest Soup was a success again this year.  Thank you to all who contributed with vegetables for the soup and the parents who volunteered to help out.  Due to the cold temperatures, it was decided to keep it indoors.  Here is a video that Ms. Birdsall made for our school.  Enjoy.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B364_8NhelMVX2duZlQ3SGw5MlE/view

Writing:
We started our small moment stories this week.  Please scroll down for more information and pictures regarding our teaching approach.  You can help at home by talking to your child about the everyday experiences that occurs.  There are hidden gems in everything-we just have to slow down to discover them!  I hope the students learned that writing stories and finding appropriate topics is not about trips to foreign countries or adventures at amusement parks.  It is about finding the stories in the everyday moments.  It is about identifying the experiences that at first glance seem mundane or even boring or average, but on closer prove to be fantastic explorations of growth, lessons learned or cooperation.
A particular skill the students worked on this week was how to go back and add more to what was already written.  They also practiced re-reading their own writing before adding more to their stories.

Technology:
We are almost done with the process of sharing our google docs entitled "All About Me".  Only a few students have yet to do it.  We will continue next week.  Many children have asked if they can add to their docs from home.  Of course they can!  I encourage your child to do that.  Additional practice using online resources and typing is beneficial to all.  We will start Typing Club again next week, so please stay tuned for that.  2nd graders probably remember from last year and since the link is still on KidBlog, many have already accessed it.  Thank you again for supporting our digital learning from home too!

First grade math:
First grade mathematician continued their work on number facts and relations to 10 and 10 and some more this week.  They also explored story-problem solving using mathematical representations and equations to show their thinking and justify their answers.  All first grade students took home their math work place planners this week.  Please look through their work at home and praise them for all they accomplished at school.  Sometimes, you will see unfinished pages.  Your child is encouraged to finish these pages at home, but it is voluntary and your child does not have to bring them in again for me to see (unless he/she wants to).  There are many different reasons why pages or parts of a page is left unfinished.  Sometimes, I might have asked a child to stop a game/task for a particular reason, sometimes another teacher comes to work with a child and sometimes the concepts are mastered so we can move on to other games/tasks.  Please don't hesitate to contact me if you have any concerns or questions.  Thank you.

Have a great weekend,
Maria