Family Newsletter

 Dear Families,

Here is our week in review:

Social-Emotional Learning:

• This week, we reviewed how to deal with sudden changes in other people’s reactions and moods.  We reviewed what our strategies are and how we can be compassionate friends, while also advocating for our own needs and learning.  We practiced using our assertive voice in these situations.

• We also practiced active listening; focusing our attention on the speaker for a sustained period of time.  Active listening means we’re focusing our eyes, ears and bodies towards the speaker and we are ready to revoice what was being said.

• We celebrated our team and learning community together with the second graders in Mrs. Benoit’s class for some extra time outside.  Due to the unpredictable weather lately, we decided to shift our Friday Workshops to a Thursday afternoon.  The students exchanged pen pal letters, participated in a rain song and had extra recess together.  The rain song was recorded and will be shared with the entire school during our school-wide Arbor Day celebration on 5/14.  We watched it together today and it was fantastic!  We will share the video with you shortly.  Stay tuned.

Reading:

• We practiced our reading stamina this week.  We set goals as a class for sustained, engaged reading when we’re not in guided reading groups.  The students also had the opportunity to practice navigating between “just right” books, choice books, poetry and word work activities.

• We had partner reading this week as well.  Partner reading is a time when the students have the opportunity to read a book with a friend while taking turns reading out loud and talking about the stories read.  The students love this time.  They are fully immersed in a variety of books.  

Writing:

• We continued our word work this week.  We started preparing for our end-of-the-year celebration with Ms. Patti.  We created our Vocabulary Tree.  The leaves contain words that reflect our learning community; words such as friendship, peace, freedom and independence. The students also created paper flowers.  Each petal contained an adjective describing themselves.  They will generate synonyms for these adjectives for our online Flipgrid project.

• We learned how to write acrostic poems this week as well.  First, we created an acrostic poem reflecting adjectives and short sentences for ourselves.  Second, we created a special acrostic poem and painting for Mother’s Day.  Please check your child’s backpack for this special surprise.

First Grade Math:

• The calendar for the month of May introduces the students to geometry.  Throughout this month, the students will learn about 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional shapes.  They will learn how different attributes help us define these shapes.  We are adding these new words to our Vocabulary Tree as well.  This week we learned to define the following words in math:

1. Attributes

2. Curved

3. Straight

4. Closed shape

5. Edge

6. Corner

7. Side

8. Parallel

• We also started a new unit on subtraction.  Although first grade mathematicians have explored some subtraction already through our work on number bonds, finding the number before (subtracting by 1) and subtracting/adding zero, we will spend the next few weeks delving deeper into subtraction.  This week, the focus was primarily on subtracting a group of 10, or many groups of tens.  We used 10-frames to help us visualize before writing equations.  We also used our math hands, representing each group of ten with one finger. The students also began exploring subtraction while anchoring to the next decuple, ie. finding the next group of ten first.  

News and Reminders:

• We will switch our Essential Arts classes again on Monday.  We will have PE on Mondays and Tuesdays and Enrichment with Ms. Rogers on Thursdays and Fridays.  Please send in sneakers and appropriate outdoor gear for PE days as Ms. Porter tries to be outside as often as possible.

• Please send in a bag with extra socks and pants for your child to keep inside his/her locker.  The grass is usually very wet and sometimes the extra rain we have had lately creates areas of mud.  It is nice for your child to change into something dry after recess, if needed.

• Please note that we have outdoor recess every day (weather permitting).  It is still chilly outside.  Your child benefits from a sweatshirt, lighter jacket or  a fleece jacket still.  It is still not warm enough for just T-shirts!

• Here's a link to this week's Bell

Have a great weekend,

Maria