• Jan032010
    Happy New Year!

    POSTED AT 11:50 AM

    I hope you all had a wonderful winter break. I know I enjoyed having 2 weeks off to spend with my family.
    I wanted to thank you all for attendance at our play, The children were so excited to see you and to perform for you. I hope you enjoyed it - They did a great job!
    I also wanted to thank you all for the lovely gifts that I received from you. It was very appreciated.
    Now that we have finished our play, we will be able to get back into our normal routines - which means that we will be back to reading groups this week.
    Since it's going to be a snowy week, I thought we would learn about snow. Please send in mittens/gloves, hats and boots everyday this week as we will be going outside to observe the snow.

    This week we are learning:
    Reading: decoding and comprehension strategies
    Writing: writing stories
    Spelling: s as a suffix (spelling test resumes this week)
    Math: addition and subtraction games
    Science: snow

    Have a great week!
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    Dec132009
    Holiday Play

    POSTED AT 07:33 PM

    It finally here! This week we will be doing our play for our friends at school and most importantly for our families.

    If you would be willing to donate some cookies, paper products, or drinks for our play performance, please send me an email letting me know what you would like to donate. Please let me know your preference by Wednesday so I can make sure that we don't have any duplicates.

    Don't forget to come to our play:
    Thursday, December 17
    10:30 am or 2:30 pm
    Room 11 (Our classroom)

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    Dec062009
    Week of December 7

    POSTED AT 08:10 PM

    The children are doing a great job of learning their lines for our play. Invitations should come home with your child on Monday. Just in case they get lost on the way, our play will be in our classroom on December  17 at 10:30 and 2:30. Both performances will be the same. I hope you will be able to make it.
    The children did well with their first spelling test. We will be taking another one this week that is a review of letter sounds already taught. We will not take a spelling test next week - its too much with doing the play that week.

    This week we are learning:
    Reading: More gingerbread stories and play practice
    Writing: small moments stories
    Phonics: spelling test
    Math: addition and subtraction strategies
    Social Studies: Las Posadas, Kwanzaa and Hanukkah

    Have a great week.
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    Nov292009
    The time for Holidays

    POSTED AT 07:13 PM

    I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I had a great time with my family and am ready to be back in the classroom with my wonderful class.
    Our learning will transition into learning about many different holidays. With this unit on different holidays, we will be working on a play. Your child will bring home their script daily. If you have a chance please practice your child's line. Please have your child bring the script back to school - we will be rehearsing every day.
    We will be making formal invitations for you later but I wanted to give you a head's up. Our play performance will be on Thursday, December 17. There will one performance at 10:30 and one performance at 2:30.
    NEW THIS WEEK:
    The children will have their first spelling test this week. I will be sending home a list of 17 words that will use all the letter sounds we have learned. On Friday, I will choose 7 words from the list and give your child a spelling test. Words will also be posted on the spelling test page of my website (see the spelling test page). I know that studying 17 words may seem like a lot of words but we have learned every sound they are being tested on and they are a review from Kindergarten.

    This week we are learning:
    Reading: decoding strategies, comprehension strategies, reading test
    Writing: Narrative stories, nouns and verbs
    Phonics: spelling test on all letter sounds
    Math: Shapes and patterns
    Social Studies: Holidays such as Diwali, Ramadan, Los Posadas, and St. Lucia's Day
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    Nov222009
    Happy Thanksgiving

    POSTED AT 12:57 PM

    I can't believe that it is Thanksgiving time already! Wow this year is going by so quickly.

    Your child will be bringing home many shape papers this week in their weekly red portfolio. Some of them might be completed while others are not. Your child did not need to complete all the papers. The children were given all the papers at the same time and were allowed to choose what they worked on. I didn't want you to see the paper and worry that your child wasn't doing their work. If you check progress book, you might notice that all the papers are listed but your child was only graded on papers they started.

    This week we will be taking our Pilgrim test and working with turkeys. Gobble, Gobble!!!
    Have a Happy Thanksgiving!
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    Nov152009
    Thankful for friends

    POSTED AT 06:57 PM

    This week we will be continuing our unit on the pilgrims. We are going to make our own Plimoth Plantation (Yes that is how it is spelled.) and learn about the Wampanoag Native Americans who helped the Pilgrims.
    If you have not returned your child's report card response and envelope, pleas do so.
     
    We are learning:
    Reading: decoding strategies (Learning other ways than sounding out words - Sounding out is the least efficient strategy there is)
    Writing: writing workshop, making complete sentences
    Math: shapes, patterns, graphs
    Social Studies: map of Plimoth Plantations, Squanto and Samoset, Wampanoag Native Americans
     
    I hope you had a wonderful weekend - can't believe that it is the middle of November and it has been so wonderful!!!
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    Nov082009
    P is for Pilgrims

    POSTED AT 08:09 PM

    I hope you enjoyed seeing your child's growth as it was reflected in their grades. The boys and girls have made so much progress already. I am very proud of them and I know you are as well.
    Please remember to sign the comment section of the report card and send it back to school in the envelope that was sent home.
    The children are really enjoying learning about the pilgrims. Last week we learned some vocabulary words - England, Pilgrim and Mayflower. We put these words onto our word card ring. The children need to recognize these words but they do not need to know how to spell them.
     
    This week we are learning about:
    Reading: summarizing, decoding (We are really working on learning other strategies besides sounding words out - please encourage your child to use other strategies )
    Writing: writing about small moments in our lives
    Phonics: wh, v, x, z
    Math: Shapes - defining triangles and quadrilaterals
    Social Studies: voyage of the Mayflower, pilgrim life (especially the children)
     
    I will be out of the classroom on Monday for a meeting. I value all your comments that you have about your child's report card. I look forward to reading them on Tuesday and will respond promptly if needed.
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    Nov012009
    Thank you

    POSTED AT 07:29 PM

    Thanks to all the parents who organized our Halloween Party. We had a great time!
     
    We will start learning about the pilgrims this week as we start our Thanksgiving unit.  I really enjoy making history real to the students.
     
    Reminder, there is no school on Tuesday - Election Day.
     
    My mind is a little frazzled right now. I was working on report cards today and am having problems thinking clearly. I will do better next week.
     
    Reading: summarizing
    Writing: adding details into our writing
    Math: shapes
    Social Studies: the "mean" king of England, packing for our voyage, map of England and Atlantic Ocean

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    Oct252009
    Pumpkins and Halloween Party

    POSTED AT 07:12 PM

    Now that our class is healthy - it's time for us to start learning about pumpkins. We each got a pumpkin after our trip to the apple orchard and we will be using them to learn this week.
    Parent volunteers have started coming in. We are so enjoying getting to know each other. 
    Friday is a very busy day for our classroom. At 10:30 we will have our Halloween party and parade. Thank you to Mrs. Pratt for organizing the fun and to all the room parents who are supplying the fun!!! Please have your child bring in their costumes in a separate bag. We will change into our costumes before the parade and then change back into our clothes for lunch. After all that fun, we have early dismissal. Children will start being dismissed at 1:15 (or whenever their buses or parents arrive). If you want to take your child home after our parade/party, I will have a sign out sheet in the classroom.
     
    We are learning:
    Reading: cause and effect, decoding strategies, prediction
    Writing: nouns and verbs, telling and asking sentences, publishing a book
    Phonics: ch, sh, e, k 
    Math:  2-D shapes - square, rectangle, triangle, rhombus, trapezoid, hexagon, ellipse, circle (In first grade we call a diamond a rhombus and an oval is an ellipse.)
    Science: pumpkin life cycles, comparing apples and pumpkins, pumpkin activities
     
    Have a Boo-tiful week!

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    Oct192009
    Take 2 and Apple Orchard

    POSTED AT 06:25 PM

    We had a lot of absences last week (at least 7 students out each day). Due to this we will be learning what I had planned for last week. (With a third of the class out, we spent most of the week reviewing and using Study Island.)
     
    Please remember that we are going to the Apple Orchard on Thursday. If you have not sent in your $5.00 please do so ASAP. We will be going to the orchard in rain or in sunshine (Let's hope for the last one). Every child needs to bring in a bagged lunched for Thursday. (We might get back after lunch has occurred so we will be eating in our classrooms.)
     
    Mrs. Toburen, Mrs./Mr. Zemanski, Mrs. Pratt, Mrs. Gage, Mrs. Lane and Mrs./Mr. Taylor are our lucky parents who get to go the orchard with us.  (Please send in $4.00 to cover your cost of the trip). Thanks for volunteering to help us end our apple unit on such a fun note.
     
    Halloween parties are coming up soon. If you have any questions about costumes, please email me.  Reminder our Halloween party will take place on Friday, October 30 at 10:30ish with early dismissal occurring at 1:30.
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