This was a week of reflection, revisiting, and looking ahead. Here are some important questions we focused on this week:
How have you improved in first grade? How did you improve and who helped you improve?
What has been challenging?
What would you like to work on more?
We used these reflective questions to help us with a couple New Year projects. The first was a way for us to brainstorm ideas for our second project. In this first project we used "2017" to write about the following:
During word work we focused on short /u/ families -un, -ut and -ug as well as short /i/ families -ip, -ig and -ill.
2 = Two goals I have
0 = Something I want to stop doing
1 = One book I want to read in 2017
7 = Seven new things I want to learn
Our second project had us focusing in a bit more on one personal goal, one book to read, one thing to learn, and we added one new food we want to try. Here they are without the noisemakers attached - you can see those when you come for conferences!
During word work we focused on short /u/ families -un, -ut and -ug as well as short /i/ families -ip, -ig and -ill.
During Reader's Workshop this week, we revisited our understanding of Just-Right Books. We then sorted our book bin books into 3 piles: Books that were too easy, books that were too hard, and books that were just right. We then focused on finding interesting information to share in our just-right nonfiction books and marked them with post-its. Here we are sharing our books with classroom peers:
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| This reader decided to add a "?" to the front of the book as a reminder to ask his partner what s/he knew about soccer before he read it. |
We had time on Thursday and Friday to practice reading our nonfiction books with smooth and lively voices in preparation for a visit from Mrs. Grambow's friends who were doing the same! All of the children gathered together in partnerships on Friday morning, sharing their nonfiction books with each other!
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| The sticker on the wing of the pinwheel helps us to watch and keep track of the rotations. |
In science this week, we created pinwheels. We'll be using these this upcoming week to answer the following focus questions:
How strong is the wind today?
How can pinwheels be used to observe the wind?
A reminder that your child's collection is due tomorrow (Monday, January 9th). Some great collections have arrived at school while some may be a bit tricky to rate, rank and write about. As you're helping your child to choose a collection, please remember that the items should lend themselves to A LOT of writing. An important piece of information in the note that went home is that the items in the collection should be different but similar. Here are some photos of some collections that will lend themselves to some great writing:
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| A collection of Pokemon figurines. They're similar in that they're all Pokemon, however, each one is different. |
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| Similar in that they're Matchbox cars, different in that they're different kinds of cars. |
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| Similar in that they're all plastic animals, different in that they're different animals. |
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| All Shopkins, but different Shopkins. What's really terrific about each of these collections is that each item is interesting and have different characteristics. This way your child. would be able to write, for example, that Batmobile is the best because it's faster than the others, the windows open, the tires are really big, it's my favorite colors, etc. Or the mixer Shopkin is the best because it has two characters instead of one, it has my favorite colors, it's a tool rather than a food, etc. If the items are too different, it's very difficult to make comparisons, and if the items aren't interesting in and of themselves, it will be quite difficult for your young writer to write about them from a descriptive lens. If you've send a collection that you're now rethinking, please send a new one to school tomorrow as we'll be sharing our collections with each other. If your note regarding the collections either never came home or got lost in the shuffle, here it is.  Your child should be able to tell you about the collection as many of our friends have already brought their collections in. |
I'm looking forward to seeing and learning about all of the collections tomorrow!
Until then...
Michelle Mullen
***Please make note of our annual family picnic which has been added to our list of important dates below. Also, this Thursday is our field trip to Marquette to see the musical Fancy Nancy. Please be sure to return your child's permission slip/fee if you haven't done so already. Thank you to everyone who offered to volunteer to be our chaperone. The parent selected has been contacted.
Mark Your Calendars!
Wednesday, January 11: Early Release Day
Thursday, January 12: Fancy Nancy play at Marquette
(please be sure to return your child's permission slip and money)
Monday, January 16: NO SCHOOL
Wednesday, February 8: Early Release Day
Monday, February 20: NO SCHOOL/Teacher In-Service Day
Wednesday, March 8: Early Release Day
Wednesday, March 22: Early Release Day
Thursday, March 23: Musical (2pm & 6:30pm)
Monday, March 27-Friday, March 31: Spring Break
Wednesday, April 12: Early Release Day
Friday, April 14: NO SCHOOL
Monday, April 17: NO SCHOOL/Teacher In-Service
Wednesday, April 26: Early Release Day
Wednesday, May 10: Early Release Day
Wednesday, May 24: Early release Day
Monday, May 29: NO SCHOOL
Tuesday, June 6th: SAVE THE DATE!!!
Annual Family Picnic! 11:30-12:40
Thursday, June 8: Last day of First Grade!
See you later, Second Grader!
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