Wonderful Insect Learning

We have come to the end of our "at school" insect learning, but of course learning never stops and you and your young scientist will continue to explore insects in your own ways!  Take a look at some of the great learning we have been engaged in over the past few weeks...

We researched to find out why we should even care about insects?  What would the world be like without them?


We created posters for the hall so we could teach others about why they should care about insects.

Finally, we complied all of our good learning into our own science book about insects.  Then we invited our parents to be part of our learning. We taught our parents what we had learned.









This week we also had some good working time with third grade buddies as we created a project about what we are thankful for.






Finally, ask your child about playing "Gobble, BUMP!"  This is a great game to help students add three numbers together.

Getting started as insect scientists!

Hi everyone!
We have had a few busy and exciting weeks in first grade as we begin our study of insects. 
During back to school night, we talked about how learners acquire new information when the learning is meaningful, purposeful, and has value...so the work we do in first grade together is based around science concepts.  This also helps us learn importance life science concepts as we read, write, think, speak, view, listen and calculate - the processes of literacy.  The more concepts we learn in any subject areas, the more neural connections we make, and the better learners we become!

Here are some of the things we have been doing:

All learning begins with what we already know, so we began by telling our stories about bugs and sharing them with each other.

Then we decided how scientist learn new things - and how an entomologist would learn about insects - this is what we decided we could do to learn more about insects







We decided that we need insects to observe - so here are the mealworms!



We researched by reading books to find out where insects lived, the drew and wrote about our ideas.




After learning more about bats, we decided to research other insect predators - we read, spoke, listened, viewed, drew, and wrote about insect predators.

We have had a great two weeks starting our insect learning - stay tuned for more!

Our First Open House!

It was wonderful to see so many families yesterday - thanks so much for coming.  The kids were super excited to "show off" their space, Special Person books and posters.

You may have head that we have begun our study of insects!  Things are going to get exciting!

Enjoy some pictures from the event and have a great weekend!

Moving along with math

Hi everyone!
We have been working hard in math, and there have been some big concepts we have been covering.  One of them is combinations of 10.  Understanding combinations of 10 (1+9, 2+8, etc..) is foundational as student begin to add larger numbers such as 20+80.  We use a mathematical model called a Tens Frame to help us visualize these combinations:



Using a Tens Frame can also help young mathematicians to "trust" certain numbers.  For example , when holding up 8 fingers (5 on one hand and 3 on the other), many children will count the five fingers on their hand ,then the 3 on the other- we want them to trust that their hand is five, the count one from there "5 - 6,7,8".  Tens Frames allow children to do this by trusting that if the whole frame is filled, then, using the above example, we can say "10 - 11, 12, 13, 14, 15" instead of counting every dot.  Of course, some children would see the 10 and 5 and immediately see that it is 15.

So, we have been playing games with Frame cards and exploring how many combination, such as odd and even numbers, look on these cards.
 Here are a few pictures of "Make 10's" concentration - a big hit!

Have a great week everyone!

Reading and Writing

Hello everyone!

Today you will see your student bringing home a small packet of work from our morning “literacy” time.  This is independent work that represents much thinking.

Although we tend to define literacy as reading and writing in our culture, literacy consists of seven psychological processes: reading, writing, thinking, speaking, listening, viewing, and calculating.  Most facets of adulthood and life-long learning consist of being able in effectively engage in all of these processes.  In addition, reading and writing are highly interconnected; one is reading while writing; those who can write a word independently can also read it. So, the more writing we can overlap with reading, the faster students learn to do both.

During our morning literacy hour, the students are engaging in most of the psychological processes of literacy.  Every day they will read, both teacher selected and self-selected texts. 

On Monday, we engage in shared (interactive) reading of a text where we make predictions, learn expanded concept vocabulary, and think about author intent (just to name a few).  We also will read and learn a poem each week.  These two whole class learnings become two of the four learning activities your child will complete each week as they rotate through literacy centers.  One day, they will respond to the poem, and locate key words within the poem; another day they will engage with the story of the week (such as identifying problem/solution); another day they will engage with non-fiction texts, (such as a Scholastic News or other content book); and one day they will observe science artifacts or works of art then write about them.  They will also be reading many different books during this time.  All of this work is independent – so it may not be absolutely perfect – but we do expect the best from each child.  Also during this time, your child will receive small group instruction in reading at their rate and level to help target in on their needs as a learner.  The goal is to meet 3-4 times a week in small group.  With this model, your child will engage with a variety of texts, receive small group instruction, and increase their stamina in both reading and writing. We also have a 30 minute quiet reading time in the afternoon.

We also have buddy reading time with third grade! Take a peek:

So much learning is happening in first grade – thanks for all of the support from home!

Moving Along with First Grade

Thank you all for the lovely Back to School Night!
 For the last 11 days of school we have been working on a project I call "Special Person".  For this activity, we choose one person each day of school who tells us a story about something they have done with their family.  Here are a few examples of how this looks:

There are several levels of learning occurring through the literacy processes. 
First, your children are learning to tell a story with a who/what/where/when and sometimes a "why".  (speaking)
The students are also learning to listen to another person's story, and ask clarifying questions (listening & thinking).
They are watching the story be drawn (viewing) which helps them solidify the story in their own mind's eye AND learn to draw many different scenarios  that they may encounter when they write stories in the future.
As you can see, the pictographs are then labeled (tagged) with symbols (written words).  This way, the student learn that all of the pictures in their head can be translated into a symbol - this is writing!
Then we read the story as a group (reading) to add another layer of our understanding of the symbols on the page (idea words). The ideas that are outlined are "sight" words (I call them glue words) because they hold the big ideas together.
Finally, the students write their own stories based upon the topic chosen by the special person.
On the social emotional side, the students are learning they they have great ideas to share, they have much in common, and they CAN read and write! 

We spoke at back to school night about using science concepts as the vehicle for reading, writing, speaking, viewing, thinking, listening and calculating.  Check out this article addressing this topic:

https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2018/04/-american-students-reading/557915/

Have a great weekend!

Welcome to First Grade

Hello everyone!
We have been together for seven days now and it feels like we are settling in very well.  The learners in our class are so kind to each other, but also serious about learning new things! 

Below is a general outline of our days - but the printed word does not do justice to the fun we have been having!  We have been reading, and writing, and even starting some math ideas together!

Time	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
8:45-8:50	Morning Routine	Morning Routine	Morning Routine	Morning Routine	Morning Routine
8:50-9:45	Story of the week –Interactive Read-Aloud (Direct reading strategies, instruction/modeling) Poem of the week (word work)	Literacy Block-reader’s workshop (Independent writing/reading work, word work)	Literacy Block- reader’s workshop (Independent writing/reading work, word work)	Literacy Block- reader’s workshop (Independent writing/reading work, word work)	Literacy Block- reader’s workshop (Independent writing/reading work, word work)
9:45-10:00	Math/Number Corner	Math/Number Corner	Math/Number Corner	Math/Number Corner	Math/Number Corner
10:00-10:20	Break (snack)	Break (snack)	Break (snack)	Break (snack)	Break (snack)
10:20-11:10	Math	Math	Math	Math	Math
11:10-11:55	Lunch & Recess	Lunch & Recess	Lunch & Recess	Lunch & Recess	Lunch & Recess
11:55-12:20	Read Aloud Independent Reading	Read Aloud Independent Reading	Read Aloud Independent Reading	Read Aloud Independent Reading	Read Aloud 3rd Grade Buddies!
12:25-2:00	12:25-12:55   Music	Integrated Content Instruction-Language development   Reading & Writing Science/Social Studies & Project Work	12:25-12:55   Music	Integrated Content Instruction-Language development   Reading & Writing Science/Social Studies & Project Work	Integrated Content Instruction-Language development   Reading & Writing Science/Social Studies & Project Work
	1:00-2:00 Literacy Based Art Instruction		Integrated Content Instruction-Language development   Reading & Writing Science/Social Studies & Project Work
2:00-2:30	Writing	1:45-2:15 Writing	Writing	1:45-2:15 Writing	Writing
2:30-3:00	Community Circle	2:15-3:00 PE	End of Day Routine	2:15-3:00 PE	2:00-2:45 Library/Media

On this blog, there will be weekly / bi-weekly updates to what we are doing in our class.  You can invite grandparents and other family to look from time to time!

Check out some of the ways we have been learning over the past seven days!

learning about geometric shapes

sorting according to features

partner games with coordinate graphing

Reading, reading - your children love books!

45 minutes of gym twice a week - thanks to the Duniway Foundation

getting used to finishing jobs

Recess!  Exercise!

exploring shapes

listening on the carpet

writing everyday

choosing time!

Number Corner math with Miss Heidi!

Everyday we chose a new Special person and write about their story idea - then our writing becomes a books for them!  Can't wait for you to see all the great work we have been doing at back to school night!