Sunday, September 30, 2018

Week of October 1st

First Grade Families we did it! This is our final week before a well deserved break. Just a reminder that our annual Read-A-Thon has begun and will continue through October. This is a great opportunity for you to encourage your child to read while supporting our school. Our goal is to have 100% of our scholars get at least one donation. Your child will be bringing home the instructions on how to log minutes and earn points.

Book Fair Dates:

Our Annual Book Fair begins THIS Friday night, September 28th with our Literacy Night.  Come shop from 5pm-8pm and enjoy activities, food trucks, and more!  The Book Fair will be open Monday, 10/1- Friday, 10/5.  All classes will have a chance to preview the book fair on Monday, October 1st during the school day.  

Book Fair Hours:

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday:  7:30am-4:30pm
Thursday:                                         7:30am-6:30pm

Students with money will be able to shop during the school day Tuesday-Friday.  They will be brought down 15 minutes prior to their morning special.


This quarter parent teacher conferences are mandatory and will be held on October 15th-17th. School will resume Wednesday October 17th. Please read on to to learn about the exciting things we have planned this week.

Spalding
We will be taking our Morrison McCall monthly test on Monday and will only have 20 words this week. Please continue to practice phonograms 1-52.

Words:
men, man, for, ran, run, was, that, his, led, lay
apple, ate, author, bread, brown, dog, eats, fast, food, jump

Language Arts
We will continue our unit on Cinderella. We will be exploring Yeh Shen, the original Cinderella, Cendrillon from the Caribbean, The Rough Face Girl (Native American) and Adelita from Mexico. We will discuss and work through the common problem in each of these versions of our beloved classic. 

Math
We will wrap up our subtraction unit at the end of this week with our unit test on Friday. We will continue to hone our skills at subtraction facts and encourage continued practice at home. We will also take a look at true and false equations.

Science
We are continue to work through different habitats. This week our focus will be on the temperate deciduous forest. We will begin to understand the characteristics of this habitat and the adaptations that have been made in order for plants and animals to thrive there. 

History
We will add the finishing touches to our Ancient Egypt books and review the many exciting things we have learned over the past month. Our unit test has been pushed to this week due to the half day on Friday.

Wishing you a wonderful week ahead and a well deserved fall break! We are looking forward to meeting with you at our fall conferences!

Warmly,
The First Grade Team

Sunday, September 23, 2018

Week of September 24th

Hello first grade families!
It is hard to believe that this week we will wrap up September. We have much to accomplish before fall break in a few weeks. Read on to see the exciting things that we will be covering this week!

Important Dates
Wednesday 9/26 Chipotle Fundraiser for PSO
Friday 9/28 Half Day for teacher inservice
Friday 9/28 Literacy Night and book fair kick-off
9/28-10/5 Book Fair in library (no regular library time)

Spalding
Phonograms
1-52

Words
ask, just, way, get, home, much, call, long, love. then
house, year, to, I, as, send, alone, lone, one, has
some, if, how, her, them, other, baby, well, about

Launguage Arts
We will be exploring the same story in different lands this week with the different versions of Cinderella. We will read Korean Cinderella and Yeh Shen. We will note differences and similarities and take a look at story elements and vocabulary.

Math
This week we will dive into the relationship between addition and subtraction. Scholars will be able to rely on fact families, counting on and counting backward to solve for missing parts of an addition or subtraction equation. We will start memorizing subtraction facts. Practicing facts at home with flash cards will help ensure your child's success.

Science
We have had so much fun learning about the different habitats and adaptations of animals these past few weeks. We will learn about the savanna this week. We will begin to understand how animals coexist and the relationships between predator and prey.

History
Ancient Egypt has been such an exciting unit for our scholars. We have been working on a book to showcase all of the fun facts we have learned. This week we will learn about hieroglyphics and put our books together. We will also learn about King Tut and Hatshepsut two of Egypt's well known pharaohs. We will take our end of unit quiz this week.

Wishing you all a wonderful week ahead,
The First Grade Team

Friday, September 14, 2018

Week of September 17th

Hello first grade families!
It is hard to believe that we are already more than half way through the first quarter. We really appreciate your support and have loved having you in the classroom especially as we are getting our reading and math groups off the ground. Please reach out to me via email if you wish to help with these endeavors.

What to expect this week:

In Spalding please continue to review phonogram cards 1-52.

New words:
feed, fur, green, oil, paint, pool, tooth, teeth, worm, day
eat, sits, sit, lot, box, school, belong, door, floor, yes
low, soft, stands, stand, yard, bring, tell, five, ball, law

In language arts we will be wrapping up Owl at Home and beginning Cinderella. This week will read and study Egyptian and Korean Cinderella. We will compare the similarities and differences between these two versions. We will be emphasizing proper nouns, specifically places this week.

In math we will test on Methods of Addition on Tuesday, please use the review in the workbook to study. We will move into Unit 4 Subtraction Within 10 this week. We will look at subtraction number stories and explore the relationship between subtraction and number bonds.

In science we are continuing to study habitats. This week our focus will be on Desert Sonoran Habitats. We will learn about nocturnal animals and camouflage. We will create a flip book to showcase what we have learned.

Our scholars are really enjoying our Ancient Egypt unit of study. This week is no exception as we continue to look at mummies, pyramids and tomb robbers! Scholars are completing an informational book that will be sent home at the end of our unit.

Wishing you all a great week,
The First Grade Team


Sunday, September 9, 2018

Week of September 10th

Hello first grade families,
Here are a few things you can expect in the week to come. As always we appreciate all that you do, and to dedicating an evening last week to better understand Spalding, Singapore and homework. If you have further questions or were unable to attend do not hesitate to reach out to me.

Language Arts:
This week we will continue to read Owl at Home. We will read the chapters "Tear Water Tea" and "Upstairs and Downstairs". We will also discuss the meaning of the saying "The Land of Nod". Please continue to work on memorizing The Pasture by Robert Frost at home.

Spalding
Phonogram Review: 1-50
Words: 
make, street, say, come, hand, ring, live, live, hill, late
let, big, bag, beg, bog, bug, mother, three, land, cold
hot, hat, child, ice, play, sea, see, bird, cool, earth

Math
This week in math we will:
·         Solve addition problems by counting on
·          Using Mental math and memorizing fact
·         Practice addition facts within 10
·         Review all the strategies 
*Our unit test will be next Tuesday

History
This week we will continue in our Ancient Egypt unit. We will finish our study on the Nile River and our scholars will explore Pharaohs and who they were in Ancient Egypt.

Science
This week we will take a look at:
-          arctic habitats such as arctic tundra and arctic ocean
-          animals and how they adapt to their habitat
-          animals and plants in the arctic habitat

Thank you to everyone who volunteered to help out in the classroom, and those who have agreed to be liaisons. You are the ones who pull everything together and make it all happen, and we are so grateful for you!

Warmly,
The First Grade Team

Sunday, September 2, 2018

First Grade Families,
I hope you are all enjoying a relaxing three .day weekend! We have many exciting things coming up this week.

This Tuesday September 4th we will be hosting our Singapore and Spalding Night. New and returning families please join us for a hands-on, interactive workshop highlighting the techniques and teaching strategies for Singapore and Spalding. You will have the opportunity to experience sample lessons, receive homework pointers and help and much, much more.

The evening will be divided into two parts. If your child is in section A or B you will attend Spalding workshop first, from 6:00-6:40. If your child is in section C or D you will attend the Singapore workshop first also from 6:00-6:40. From 6:50-7:30 you will rotate.

Spading
Please continue to practice phonogram cards 1-54

New Words:
your, you, out, time, may, into, him, today, look, did
like, six, boy, book, by, have, are, had, over, must

Language Arts
This week we will begin reading Owl at Home. If you have not already sent in a copy for your child please have him or her bring it to school on Tuesday. I do have a few extra copies, please reach out to me if you are unable to get the book. I will be emailing you individually to remind you who still needs a book.

We will also look at sentence structure, the meaning of "The Land of Nod" and begin memorizing our September poem The Pasture by Robert Louis Stevenson.

Math
We are continuing to work through addition problems. This week we will specifically be looking at how to solve addition problems using number bonds. Please continue to work on math facts using numbers 1-5. In class we flip over number cards 1-5 to solve problems. Using a regular deck of cards with these numbers is a fun and easy way to squeeze in extra practice.

Science
This week we will begin our unit on habitats. We will explain what a habitat is and why living things live in habitats to which they are particularly suited.

History
We launch our unit on Ancient Egypt this week. We will be discussing the Nile and its seasonal floods and the role it has played in farming. One of our activities will be creating a model of The Nile. If you are able to donate sugar cubes, salt dough, paint or plain paper plates please let me know. We will also be in need of a few parents to help prep projects at home in the coming weeks. You can email me directly if you are interested.

Thank you for all of your support, the start of our year together has been strong and we are looking forward to all that is to come.

Warmly,
The First Grade Team