Hi Everyone!  Below are a few pictures of Polar Express Day and our Holiday concert last week.  The kids did such a wonderful job singing.  Thank you so much to all of you who give your time to help out in our classroom this time of year.  :)

Hi Parents!
     I hope everyone is have a wonderful week!  It's been awhile since I've updated the blog.  It's getting to be the "most wonderful time of the year" again, and the kiddos are so excited about their Winter Concert tomorrow.  Polar Express Day will be Tuesday, December 14th, and the kids are welcome to wear their pj's this day.  We will be doing educational activities related to the book, and at the end of the day, we will drink hot cocoa and watch the movie.  Our class's Christmas party will be Friday, December 17th at noon.  We will be having a book exchange, so please send in a book under $10.00, appropriate for a boy or girl.  As always, thank you so much for all your support.  Enjoy this wonderful Christmas season!  :)

Hi Folks!  I hope you all have had a good Monday.  Today, the kids brought home: their packet of reading work and a packet of math Homelinks, which is all due on Friday.  They also brought home an information sheet on the new "Earobics" program found on-line.  The website is:  http://earobics.k12northstar.org.  You can log your child in by typing a lowercase s and then their student number.  For example:  s123456.  Use this for the username AND password, and have fun!
        Our class Harvest Party will be on Wednesday, October 27th.  I am finding out the time this week and will let you know as soon as possible.  Carla's mom, Mrs. Watts, has graciously volunteered to head-up the festivities.  If you would like to help out, and need her contact information, please let me know. Thank you all so much, and have a great rest of the week!

Hi Everyone!  I hope you all are having an enjoyable weekend, even though the temperatures are dropping quickly.  Yesterday morning, we practiced walking to our new reading classes.  Each teacher has a different Alaska animal posted outside his/her door, so the kids can recognize which classroom to go to each day.  It is my understanding that the kids' reading homework will be sent home as a packet on Mondays and is to be returned to school on Fridays.  I will start doing this with math homelinks too and will send home the homelinks that match the lessons we do that week.  As always, thank you so much for your continued support. 

Spelling Words for this week:  Sept. 20th - 24th
- hot
- hop
- pop
- pot
- dot
- not
- back
- pick
- now
- want
Bonus Word:  cloud

          Hi Folks!  I hope everyone is enjoying the beautiful weather outside!  Hopefully, it'll stick around for just a little while longer.  In our first grade world this week in reading we were introduced to contractions.  This can be a difficult skill for students to grasp, so any practice at home with contractions would be a big help.  We also discussed diagraph ck and the rules that go with it ending a word or just plain k ending  a word.  We are still working on sentence building and writing complete sentences with a subject and predicate. 
         In math this week, we completed lessons 2-2 through 2-6.  Next week, we will begin lesson 2-7 and go through 2-10.  Please look for the Homelinks to come home with your child.  We use our dry erase boards everyday in math and are running short on black dry erase markers.  If you are ever out and about and think about it, please pick us up some black markers.  Thank you so much, in advance, for helping us out. 
         We have been discussing the elements of fall some more this week and even went on a nature walk outside to write down some of the signs of fall we saw.  We collected leaves and, in art, created creatures from our leaves. 
         If at all possible, please send in the ziplock bag with your child's book and reading log in it.  If we have any time in our day, I call them up one by one and have them read a few pages in their book to me.  They will each get to pick a new book every Monday or get a new one during the week if they are fluently reading the book they already had. 
         I hope you all have had a wonderful weekend, and thank you for your support.  
         

Hi Parents!  Don't forget, tomorrow, 9-14-10 is picture day!  Also, this Friday, 9-17-10, we have an early dismissal.  The students will be dismissed at 12:50.  Your child's "book bag" came home today with a book and reading log in it.  Please have your child read for at least 10 minutes, and sign the reading log.  Also, Math Links 2-2 and 2-3 came home today with your child.  Thank you so much for looking over them and having your child complete them.  I appreciate all your support, and have a great evening!

Hi everyone!  Thank you so much to everybody who came to Open House Wednesday night.  Your support means so much!  Our short week felt like a full one because we had to squeeze in five days of first grade into four.  Yesterday in reading we took our spelling test and reading assessment on our story this week called "Ants".  Thank you so much for studying spelling words with your child at nights.  On Monday, I will send home a list of our spelling words for the week.  In math right now, we are reviewing and building upon skills from last year.  These skills include:  counting forwards and backwards by 1's, skip counting by 2's, 5's, and 10's, finding numbers that come before and after a number, and the usage of tally marks.  In science/art this week, we have been discussing seasons and the differences among them.  We painted beautiful paintings of a fall tree on Friday.  The kids really enjoyed using the water color paints. 

If you would like to volunteer to come in a work with a group of children sometime within the school year, the best times during our day would be:  Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays from 9:30 - 10:10 and Monday-Friday from 1:30 - 1:55.  Please let me know if you would like to volunteer and which day/time would be best for you. 

We use dry erase boards every day in math this year and are in desperate need of some black dry erase markers.  If you are ever out and about and think about it, please pick some up for us.  Thank you so much! 

On Monday, your child will be bringing home a book in a ziplock bag with a reading log.  Please make sure your child reads at least 10 minutes every night, and sign the reading log.  The kids will pick out their book to bring home on Monday.

On Thursday we began Unit 2 in Everyday Math.  I sent home the Everyday Math Home Link for Lesson 2.1 on that day.  Thank you for sending it back to school.  We did lesson 2.2 on Friday, but I didn't send home the Home Link for this lesson because it was the weekend.  When a Home Link comes home, please have your child complete it, and send it in the next day OR when the Home Link for the next lesson comes home with your child.  If you have any more questions about the Home Links, please let me know.

For snack purposes, there are 23 kids in our class.  Thank you so much, again for all your help and support!  Have a great weekend! 

Hi Parents!  It's been another great week of learning in our classroom.  In reading this week, we have been practicing more with short /a/ words.  We were also introduced to four new sight words: and, in, oh and yes.  Our story this week was called "Sam and the Bag", and we took our assessment on that as well as our spelling test yesterday.  We have been adding more math games to our day, and Thursday we had an "exploration" day where the kids got to explore new math manipulatives we will be using this year.  We have also been doing lots of "apple" activities in science this week.  Below are some pictures that were taken yesterday when we tasted some different products made from apples.  We had a good time graphing which type of apple product was our favorite.  Thank you so much for your support, and have a wonderful, long weekend!

Hi Parents!  There was a typo in a previous post, and the Open House on Wednesday, September 8th lasts from 5:30 - 7:00pm.  Thanks so much! 

A few important announcements to be aware of are: 

• September 6th ~ No school due to Labor Day Holiday
• September 8th ~ Open House 5:30 - 7:30pm
• September 14th ~ Picture Day

Hi Parents!  Lots of folks have been asking about the Everyday Math homelinks.  I am sorry for any confusion these may have caused you.  I'll do a better job to let you know where we are in our Everyday Math curriculum.  Tomorrow, Aug. 31st, we will be doing Lesson 1-9 that has to do with the calendar.  Please try not to work ahead in the packet, as we have not covered all the information in class yet.  Please return them to school as you finish each link.  Thank you!  Please let me know if you have anymore questions.

Hi parents!  Our classroom has been buzzing with busy first graders all week.  We have been reading lots of decodable readers, sounding out many words that contain the short /a/ sound, and practicing our sentence writing.  We took our first spelling test this morning as well as our first reading assessment on the Harcourt story this week entitled "The Hat".  We've been working on writing a variety of sentences using capitalization and end punctuation.  Also, we have been focusing on writing a complete sentence with a subject and a predicate.  In Everyday Math, we have been doing lots of activities using pattern block templates, pennies, dice, and our calendar.  We have been comparing numbers, as well as practicing making tally marks to represent numbers.  In social studies, we have been talking about and applying rules of the school and classroom.  We've also been discussing the imprtance of listening and how that keeps us safe and happy.  A September snack calendar came home with your child today, and I'll staple another one in their folders on September 1st.  They like coloring their dot on their snack calendars to let you know what kind of day they had.  :)  I will continue to go over their homework with them before sending it home in the afternoons.  I hope they are doing well at home with their work.  Remember, there will be no school on September 6th due to the Labor Day Holiday.  Have a magnificent weekend! 

Hi Folks!  Thank you so much for a wonderful start to our school year!  We have really been busy this week getting into the swing of things again.  I've been trying to do activities that will correlate with our daily schedule and routine.  We have been doing some review from last year with sight words, letters and sounds, and next week we'll start with our first spelling list along with the first theme in our Harcourt Trophies Reading.  We have done some art this week to help decorate our room some more and have reviewed some Everyday Math from last year as well.  If y'all want to look at any of the Grade Level Expectations and educational standards we will be covering in first grade, please go to www.eed.state.ak.us/tls/assessment/GLEHome.html  to check those out.  Thank you also for the pennies y'all have sent in.  Keep checking our class blog for upcoming pictures!  Have a great weekend!

Back to School

Welcome to a brand new school year!  I can't believe the summer is already over, and our little ones are going to be in first grade!  It seems like yesterday they were starting kindergarten.  This Tuesday, August 17th is our school-wide Back to School Picnic.  It begins at 11:30 and lasts until 1pm.  If your child rides the bus, y'all are more than welcome to come look at the buses before the picnic at 10:30.  The classroom will be open so please stop by and say, "Hello!"  Our new room will be Room 36.  It is right by the Music Room near the side entrance of the school.  The first day of school for the kiddos will be Wednesday, August 18th.  Our day begins at 7:50 and ends at 2:20.  I can't wait to see you all very soon!