Phonics Instruction - Fundations

Today, I recorded our teacher helper for the day leading our Fundations warm up. Each day we do a drill sound/warm up before we start our lesson. The teacher helper gets to choose 5-7 letters to do the letter-keyword-sound. In this video you will notice that the teacher helper will state the letter-keyword-sound and all of the other students will then repeat the letter-keyword-sound. The teacher helper then leads our vowel extensions. The vowel extensions helps the students stretch out their vowel sounds. You have probably noticed the Fundations packets coming home in your child's take home folder. These packets will let you know what we are learning and are for you to use at home.  They are not required but do offer activities for your child to have a little extra phonics practice.

Enjoy! If at any time you have any questions, please let me know! :)

The Little House - Setting of a Story

This week we have been learning about the setting of a story. We learned that the setting of a story is where and when the story takes place. We have been practicing identifying the setting with various texts. Today they had the opportunity to draw the setting of the story The Little House written by Virginia Lee Burton. The setting changes throughout this particular story.  I stopped at various points throughout the story and the students drew the setting that they pictured in their minds while I was reading. Here are some of the students working hard on their piece of work. Please discuss the setting of stories you read together at home!

   

     

  

September Book Order

A huge "thank you" to all of the parents that submitted book orders for the month of September. We had so many book orders that we were able to add about 50 new books to the classroom library. The kiddos and I are excited to read the new books. Here are all of our free books that are being added to our classroom library! Thank you again!

Fuel Up to Play 60

Last Friday, we had our Fuel Up to Play 60 event at school. We learned about healthy eating and we got to try some new food like jicama, tomatoes, and grapes. After learning about these foods, we had a lot of fun dancing and participating in many other activities. We also made a pledge to stay active for at least 60 minutes a day. Check out the photos below from this awesome event!

Power Towers

Today we had a lot of fun learning how to play Power Towers. You can easily make this game at home. You will need some small cups and a sharpie marker. On each plastic cup is a math addition or subtraction equation. The students take turns pulling out a cup, say and answer the equation, then stack the cup. In the classroom, when the students are done stacking all of the cups, they then take turns taking a cup off of the Power Tower. They must say and answer the equation and then they get to keep the cup in front of them.

Math Mountains

We have been learning a lot about partner numbers of 6-10. Today we decided to take a little different approach to our learning and use some manipulative a to discover the partner numbers of 9. The students loved using the red/yellow chips along with their math boards to make math mountains and explore their partner numbers. We found all of the partner numbers of 9 along with their switch partner numbers (what we have been referring to as the "flip flop" partner). 

Writers' Workshop

This week we began Writers' Workshop! During the first trimester, we will be learning about Small Moment (narrative) writing. We will be working on choosing a small moment (a thing that happened to us or a thing that we have done) and writing all about it. We will also work on using capital letters and punctuation in our writing. Today, the students chose a small moment from their life to write about. Some of the topics were the following: holding a baby alligator at a zoo, falling down and getting hurt, and going down a water slide at a water park. The first graders worked really hard on their writing and I look forward to reading the pieces of writing that they create this trimester.