Week of October 20th

     Last week we enjoyed our time with George Steele. He taught us about mammals in New York State and turned our classroom into a museum. We also met with our first grade buddies and helped them make Halloween puppets. Mr. Jones was our Mystery Reader this week. Please see the following post for some photos from last week!

          This week we have our last conference day on Monday and school picture day on Wednesday. Our picture time is 11:30 am on Wednesday. I have enjoyed speaking with you about your child. Please know that we are not limited to parent conference days to speak about progress, concerns or successes. I am always just an email or phone call away!

Reading

     We are working on identifying character traits and using textual evidence to support our thinking. We are using The Tale of Despereaux as a class study text. It is a wonderful, rich text by a fantastic author. If you are looking to read a book as a family (after Humphrey) I highly suggest any book by Kate DiCamillo. This week we will analyze the characters' dialog and actions to infer character traits that are less obvious. 

Writing

     We have begun drafting our personal narratives. Our focus has been on staying in our storyteller's voice and using rich descriptive language while writing. We are also learning the parts of a paragraph and we are trying to use paragraphs in our writing.

Math

     We have finished our unit on estimation, addition properties, and subtraction meanings. The students will bring home their math notebooks tomorrow for you to peruse. They will have a unit test on Tuesday. Then we will move on to subtraction with regrouping. Please continue to practice math facts at home. 

Science

     Our plants have grown and grown! This week we will learn the parts of a bee and the role a bee plays in pollination. As I told the class, we will be pollinating with real bees. I promise to include photos of this next week (don't worry there is NO danger of being stung :)! We will also learn the parts of a flower and the role the parts play in the pollination process. 

Some odds and ends...

    On Thursday the class will have a cumulative spelling quiz from the first four weeks. They do not have to write sentences to go with the words. The class has learned how to use the dictionary and the students will be defining their words for unit 5. I am hoping this will help the students use their words in more complex sentences for spelling quizzes. 

     

   

Fun from last week!

Thank you to Mr. George Steele!

Working with our first grade buddies!

Thank you to our Mystery Readers, Mrs. Ko and Mr. Jones!

Monday, October 14th

To say last week was busy would be a huge understatement. We had a visit from an Olympic luge athlete, Aiden Kelly, a visit from the Elsmere Fire Department, a presentation about farming from 4-H and Friday was a half day of instruction for parent conferences. This week will be just as busy! We will have a visit from George Steele. He is an amazing teacher and naturalist. He will teach our class about mammals at 2pm on Thursday. Feel free to drop in and join our class. I learned quite a bit from him last year!

Enjoy some photos from our fun last week!