Weekly News Oct 17-21

The boys and girls are REALLY looking forward to our field trip this week!  Prior to Wednesday we will discuss fire safety so we can ask great questions during our fire station tour!  At Heckrodt we will learn more about looking closely (like scientists) and this will have a great impact on our writing...I just know it!   Please be sure your child dresses for the weather on Wednesday, unless there is rain, we will be outdoors for the entire afternoon.  Also, unless you have ordered a lunch through Chartwells, please send your child with a lunch in a disposable bag. 


Important Dates and Reminders:
October 18th: Family Night 6-7pm
October 19th: Field Trip to Fire Station and Heckrodt
October 24th-26th Red Ribbon Week to celebrate drug and alcohol prevention

• Mon. Oct. 24th  Wear "Red, White, and Blue” …I Elect to be Drug Free!! 
• Tues. Oct. 25th  Wear “Active Wear/Sweats”…Stay active and be drug free!!
• Wed. Oct. 26th….District Wide Wear ”RED DAY”… Unite against drugs!!

October  27th-28th NO SCHOOL FOR STUDENTS

Here is what our week of learning will look like:

Reading:  Our work in storybooks has really gotten us ready to tackle the challenges of conventional reading!  This week we will wrap up the use of story books by acting our favorite stories out using puppets.  Performing these books will truly be a way for us to show off the many skills we have acquired while working with these books...a huge skill being comprehension of character feelings and actions.  We will also take some time as a class to write some predictable books that include sight words and repeated patterns...we will aim to make these books similar to the leveled books we will be reading soon!

Writing: Our writing like scientists unit is up and running and the kids are amazing me at the work they are doing!  This week we focused on choosing one fall artifact and observing and saying all we could about it and then showing what we learned with words and pictures!  All of the students are bravely attempting to write words on every page!!  This week we will focus on drawing zoomed in pictures, planning books with a partner, listening for more sounds in our words and beginning to write sentences!   

Math: This week we will wrap up our first math unit and will begin unit 2.  The goals of this unit are:  to continue strengthening our knowledge of 1-10 and number order and understand that numbers 6-10 are created composed of a 5 group and some extra ones.  Also to explore +1 and -1 relationships and how they impact the value of a number.

These are the math centers we will be working in this week and during some of our short week next week: 

1. Five Finder: One object of the unit is for students to quickly be able to identify a group of five objects. They will be searching for five groups in pictures, circling them, and writing and equation to match the picture.

2. Students will create a counting book with objects for numbers 6-10.
3. Students will be given a piece of paper with an equation at the bottom. They will trace their fingers on the page to match the equation.

4. Students will roll two dice with numbers 0-5 on them. They will show the numbers using tiles and then add or subtract using the tiles

Social Studies: We are continuing to work on our school helpers interviews and have written and illustrated 3 books together so far!  We have Mrs. Geoffrey (the health aide) and Mr. Tom (the custodian) left on our interview list yet :).

Word Work: Our new sight words for the next two weeks are: it, me we, here, can, we.  These are also listed on our homework calendar to help you keep track!  We will learn a variety of ways to do word sorts in the following weeks as well.  In the beginning of November students will move into differentiated word sorts to fit their individual letter sound and spelling needs; practicing whole group sorts for the next two weeks will build the routines for this work.