Tomorrow is a dress down day.

First grade has math homework tonight.

Our classroom is full of elves!

A little preview of tomorrow's concert.  :)

If you can't get this video to play in the e-mail you're sent when a blog post is written, try the blog website.  The website is ressullivan.blogspot.com

Info from Mrs. Fritz -

Dear parents,

I wanted to send you a few last minute details about tomorrow night's Christmas Concert.  

The concert begins at 6:30 pm in the church.

All students are asked to report to their homeroom no later than 6:15 pm.  Attendance will be taken, students will line up in concert order and be escorted to church by their homeroom teacher at 6:25 pm.

Following their performances, Early Childhood and Kindergarten parents will be invited to come up to the altar and bring their students back to their family seats for the remainder of the concert.  All other students will sit with their class until the end of the concert. 

 Concert Dress for all students:

- NO JEANS

- Guys:acceptable clothing includes dress pants, khakis, dress shirt, tie, vest, button down shirts, blazer, sweater, dress shoes, school shoes

- Girls: acceptable clothing includes dresses (no spaghetti straps) to the knee, skirts to the knee, tights, pants, leggings, sweaters, button down shirts, dress pants, open or closed toed shoes/boots

*** Band students may have been told what concert dress should be from Ms. Mongin.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me. 

The students and I are looking forward to a great concert tomorrow night!  See you there.

Sincerely,

Abby Fritz

Weekly Spelling Lists-

First Grade Phonetic List- Suffix -ing

doing

going

seeing

feeding

feeling

keeping

mowing

packing

bending

picking

***All first graders are on the phonetic list this week.

Second Grade Phonetic List- Long i(y, i-consonant-e)

try

mile

cry

fry

nice

by

sky

fine

dry

prize

Second Grade High-Frequency List - Words 301-310

living

black

eat

short

United States

run

book

gave

order

open

Today we made cards for a little girl named Safyre Terry.  Maybe you've heard this story...it's been on the news and in social media recently.  (Google her name and you'll see many stories.)

Safyre is a little girl who lives in New York.  In 2013 her whole family died in a fire - she's the only survivor.  She was badly injured, but she survived.  She now lives with her aunt and uncle.  Safyre is now 8 years old.  Her wish for Christmas was to receive Christmas cards.  So, we made our cards and sent them off to her today.  :)

This week one of our science lessons was testing to see which of our 20 solids would roll.  We tested them out by trying to roll them across our tables.  Then we built ramps and used straws to help us as well.  Here are a few pictures -

Today is a Packer Dress Down Day.

A few FYIs-

First Grade Math- We have started unit 5.  We are working on teen problems.  We have been working on word problems, as well as matching equations and equation pictures.

First Grade Phonics- We are working on the glued sounds ang, ing, ong, ung, ank, ink, onk, and unk.

Science- We have a new Einstein kit called Solids and Liquids.  So far we have done experiments with solids on these properties- color, shape, rolling, and stacking.

Religion- We have been preparing for our Mass on December 17.  Speaking of our Mass, on that day I ask that you do not sit with us.  Our students are in a specific order.  Any other day, please feel free to sit with us.

Writing- The students are creating great stories in writers workshop.  Our second graders have been a great help in teaching the first graders the writing process.  Yesterday they wrote letters to Santa.  

First grade has math homework tonight.

An update for second grade families from Mrs. Van Zeeland -

Second Grade Math and Phonics:

We just finished Unit 6 in Math where we worked on time,  picture graphs and line graphs.  We made graphs on our favorite puppies and kittens.  We had an apple tasting contest and then made a graph to show which ones we liked the best.  Our two favorites were Red Delicious and Granny Smith.  Our least favorites were MacIntosh and Golden Delicious.  Golden Delicious was too "squishy"!  

We are inching closer to finishing our second grade books.  We are starting Unit 7 today where we will be learning to add 3 digit numbers to over 1,000!  There is only one unit after unit 7!  Thank you for helping and reminding your child to practice math facts.  We always test on Thursdays!  

In phonics, we have been working with different ways to spell long vowel sounds and y at the end of words.  We have learned 17 different suffixes so far.  

This year seems to be flying by.  This is such a great class - so much fun to work with!!

Mass Parts
Greeters - Maxim, Rowen, Max, Kyan
Cross - Katey
Book - Ella
Introduction - Madison
First Reading - Cullan, Monika
Responsorial Psalm - Jonas, Claire
Petitions - Gabriel, Clara, Kate, Landon, Jonah, Anna Meyer, Mario
Bread - Ryan
Wine - Anna Miller

Mass parts went home today.  If your child has a reading part please practice with them at home.

***We will be having Mass tomorrow instead of Thursday this week.

***This Thursday grades 1-4 will be going to NDA's Christmas play.  Permission slips are going home today.  Please return ASAP.  Thank you.

***Weekly Spelling Lists -

First Grade - Phonetic List - Suffix s

bugs

cats

pigs

sits

runs

gets

cards

chips

twins

pumps

First Grade - High-Frequency List - Words 91-100

long

little

very

after

words

called

just

where

most

know

Second Grade - Phonetic List - Long e Words (ee, ea)

sea

week

eat

beef

neat

need

seat

seem

read

seen

Second Grade - High-Frequency List - Words 291-300

face

door

cut

done

group

true

half

red

fish

plants

***We have Mass on December 17th.  We are picking parts this afternoon.  After the parts are assigned I will let you know who has which parts.

I just found out...Tomorrow is a Packer Dress Down Day!

She's back!  For our first grade families - she is our classroom elf!  Her name is Samantha Snowbell!  She returned today from the North Pole!  The second graders  were very excited to see her again and the first graders were very excited to meet her!

Last week Wednesday St. Matts spent the day with us.  Here's one of the projects that we did - the students had to write something on a leaf that they were thankful for.

Weekly Spelling Lists -

First Grade - Phonetic List - Unit 17 - st Blends
best
rest
fast
must
step
still
post
stir
rust
stiff

First Grade - High-Frequency List - Words 81-90
made
over
did
down
only
way
find
use
may
water

Second Grade - Phonetic List - Long a (a-consonant-e, ai, ay)
safe
day
rain
play
ate
stay
save
wait
game
space

Second Grade - High-Frequency List - Words 281-290
didn't
car
morning
I'm
body
upon
family
later
turn
move

If you cannot view the video open it from our blog website.  The website is ressullivan.blogspot.com. I tried it from there and it worked.  :)

Today we were making Advent wreaths.  The students started singing Christmas songs - on their own - not prompted by me at all.  It was so beautiful!  I had to take a video.  Here it is...Enjoy!

First grade has math homework tonight.

Happy Thanksgiving!

A Few FYIs -

First Grade Math - We have been working on place value.  They have been learning about ones and tens using "sticks and circles" for drawings.  We have also used ten sticks.  We are using our math boards to learn methods to add two digit and one digit numbers together.  Today we learned about the symbols for greater than and less than.  (> and <)  The first graders are also learning how to tell time.  Time isn't until the second half of our book and I figured they could do it - and boy are they!  We started with :00 and :30.  Now most of the first graders can even tell time to the :05 - some kids even to the minute!  Also - continue to practice those math facts!

First Grade Phonics - The first graders are learning about basewords and suffix s.  Today we also had a discussion about punctuation while reading our phonics story.  We learned about quotation marks and apostrophes when words are contraction words.

Reading - We have Daily 5 every day.  Each of our groups is working on different things - depending on their reading level.  When not in group, the students are in Daily 5 centers.  This week our writing center has the students making turkeys and writing on them things that they are thankful for.  Our word work center has them making words out of the letters in Thanksgiving, working on Thanksgiving activities such as a word search and a word mix-up, completing a November calendar, and practicing spelling words, among other things.  I downloaded a new app for listening called Epic.  The students love it!

Science - We are getting close to the end of our weather unit - and our solids and liquids Einstein kit arrived this week...so we'll need to start that soon.  This week in science we learned about the water cycle.  We are currently in the middle of an experiment with a puddle.  We have a puddle in a pie tin.  We're recording what it looks like every day.  We're checking to see how long it takes to completely evaporate.  Today we had a lesson about rainy day fabrics.  We tested four fabrics to see which would be the best to wear on a rainy day.  We tested cotton, cotton-polyester, wool, and nylon.  We found out the nylon would be the best out of those four fabrics.

Handwriting - We continue to work on our handwriting skills - writing the letters in the correct places and forming the letters the correct way.  The second graders are super excited because this week we started cursive.   So far they have learned the lower case i and the lower case t.  They are finding out it's a little harder than it looks.  :)

Writing - We are fortunate to have two fantastic grandma helpers.  Mrs. Johnson and Mrs. Kelly have been volunteering in our classroom for years!  They just returned about four weeks ago.  So far when they have been here the writing assignments have been pumpkins stories, Halloween stories, turkey stories, etc.  This week, for the first time, we used our writer's workshop notebooks.  Writer's workshop is the writing process.  The steps are -
1.  Make a web
2.  Write the rough draft
3.  Edit the story
4.  Rewrite the story with corrections
5.  Publish  (Have your story typed, bound, and then you illustrate)

This is a big process!  The second graders are the experts since they worked on this last year as well.  Since yesterday was the first time for the first graders, they were paired up with a second grade helper.  The outcome - amazing!  The second graders were such great helpers for the first graders.  I had to snap a few pics of the kids working together.

At the end of writer's workshop we always share what we worked on.  All of the partners went up to share together.  It was beautiful.  Then, Monika shared.  She worked with our Grandma helper Mrs. Kelly and she asked Mrs. Kelly to sit with her when she shared.  It was so cute.

Reminder - Tomorrow is a Res Spirit Dress Down Day.

Have a great night!

Tomorrow is a Res Spirit Dress Down Day.

First grade has math homework tonight.

Weekly Spelling Lists

First Grade - Phonetic List - Beginning Blends
crab
spin
skip
frog
plum
slam
grab
flip
snap
plus

First Grade - High-Frequency List - Words 71-80
no
make
than
first
been
its
who
now
people
my

Second Grade - Phonetic List - Vowel - Consonant - e
cute
wave
robe
late
mule
tape
joke
fire
base
broke

Second Grade - High-Frequency List - Words 271-280
learn
point
city
play
toward
five
himself
usually
money
seen

Second grade has phonics homework tonight.

Tomorrow is a Packer Dress Down Day!

One of my favorite art projects - Handprint and footprint turkeys.  :)

The first graders have math homework tonight.  They need to finish the back side of a sheet we were working on during class today when we had a fire drill.  :)  The sheet is class activity 4-6.  The sheet is working on doubles, doubles plus one, doubles minus one, doubles plus two, and doubles minus two.  See if they can explain that to you.  :)

Look at this beautiful flag we made out of our hand prints - 

Weekly Spelling Lists -

This week - crazy - all of the first graders are on one list and all of the second graders are on one list.

In first grade the list we worked on was different from all of the lists we've had so far.  It is called - Words Writers Use.  It's common sight words that we use in stories.  They are simple to read, but not as simple to spell.  It's actually a great list to work on for helping the first graders write.

In second grade, all of the words in the list today ended with nk and ng.  The second graders recognized that all of the words were glued sounds - and that is what they are working on in phonics!  All of the second graders will be doing the high frequency list this week.

First Grade - Unit 14 - Words Writers Use
the
I
to
of
was
are
ago
easy
goes
only

Second Grade - High Frequency List - Words 261-270
example
heard
several
change
answer
room
sea
against
top
turned



Today Steve Beylon from Channel 2 came to talk to our class about weather and being a meteorologist.  We took a group picture and he's going to put it on the news on Wednesday morning.  It will be on Action 2 New This Morning at 4:55 am, 5:25 am, 5:55 am, and 6:25 am.  Here are a few pictures from today -

We ended the presentation with some cupcakes I made.  Thank you Pinterest!

First Grade Math - We finished up our unit on word problems.  :)  Now we are working on place value - ones and tens.  We have been using our boards (they have hundreds charts on them) to make numbers using ten sticks and circles.  The first graders have also been doing a great job on practicing their math facts!  A fun game we have been playing is shut the box.  It's great for adding and figuring out partners.  They love it!

First Grade Phonics - We are starting to learn about glued sounds.  Glued sounds are letters that are "glued together" to make a word family.  We learned about the glued sounds -all, -am, and -an.

Science - We are plugging away in our weather unit.  We continue to record the cloud cover, precipitation, and wind daily, as well as the temperature.  Today we had a lesson on if the color of clothing plays a role in how warm you feel.  We learned that black (and dark colors) absorb the sun and will make you feel warmer and that white (and light colors) reflect the sun.  Monday Steve Beylon from Channel 2 will be visiting our class.

Writing - This week in writer's workshop we worked on "Thankful Turkeys"  The students had to write on turkey feathers things they are thankful for.

Handwriting - We continue to work in our handwriting books.  Our goals are always to form the letters the correct way and put them in the correct spaces. 

Reading - Every day we work in reading groups and in Daily 5.  This week in word work the students are putting together a Thanksgiving poem.  This week we did learn three Thanksgiving poems.  We also made a Thanksgiving book.  

Religion - Last week in Religion we went through a chapter on Mary.  This week we went through a chapter on Jesus and the Holy Family.  We have been practicing the Hail Mary and the Our Father with some fun activities I created on the SMART Board.  We also work on our Promises Papers every week.  This week we learned about saints.

Read-Aloud - We are reading Junie B. Jones - First Grader - Turkeys We have Loved and Eaten (And Other Thankful Stuff).

***Tomorrow is going to be a green and blue dress down day.***

First grade and second grade have math homework tonight.  Some students did finish it at school.

***Diary of a Wimpy Kid - Old School

Someone from our class pre-ordered the book Diary of a Wimpy Kid - Old School with the last book order.  The book came today - but it doesn't tell me who ordered it.  If you ordered it, please let me know.

Thank you!

Weekly Spelling Lists -

First Grade - Phonetic List - Short u Words
bus
cut
nut
bug
run
tug
snug
bump
drum
plug

First Grade - High-Frequency List - Words 61-70
into
has
more
her
two
like
him
see
time
could

Second Grade - Phonetic List - Consonant Clusters (Blends)
flat
glass
plant
dress
front
bring
glad
cliff
grand
cluck

Second Grade - High-Frequency List - Words 251-260
sure
knew
it's
try
told
young
sun
thing
whole
hear



***Halloween***
Thank you so much to Kristin Warden, Julie Van Pay, and Katie Skurka for planning our Halloween party.  The kids had a blast!  Thank you, also, to everyone who sent a treat.  That was very kind!

Here are a few pictures from last Thursday -

Reminder- The students are to wear their uniforms to school.  They may bring their Halloween costumes.  They will be changing into their costumes after Mass and gym.

First grade has math homework tonight.

*We will not have a spelling list this week.

*Thursday the students may bring their costumes to change into after Mass.

*We will have our Halloween party on Thursday morning at 10:00.

*Our class won the Mind Marathon pizza party.  We will be having pizza on Thursday at 11:00.

*Thursday is an early dismissal - 11:30.

Second Grade Math

We have been spending a lot of time lately on ungrouping in subtraction.  This is the same system most of us learned in second grade except they called it regrouping or borrowing.  Student progress has been great, and though sometimes we forget a step, we are getting better.  You may notice that sometimes papers have two scores on them.  I believe that seatwork is a learning process, and I want the kids to correct their answers to find out where their mistakes are.  I like to have them make corrections in the room so I can give them immediate help.  I record their new scores with corrections made.  

In math facts, we have about 6 kids that are two levels away from starting multiplication. That's awesome.  We test facts every Thursday so if your child can not find their facts sheet, you can email me for a new one. I give the students 4 minutes, but they generally finish before then.  

Second Grade Phonics

Our focus right now is suffixes - es, ed, est, en, s, less, ment, ing, er, ish, able, ful, and ness.  Learning base words and adding suffixes is actually a good way to learn to spell correctly.   First we write our base word, and then we add our suffix. This is especially helpful in knowing if the suffix is s or es. We are also learning how to divide words into syllables.  These longer words can sometimes be intimidating for less confident readers, but when we isolate words into smaller parts,it helps to be able to able to decode them as well as spell them. 

Art Update - Grades 1 and 2 are doing an excellent job in STREAM working on the mosaic birdbaths. One is almost complete. In class we are working on our designs for other birdbaths. The kids have great ideas. The challenge for them is to transfer their idea and drawing into a tile design. They are doing a great job! I'm really proud of them.

Tomorrow is going to be a Spirit Dress Down Day.  The students may wear anything that has Res on it or our school colors - green and white.


Also - Today we read the story Scary Party by Sue Hendra.  Then we divided ourselves into the parts of the book and acted out the story.  Here's a cute picture!

After that we listened to some fun Halloween music!  I found out their favorites are The Monster Mash, Purple People Eater, and Ghostbusters.  :)

First grade has math homework tonight.

Tomorrow is the Diocesan Mass at the Resch Center.
Everyone needs to either bring a bag lunch or you indicated that  your child would have a lunch (turkey and cheese sandwich) from the hot lunch program.

The list of students that I have that is taking the lunch from the hot lunch program is Cullan, Ella, Katey, Landon, Misha, Madison, Gabriel, Monika, and Clara.

If your child is bringing a lunch, there are a few guidelines - All lunches must be in a consumable bag (brown bag lunch).  Everything that is in their lunch must be consumable - plastic silverware, baggies, etc.  We will not be bringing the lunches back with us to school...so no lunch boxes, tupperware, silverware, etc.  Also - no soda is allowed.  I'll put all of the lunches together in a bag and pass them out at lunch time.

Weekly Spelling Lists

First Grade - Phonetic List - Short o Words
box
fox
top
job
not
hop
trot
spot
chop
frog

First Grade - High Frequency List - Words 51-60
out
them
then
she
many
some
so
these
would
other

Second Grade - Phonetic List - Short u Words
just
hunt
club
drum
jump
dust
bump
until
ugly
sunny

Second Grade - High-Frequency List - Words 241-250
paper
hard
near
sentence
better
best
across
during
today
however



*Writer's Workshop -
Today I sent home a sheet of paper called an interest inventory.  Please fill this out at home and return it to school.  I will glue these sheets into the back of the writer's workshop notebooks.  This can help the students out when they can't think of what to write about.  :)

Reminder - Tomorrow is a Packer Dress Down Day and the Mind Marathon!

First Grade Math - This week we finished unit 2 and we are now moving on to unit 3.  We are working on finding the missing partner in the equation.  We are doing this by using math mountains, circle drawings, and writing out the equations both horizontally and vertically.

First Grade Phonics - This week we finished unit 3 and we are now moving on to unit 4.  Unit 3 focused on digraphs.  We even made some cute digraph spiders.  :)  Starting today we will be learning about bonus letters.  Bonus letters are the letter f, l, and s.  When word is one syllable, has a short vowel, and it ends with f, l, or s, usually you double the final letter.  (Ex. mass, cuff, ball)

Reading - We are now into our second week of Daily 5 and reading groups.  It is going great!  Right now we currently have four different reading groups.  I meet with each group at least every other day. When the students are not with me, they are in their Daily 5 centers - Read to Self, Read to Someone, Work on Writing, Word Work, and Listening.  They may also work on Odyssey at this time.  The Word Work focus changes every two weeks.  Currently we have Halloween Word Work.  We learned some Halloween poems.  The students are putting the poems in order on note cards or they are filling in the missing words in a cloze activity.  Next week Word Work will also include making a Halloween book.  During the Halloween season, I've also added Halloween sticker stories to Work on Writing.  The students may choose up to 5 Halloween stickers and use them with an illustration.  Then they write a story about their picture.  This has been a popular center.

Writing - We have been writing in our journals.  Next week we will also be doing a pumpkin story and art project.  The following week we will be starting writer's workshop.

Handwriting - We are plugging away in our books.  Each time we have handwriting the first graders work on one letter and the second graders work on two.  The focus is always to have the students form the letters the correct way and put the letters in the correct spaces.

Religion - This week we finished chapter 3 in our book.  The first three chapters all dealt with creation.  We have been making these beautiful creation books.  We are almost done.  Each week we also read a Promise Paper.  The Promise Papers go through the weekly Gospel and then there are activities that focus on the Gospel message.  On Fridays Ms. McAllister has been coming into our classroom to share a Religion lesson with us.  She has been teaching the students about the Bible and Pope Francis.

Science - In science we are learning about weather.  This week we had a lesson where we had two different water temperatures - hot and cold.  We put thermometers in each bowl and read the thermometers.  The students loved watching the mercury go up and down quickly as they switched which bowl the thermometer was in.

Mass - We were scheduled to have the Mass on October 22,  Due to the Diocesan Mass on October 21, we are not going to have Mass at Res on the 22nd.  Our next Mass will now be on December 17.

Art - We continue work on our STREAM mosaic bird baths. Kids are doing great so far on this project. We also read a book called, ART. This is a story about a boy named ART who loves ART, and uses all different types of lines to create his ART. At the end of the story his mom hangs his ART on the refrig because she loves ART. We practiced a variety of these lines on large paper and will be using this paper for the background of another project at a later time. We will be looking at master art work to see how artists use lines in their ART.


Gym - We are working on racquet skills with high bounce foam balls.  Occasionally, they will be also working on upper body strength with scooters.

First grade has math homework tonight.

Thank you to Katie Skurka, Julie Van Pay, and Kristin Warden.   They have volunteered to be our room parents.  :)

Room Parents -

This year something happened and room parents were never assigned.  The room parents help out with planning parties, organizing class auction items, things like that.  Halloween is coming up and the kids would like to have a little celebration.  :)  If anyone is interested in taking this on, please let me know.

Thank you!

Weekly Spelling Lists

First Grade Phonetic List - Short i Words
sit
his
in
tip
wig
if
him
did
pin
zip

First Grade High-Frequency List - Words 41-50
which
their
said
if
do
will
each
about
how
up

Second Grade Phonetic List - Short o Words
stop
pond
spot
cot
fog
nod
block
body
doll
popcorn

Second Grade High-Frequency List - Words 231-240
night
picture
being
study
second
soon
story
since
white
ever

First Grade Math Facts -

Today the students will be coming home with math facts to practice at home.
Each Thursday we will have a little quiz on the facts they are practicing at home.  The students will have three minutes to complete their facts.  If they score 80% or higher, they'll move on to the next set of facts.

First grade has math homework tonight.

Pajama Day!

Don't forget - Pajama Day tomorrow.

Weekly Spelling Lists

First Grade - Phonetic List - Short e Words
let
pen
met
bed
yes
leg
fed
vest
mend
mess

First Grade - High-Frequency List - Words 31-40
but
what
all
were
when
we
there
can
an
your

Second Grade - Phonetic List - Short i Words
hit
fill
will
wind
miss
milk
win
fish
little
kitten

Second Grade - High-Frequency List - Words 221-230
need
far
hand
high
year
mother
light
country
father
let


***PBIS***

PBIS - We call it Positive Behavior In School.  :)

At Res when the students get caught doing something good they can earn a Faith Shield.  We have two types of rewards that the students may earn with their Faith Shields.  The students may put them in the whole school bucket or the class bucket.

If they put them in the whole school bucket, they are brought up at Mass on Thursday.  On Monday all of the school's Faith Shields go into one bucket.  Then the students have a chance to win something if their name is picked.  They can win things like sitting in the principal's chair for the day, extra recess time, a pizza party for you and a friend, an ice cream party for you and a friend, etc.

If they put them in the class bucket, they go towards a reward that the class has agreed on.  The reward our class wanted (and Mrs. Franz approved) was a movie and pajama day.  To earn our class reward, the students need to collect 400 Faith Shields.  Well, last week we had a PBIS assembly.  Each of the students earned 16 Faith Shields.  Most of them went into our class bucket.  We have already reached the 400 mark!  So...

The students will have a pajama day this week Wednesday.  They may wear their pajamas to school. They asked if they could also bring a stuffed animal if they wanted to and I told them they could. We just finished reading the book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory today so that is the movie that we will watch on Wednesday.

Mass Schedule

This year first and second grade will be leading mass on -
October 22
December 17
February 18
May 5  (May Crowning - 2nd grade)


First Communion

Second Grade Parents -
Just a heads up - First Communion classes will begin in April.  To sign your child up for First Communion, you need to visit the Resurrection Parish website.

A few updates -

Reading - Daily 5 is going great!  The students are building their stamina!  Almost everyone has done running records - we are just about ready to start groups.  We will most likely start with groups next week mid-week.

First grade math - We have been learning different strategies for adding.  Today we started subtraction.  We are learning how to make circle drawings to figure out subtraction stories.

First grade phonics - We are learning about digraphs.  The digraphs we use are sh, ch, wh, th, and ck.  Today we also played a word family game similar to Uno.  They had a blast!

Spelling - Tomorrow we have our first test!

Science - We are working on our weather Einstein kit.  This week we spent a lot of time working with thermometers.  Since September ended we also made a graph of the cloud cover, precipitation, and wind that we had recorded for the month.  I heard back from Mr. Steve Beylon from channel 2.  He will be visiting with our classroom on Monday, November 9th.

Religion - This week we learned about different items, places, etc. that are in our church.  We then spent two Religion periods in our church going on a tour.



***Second grade has phonics homework tonight***

ART

This week we discussed a painting by Carmen Garza called Birthday BBQ. She is a Mexican American artist that loves to depict scenes of family life and family celebrations. This painting has lots of detail telling the story of an extended family enjoying a backyard BBQ birthday party. Some characters are grilling, swinging at the pinata, caring for children, serving food, visiting with relatives, and sitting by the bonfire. We focused our discussion on how art can tell a story. After the discussion, students illustrated their own story of something fun they did as a family this past summer.

First grade has math homework for the first time tonight.

Spelling City -
Today I introduced Spelling City to the first graders.  (The second graders already know how to do this.)  Spelling City can be used as an app or a website.  (www.spellingcity.com)  All of our spelling lists are on Spelling City.  This is just another way for them to practice their spelling words.

On the website -
  1.  Type in www.spellingcity.com.
  2.  Go to the search tab.
  3.  Type in Jodi Sullivan.
  4.  Find Jodi Sullivan from Resurrection Catholic School and click on it.
  5.  This will bring you to our page.  Now you need to find your child's list.
       (This week it's either short a words, words 21-30, second grade short e words, or second grade
         211-220).
  6.  Click on play a game.
  7.  The students can do any of the free activities.

On the app -
  1.  Click on the app.
  2.  Click on more lists.
  3.  Search by teacher name.  Type Jodi Sullivan.
  4.  Find Jodi Sullivan from Resurrection Catholic School and click on it.
  5.  This will bring you to our page.  Now you need to find your child's list.
       (This week it's either short a words, words 21-30, second grade short e words, or second grade
         211-220).
  6.  The students can now select an activity.

Spelling -

Today we had our first spelling pre-test.  Here's how spelling works.  On Mondays the kids get a pre-test.  The pre-test is always a phonetic list.  It's 10 words.  If they get 9/10 or higher on the pre-test, I move them to a high-frequency list.  This high-frequency words (also called sight words or trick words) come from the Rebecca Sitton spelling program.  It's a list of 500 of the most frequently used words.  The first graders will start at the beginning of the Rebecca Sitton list.  (Actually it's the third list - the first two are pretty easy.)  The second graders will start where they left off at the end of first grade.  Throughout the week at home the students are to practice the words that they come home with on Monday.  The students may practice their words during Daily 5 too, but not everyone will make that choice every day.  On Fridays the students will be tested on the words they studied all week.

This week's spelling words are...

First Grade Phonetic List - short a words
an
can
man
ran
had
dad
ant
lap
tag
pants

First Grade High-Frequency List - Words 21-30
be
this
from
I
have
or
by
one
had
not

Second Grade Phonetic List - short e words
send
bell
well
help
fell
went
spell
next
best
sketch

Second Grade High-Frequency List - Words 211-220
four
head
above
kind
began
almost
live
page
got
earth

Reminder - Tomorrow is picture day.  It is a dress up day.😊

Tomorrow is a Packer Dress Down Day!!!  

First Grade Math - The first unit is a review of things learned in kindergarten.  We have been working on partners and switch partners up to 10.  Today we took our first unit test.  Tomorrow we will start unit 2.

First Grade Phonics - This week we continued working on tapping our c-v-c words.  We are starting to get trick words and words of the day.  As we get these words, we write them out on the dry erase board and write them in our student notebooks.  (The trick words are sight words - words you can not tap out.  Word of the day cards are words that follow whatever our unit is about.  So far our trick words are a, the, and, is, his, and of.  Our word of the day cards are fix and quit.)  This week we also wrote our sentences on letter tiles, found our trick words, and reviewed scooping sentences.  (Scooping sentences deals with fluency - how words flow in a sentence.)  We are also working on dictation.  Dictation is me saying a sound, a letter, a word, etc. and the students writing down what they think it is.

Writing - We are continuing to write in our journals.

Science - This week in science we learned about being a meteorologist.  I also contacted Steve Beylon, a meteorologist from channel 2.  We are working on a date for him to come on into our class for a weather talk.  :)  We talked about how to remember what the weather was like and recording weather.  Then I showed the students a calendar I made on the SMART Board.  Each day we are recording three things - cloud cover, precipitation, and wind.  The last lesson we had this week was about wind.  We learned that the instrument a meteorologist uses to measure wind speed is called an anemometer.  We also learned about the Beaufort Scale - a scale for 0 to 12 that describes wind speed.

Reading - We are continuing to dive into the Daily 5.  Remember, this takes time...a lot of time. :)  This week we worked on listening, work on writing, and tomorrow - word work.  We have practiced each component separately.  Next week we will have rounds of Daily 5 where they will rotate between all of the Daily 5.  We will practice and practice!  Reading groups can't begin until we get this perfect!  We are building our stamina!

Handwriting - We are continuing to work on letters.  Our goal - form letters correctly, write them in the correct spaces, and write letters neatly.

Religion - We are still working on our Creation books!  They are absolutely beautiful!  We have also been reading out of our Children's Bibles.  The students are learning how to look up verses in the Bibles.

Read - Aloud - We are reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.  Just yesterday, Charlie found a golden ticket!  It was fun to listen to the squeals of excitement when that happened.  :)

Reminder - The Spirituality of Change Workshop is on Sunday, September 27th.

A note to the second graders from Mrs. Van Zeeland -

We are off to a great start in second grade math and phonics.  In math, we have practiced counting money and writing it with dollar signs instead of cent signs.  We are telling time to the minute and learning different ways to say the time, such as 10 minutes after 6 instead of6:10. 

 One thing we are starting early this year is learning math facts.  Every child in second grade has math facts to practice during the week. Thursday is our testing day.  I time them for 3 minutes and their goal is to get an 80% or better before moving to the next sheet.  Everyone works at their own pace.  Right now all are in "green" facts.  After the first timed test, some will move up and some will stay in green. At this time, we are all in addition and subtraction.  The last 6 levels are multiplication.  Please ask your child to show you their practice sheets.  They are covered in plastic and can be written on with a dry-erase marker.  Thanks for your help with this.  We will start timed tests next week.  

In phonics, we are reviewing our sounds from last year.  I am impressed by how much they remembered from last year.  Today is our first unit test.  Corrected tests should be coming home on Friday!

A few FYIs...

MAP Testing - 1st grade takes 2 tests - math and reading.  2nd grade takes 3 tests - math, reading, and language.  The math test is tomorrow, the reading test is next Tuesday, and the language test is on Thursday.

Sprituality of Change Workshop

Sunday, September 27^th the Res and St. Matt’s communities will be hosting a workshop called The Spirituality of Change.  Judy Turba, Mary-Beth Friday, and teachers from Res/St. Matt’s will be presenting.  The workshop will be at St. Norbert Abbey from 1:00-4:00.  All family members are encouraged to attend.  The workshop will begin with everyone gathered together.  We will then break out into small groups – adults, K-2, 3-5, and middle school.  The workshop will conclude with all attendees back together for a Mass beginning at 3:00.  Please join us!

The first week of school has been wonderful!  Here are a few updates...

First Grade Math - The students are reviewing the concepts they learned in kindergarten...and expanding a little bit - math mountains, tiny tumblers, partners, switch partners, and break aparts.

First Grade Phonics - We reviewed all of the letters, keywords, and their sounds.  We took a test on all of the letter sounds.  We reviewed tapping out c-v-c words.

(First grade stays in our room for math and phonics.  Second grade goes to Mrs. Van Zeeland.  When Mrs. Van Zeeland gives me updates for second grade I will post those on the blog as well.)

Writing - We have started writing in our journals.  It is so cool to watch the second graders become the olders!  They have been such a great help to the first graders with spelling words in their journals!

Reading - We are starting the Daily 5 process.  Daily 5 consists of read to self, read to someone, listening, work on writing, word work, and meet with teacher.  To make Daily 5 successful, you need to do A LOT of practicing...A LOT!  :)  Each day we pick one of the concepts and work just on that concept.  So far we have gone in depth with read to self and read to someone.  We made charts of each of them, learned about each bullet point, and practiced, practiced, practiced!  By practicing, we are building our stamina.

Science - We are working on the weather Einstein kit.  So far we have only gone through the first two lessons - sharing what we know about weather and observing the weather.

Handwriting - We have been practicing our letters.  The goal of our handwriting is to form the letters correctly, write the letters in the correct spaces, and to write neatly.  The first graders work on one letter each time.  The second graders work on two letters at a time.  After the second graders have reviewed each of the letters, they will start learning how to write in cursive.

Religion - This year we are in the A year of multiage.  That means we are working out of the first grade Religion series.  (Last year we did the second grade series.)  We read through the first chapter in our book.  The first chapter talks about the story of Creation.  After we read the chapter, we found the book of Genesis in the Bible and we found the Creation story.  Then we read the story out of the Children's Bible.  We are now creating our own Story of Creation books.

The rules - We have spent a lot of time going over classroom rules, expectations, whole body listening, etc.  We review this information every day!  This year we will also use PBIS faith shields again, as well as class dojo.  For the new families, class dojo is an app.  It keeps track of student behaviors - positive and negative.  I can go in and see how they're doing by the day or by the week.  Each Friday we do a check in.  If the student has at least 60% positive for the week, they'll earn Friday Fun Time.  (The percentage will get harder as the year goes on.)  Friday Fun Time is simply free time - the last 20 minutes of the day.  They can use ipads, play games, color, etc.  The kids love it!  If a student is below 60%, they do not earn Friday Fun Time that week.  Instead, they talk with me.  We figure out what went wrong, how to change it into a positive for next week, and they write out their plan.

Read-Aloud - We are reading the book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl.

Book Orders - I will do my best to get our first book order out some time next week.


Each of the students traced their hands and decorated their hand prints.  We then put all of the hand prints together to create this beautiful piece of artwork!

Every time I post on the blog it should go right to your e-mail.  If you ever want to check out the full website, it is www.ressullivan.blogspot.com.  You'll be able to see all of the previous posts, pictures, etc.  When you get the e-mail it's just black and white.  When you go to the website, it's all pretty.  :) 

Check it out sometime.

Have a great weekend!

Hello!  I'm doing a test run tonight.  I'm hoping that I have last year's families deleted and all of this year's families added.

If I entered an e-mail that you don't want me to use or if you would like me to add a different e-mail please let me know.

If I don't have your student and you are still getting the blog postings please let me know as well.

My e-mail is jusllivan@gracesystem.org.

Thanks and have a great night!

Just a reminder- at the end of the school year the kids made books for their dads. (Some kids also made a few other things.). If they haven't given them to their dad yet, remind them to.😊. Happy Father's Day!

Here are a few pictures from today.

A picture with all of the Flat Stanleys that came back.

We had a little graduation ceremony in our classroom this morning.  We played pomp and circumstance and everyone walked to get their diploma.  :)

The first grade graduates -

The second grade graduates - 

All of the graduates - 

First grade families - Some of the students had a few folders that were left over.  I kept them in the classroom for next year.  

I have a blue folder for Rowen, Misha, Cullan, and Ella.  

I have a red folder for Kate, Rowen, Cullan, Max, Madison, Kyan, and Misha.  

We only ended up using one notebook instead of two for the first graders.  I have a notebook for everyone.  

Thank you for a great year!  Have a fantastic summer! 

Thank you so much for the amazing class gift!  You know me so well!  I can't wait to spend my summer days at our cottage!  I love the lake sign, the blanket, the pitcher, and the glasses!  I can't wait to use my Dick's card to get some new running items.  I'm also excited about adding some new music to my playlist.  I love the running headbands!  They are so cute!  Thank you all so very much!  Have a great summer vacation!

FYI - Yesterday the kids took home a book they made for Father's Day.  We had a fun discussion about where they were going to hide their projects until Father's Day.  :)  I just wanted to let you know...so those projects don't get lost in all of the things that are coming home today and tomorrow.

***Reminder***

Mrs. Becker would like to decorate the church with beach towels for our mass on Friday.  If your child would like to bring in a beach towel, they may start bringing them in.

*A little FYI -
First Grade Math - I decided to play some math games with the students this last week of school.  Yesterday and today we learned how to play cribbage.  It was so fun!  Cribbage is a lot of counting and it has a lot of points to remember.  They are doing awesome!  If you play cribbage, challenge your first grader to a game.  :)

A few updates...

First Grade Math - We have been working on different methods of adding two digit numbers.  The methods we have learned are new groups above, new groups below, show all totals, and proof drawings.  We are also regrouping to make hundreds.  And of course...there are more story problems.  :)

First Grade Phonics - We are on the last unit!  The last unit is a review of all of the concepts we have learned about in phonics this year.

Science - We are continuing to work out of the Einstein kit called changes.  We mixed water with both sugar crystals and sugar cubes to see which one dissolved first.  Then we redid the experiment with just sugar crystals, but we mixed one with hot water and one with cold water.  We put green and black markers on a coffee filter.  Then we added a drop of water to see what would happen.  We found out that other colors are hidden inside of the colors.  The kids loved this experiment!  Today or tomorrow we are going to work on the next lesson.  It involves baking soda and vinegar.  :)

Writing - In writer's workshop the kids continue to work on their books.  They're also making a special something for their Dads for Father's Day.  We've also been working on making books for all of our special helpers that come to our class.

Handwriting - The first graders have finished their workbook.  The second graders have three more pages.  We are bound and determined to get through them.  When we finish, the second graders will have learned all of the lower case and capital letters in cursive.

Religion - We finished all of our Promise Papers for the year.  Yesterday we got our Mass parts.  We will be practicing for our Mass during our Religion time.  If your child has a reading part, please also practice at home.

Reading - We are winding down with Daily 5.  Our word work centers are the kids favorites!

Flat Stanley - This has been such a fun project!  The kids LOVE getting mail!  We have heard from almost everyone now - either by sending us mail or by e-mail.  Our Stanleys have been all over the continental United States, Hawaii, and Europe!  The kids have learned where these states and countries are, as well as facts about them.  Here are our current Stanley maps...

Thank you so much to your friends and families for helping us out with this fun project!  I'm waiting for all of the Stanleys to get back.  I'd like to take a picture of all of the students with their Stanley. After the picture is taken, we'll send Stanley, his letters, and his pictures home.