Reading - This week we practice all of the daily 5 centers.  We are building stamina!  We have one more running record to complete!  I have also started do sight word checks with the students.  The goal for us at the end of first grade is 175 words from the fry sight word list.  (All of the sight words are in the students Bee Binders for them to practice at home.)  This week we will start guided reading groups as well.  The students are doing such a great job working in the daily 5 centers!

Phonics - We are continuing to work on digraphs. (wh, ch, sh, th, ck)  This week we used our magnetic tile boards to make words with digraphs.  We used our white boards to practice writing and marking words with digraphs.  We got two new vocabulary words -- much and shut.  We also added new trick words this week - to, into, we, he, she, be, and me.  We practiced sentence writing with our new trick words, vocabulary words, digraphs, and CVC words.  This week we had our first phonics story.  The story was called Cod Fish.  The students begin by reading the story.  Then we find things that we are working on in the story - so we found CVC words, digraphs, and trick words.  Then we learned about story elements - character, setting, and events.  Our final task was to scoop the story for fluency.

Math - This week we continued to practice working on doubles!  The students are becoming experts at those doubles facts!  We used our wrap-ups to practice the doubles facts.  They LOVE some of the games we've been playing on the Smart Board!  We also worked on covering designs with pattern blocks, ordering numbers (0-20), using a number line to add and subtract, and figuring out partners, switch partners, and missing partners.

Ex. 2+3 and 3+2 are switch partners.  2+__ =5 is a missing partner.

Religion - This week we read the story of Noah's Ark from our Children's Bible.  The students love reading the stories from our Children's Bible!  We continued working on the virtues and values cards.  Our current virtue is respect.  One of the cards this week was listening the first time and stopping something when you are asked.  We had a lot of discussions about this one!  Some of the students said they don't always do this at home and that they are going to work on it.  :)  We will start a new word in the next few days.  Our Promise Paper this week came from the Gospel of Matthew again.  (Matthew 21: 28-32) The Gospel story is the parable of the two sons.  Our paper talked a lot about the choices the brothers made and how we have choices.  The students are excited to see that our mustard seeds are starting to sprout!

Writing and Handwriting - We work on this often!  We are practicing writing our letters the correct way, neatly, and on the correct spaces.  We are also working on only using capital letters when they are needed.  For writing, we have a few different activities.  We have pages where the students have to choose from four choices and write a sentence or two about it.  (They love this!)  We also have our fundations journals, as well as a whole file of writing centers that they can choose from.  (squiggle, make a book, write a list, write the room, write a friendly letter, write a post card, make a card, etc.)  They are loving all of the writing choices!

Science/Social Studies - We continue to work on our weather unit.  We've been learning about thermometers, temperature, and we are tracking our September weather.  Our Scholastic News this week was about apples.  

Spelling - This week we are having our first spelling list!  Our words come from our Fundations phonics program.  This week our words are all digraphs.  Please practice spelling words at home this week.

Weekly Spelling List - Digraphs

such

thin

fish

rich

thud

shop

quick

dock

thick

shock

Have a great week!  :)

 We had a great week in first grade!

Reading - This week we continued to practice building stamina.  We added the fifth and final component of daily 5 - word work.  The word work center will change every few weeks.  The first weeks of school the word work center is all about ABC order.  

This week we worked on rotating through all of the centers.  I have also started running records on the students.  A running record is when the students read stories to the teacher.  During the reading, I am marking errors, self corrections, and making notes on the reading of the student.  After the book, the student is asked comprehension questions.  The accuracy and comprehension percentages are used to find the student's reading level.  

After all running records are completed, we will be able to start guided reading groups during our daily 5 time.  So far I have 3 running records completed.  Hopefully by the end of this week, all running records will be completed.  They take quite a bit of time, so it may take until next week.  

The students are loving daily 5 time!  The centers are - read to self, read to someone, listening, work on writing, and word work.  Here are some pictures of daily 5 from the week.

Phonics - This week we finished up our unit on CVC words and had a unit test.  Then we started our next unit on digraphs.  Digraphs are two consonants together that make a new sound.  The digraphs that we are learning are wh, ch, sh, th, and ck.  We also learned how to tap our digraphs.

We have two new trick words from our new unit - as and has.  We worked a lot on dictation this week - I say a sound, the students write the sound.  I say a word, the students write the word.  I say a sentence, the students write the sentence.  Sometimes dictation is on our white boards and sometimes it is in the composition notebook.  

Math - This week we worked on shapes and patterns using pattern blocks and we worked on doubles.  We learned the names of shapes and how many sides / angles they have.  We learned about AB patterns and ABB patterns.  We did a lot of practice on our doubles facts.  We played many doubles games on the SMART Board.  One of our favorites is a doubles version of shoots and ladders!  We are getting really good at doubles!  The big ones are tricky - but we are starting to memorize them!

Some of our pattern block patterns and creations -

Religion - This week we continued reading from our textbook.  We read more about God creating the world.  We also read about seeds.  Then we read the parable of The Mustard Seed.  Next we planted some mustard seeds for real.  They are so tiny!  Hopefully we see them sprout this coming week!  We also made our own Mustard Seed parable books.  

We continued working on our virtues and values cards.  We worked on two more cards from our word - Respect.  The next two cards were - Not interrupting someone who is talking on the phone and Not laughing at others.

Friday we had our first Promise Paper of the year.  The Promise Paper is a little newspaper for kids.  The theme each week revolves around the Sunday Gospel.  This week the Gospel was from the book of Matthew.  (Matthew 20:1-16)  It was about a vineyard owner who hired people to work for him throughout the day.  He paid everyone the same wage, even though they didn't all work the same amount of hours.  We learned about the quote - "the last shall be first and the first shall be last".

Science / Social Studies - This week in our Einstein weather kit we learned about thermometers.  We are learning how to read them.  It can be tricky!  Each line on the thermometer is 2 degrees.  We continue to monitor the weather each day (cloud cover, precipitation, and wind) and we are keeping track on our weather calendar.

A Few FYI's

*We did our second MAP test on Friday.  This week we will do our make ups - What that means is we have a few students who didn't quite finish.  They are close - maybe 10/15 questions left.  They will have time to finish the tests up this week.  The students are getting much better with their mouse skills!  Double clicking can be pretty tricky for them!

*Wednesday, September 23rd is picture day.

*Friday, September 25th - No school!

*Lysol Spray - If you can find any Lysol spray, please think about donating it to school.  We sanitize with Lysol every day - multiple times a day.  We would appreciate any donations!  Thank you!

A few recess pictures - This week we read a book about hula hooping - so 

I brought my hula hoops to school.  The kids are loving them!

Have a great week!