Here are a few pumpkin project pictures -

Tomorrow is a Packer Dress Down Day.

A few Classroom Happenings -

First Grade Math - We have been working on unknown partners.  (ex. 5 + _ = 8)  We have been working on story problems and writing the correct label.  We have also been working in math centers, such as shut the box, domino games, dice games, folder games, etc.

First Grade Phonics - We are learning about bonus letters.  (f, l, s, and sometimes z) We continue to work daily on letter keyword sounds, tapping, digraphs, handwriting in the correct places, and trick words.

Religion - We read the Gospel story about the king inviting everyone to his son's wedding.  We also touched on the 7 sacraments - most specifically on Reconciliation.  We also learned about the Ten Commandments.  Tomorrow we will read the Gospel story for this weekend and continue to learn about the sacraments.  This week we will focus on Baptism.  We have also been talking about and praying the rosary.

Reading - We work in daily 5 every day.  We have six different reading groups that are all focusing on different things.  I have also been pulling the students individually during daily 5 to do running records.  These past few weeks our word work focus has been nouns.  We started with person, place, or thing, we added common and proper, and this week we focused on singular and plural.

Handwriting - We continue to work out of our handwriting books.  The focus is forming the letters correctly and writing them in the correct spaces.

Science - We have been learning more about pumpkins.  I'm trying to think about STREAM with the pumpkins, since 1 and 2 haven't officially been given a STREAM project yet.  This week we took pumpkin candies and toothpicks and made some creations.  We started out by making a cube.  From there, we had towers and many other creations.  The kids had a blast.  They figured out quickly they needed a strong base and which candies worked best in which places.  Today we worked with real pumpkins.  We did some investigating with our senses.  We had to look at our pumpkin and draw it, decide on the size of it, count how many cubes tall it was, count how many ribs it had, predict if it would sink or float, and then find out if it did sink or float.  Tomorrow we're cutting them open to count how many seeds each pumpkin has.

Writing - We used the writer's workshop writing process to create witch stories this week.  The stories are about a little witch that came to my school and lost her broom.  First they had to make a web.  Then they needed to write a rough draft.  Next we edited the story together.  Then they wrote the final copy.  They also added a witch hat, dress, legs, and shoes to the final copy.  They needed to use the words first, next, then, and finally.


Mrs. Ihlenfeldt has an art update -

In Art we are beginning a review of the basic ART ELEMENTS. I explain these to kids as the ingredients the artist uses (beyond art supplies). The artist creates different images depending how they use the elements. 

     The first art element is LINE. We read a story about a boy named ART, who loves ART. He draws and paints a variety of lines, putting them together to make a house, wagon, tree and a night sky. Some of the lines he uses are, straight horizontal, vertical, diagonal, wavy, zigzag, curves, loops, dashes and my favorite...spirals!

Students were able to identify different types of lines in the story, and create them in our LINE project. We are making a painting of 3 layers of lines. The first layer is white crayon, the second is tissue paper. Now this week, we are painting these lines over the top. Our crayon resist lines will pop out like magic! The goal is to move away from a scribble line, to drawing specific types of lines.

  At the same time, we are practicing our basic painting skills, such as, controlling the amount of water we use, rinsing our brush, and keeping our brush, paints and water clean to keep our colors bright.

      We are still working on our expectations in the art classroom. If students are having a hard time following these expectations, I will be having them practice with me during a recess this week so we get those down pat, and use all class time most effectively.

Have a great night!

First grade has math homework tonight.  Spanish homework was sent home yesterday.  The students will have Spanish again next Tuesday.

Tomorrow is our first mass!  We are very excited!  We hope you can make it!

FYI - You are more than welcome to sit with your child at mass, except on days that we have mass. On those days we sit in a specific order that goes along with our mass parts.  Thank you!

Reminder - We are saying a decade of the rosary tomorrow after mass.  The students may bring a rosary from home.

Have a great night!

This Thursday (10-9-14) after mass the whole school will be saying a decade of the rosary.  Please have your child bring a rosary to school on Thursday.

*Tomorrow the students may dress down for the field trip.  The weather channel website shows a high of 57 and a chance of rain. 


*The first graders have math homework tonight.


*Mass parts went home today.  Please practice the readings at home.  We will also be practicing at school.

Classroom Happenings

Reading - We are a few weeks into Daily 5 and pulling groups.  We have a lot of different reading levels.  We have six different reading groups.  When the students aren't in a group, they are working on one of the daily 5 - read to self, read to someone, work on writing, listening, or word work.  The students may also work on Odyssey at this time.  This week and next week our word work focus is nouns.  Our centers are dealing with nouns being a person, place, or thing, and with common and proper nouns.

Religion - In Religion we worked on a little play that dealt with last week's Gospel reading.  For the next week, our Religion focus is practicing for our mass on October 9th. 

Science - Since we are heading to the pumpkin patch this week, we have been learning about pumpkins.  We learned about the life cycle of the pumpkin.  We also learned about the parts of a pumpkin.  We made some cool art projects to go along with what we learned.

1st grade Math - We have started working on subtraction.  The students have been making circle drawings to figure out the answer.  We have been working on story problems and writing the correct label.  We have also been writing and figuring out equations.

1st grade phonics - This week we are working with digraphs.  We have been scooping sentences for fluency.  We learned about non-sense words - words that aren't words, but we can figure them out by sounding out and tapping.  We learned five new trick words.  Today we worked on dictation - I say a sound or a word and they write it down - all while forming the letters the correct way and putting the letters in the correct spaces.

Writing - We continue to write in our journals and we are in the beginning stages of writer's workshop.

Spelling - I think we'll start spelling at the end of the month.  Looking at the October Calendar - We have two Fridays off.  I'm shooting for the last week of October.

Here is a tidbit from Mrs. Ihlenfeldt on art -

Art - Multi Grade 1 and 2

    Grades 1 and 2 have Art 1 time per week for 1 hour. Our goal in art the first few weeks is to review, practice and learn our classroom rules and expectations.  We read a few stories to put us at ease about beginning to draw, and looking at a mistake as a “happy accident”  just waiting to be made into a new, creative idea.  So, we began drawing with a dot like the student in the story, The Dot. This led to other dots, big, small, simple and complicated. We were amazed at how the artist, Georges Seurat, painted Sunday Afternoon at the Isle of La Grande Jatte, 1884-86, all with dots! Whew! That is a lot of dots! Students realized this painting was from a different time period by the clothes people were wearing. We had a fun discussion about this. “You mean you don’t wear a long dress, or top hat and cane when you go to the park to play?”

       In the story Ish,  a student stops drawing when someone askes him in a not so nice way, “What is that?” in reference to his art work. He stops drawing because he can’t draw things perfectly. Then he realizes his sister is saving all his crumpled up,  thrown away drawings. She thinks his vase of flowers looks “vase-ish.” So in class we began to draw “boat-ish”, and “fish-ish”, and “tree-ish” and “afternoon-ish”, and we drew “worry free-ish.” Then we practiced saying one thing we really liked about another student’s “art work-ish.” Have a great week.

Mrs. Jeanne Ihlenfeldt

Have a great night!  Go Pack!



Tomorrow is a Packer Dress Down Day.  It is a mass day, so the students need to wear their uniform bottoms.

We are planning our first mass for Thursday, October 9th.  Tonight I'll finish writing the parts and get them handed out tomorrow.  Here is what every student is doing -

Greeters - Mia, Hannah, Ruby, Zak
Cross - Reese
Bible - Katey
Intro - Enzo
First Reading - Brett, Teddy, Cullan
Responsorial Psalm - Mary, Heath, Megan, Cassie
Petitions - Keegan, Kate, Kyan, Rowen, Landon, Madison, Misha, Ella
Bread - Dylan
Wine - Max

Have a great night!