May 20, 2022
Well I missed last week's check-in but I am so glad to be back and updating you this week! We have just 9 days left together, but we still have so much fun and so many lessons to learn!
Reading/Writing- Thank you to everyone who came to our poetry share on Friday! I heard. the kids did a fabulous job and I hope you enjoyed all of our poems! This week we started our final writing unit- opinion writing! We are learning that opinion writing is our favorite because there are NO wrong answers- everyone gets to express their ideas. We learned there are 3 types of sentences in the opinion writing- 1) opinion statement, 2) reasons (this is our because sentence/s) and 3) repeat your opinion.
Phonics- This week we had a lot of sight words: could, would, way, may, day, away,-- as you can guess we started the vowel teams ai and ay which make the sound "A" with thumbs up just like Fonzi (and yes, we learned who Fonzi is)!!
Math- We completed chapter 17 and our working our way through our final long check of the year!
Science- Our fish arrived last week as we focused on learning about specialized body parts. This week we have started learning about plants. We compared the life cycles of humans, animals and plants to learn how they follow a similar pattern. We also learned about the needs of plants: sun, soil and water. Finally, we learned about the parts of plants (stems, roots, leaves) and how some of these parts are really good to eat!
May 6, 2022
My goodness! It has been a while since we checked in because we have been doing so many things! We have been having so much fun with starting our 26 day countdown to the end of the year and becoming 2nd graders in training. Thank you for all of the cards, notes and gifts this week. I really felt the love! I hope all of the moms feel the love this weekend and have a wonderful time!
Reading/Writing- This week we continued our poetry unit with reading and writing some feelings poems, acrostic poems, concrete poems, haikus (which thanks to all of our phonics work we were very independent with syllable counting), cinquain poems and finally our very favorite I AM.... poems. We can't wait to share all of our poems with you next week!
Phonics- We have been working hard to learn all of the Mama E/Magic E syllables! We also completed our unit 3 phonics check and the kids did really great at showing what they know and then showing what it is we could still use some more practice with. We also learned the vowel combinations aw/au who just think everything is so cute they will say "awww". Then we learned the eu/ew vowel team who don't like anything and say "ewwww" about everything.
Math- We completed chapter 16 in 1 week! It was place value with numbers to 120 and we just flew right through this. We started our final math chapter, chapter 17, which focuses on adding/subtracting numbers to 120 with and without regrouping. This is the 2nd time we will be practicing this skill, so it should be getting easier this time around!
Social Studies- We completed our map unit by designing maps of playgrounds, the LMC and our bedrooms.
Science- Our caterpillars arrived this week to kick off our final science unit on living things! We will be observing the life cycle of these little friends as we get to notice how they change every day. We will be observing living things (plants and animals) and learning about how they grow, what they need to survive and what makes each living being so special!
April 14, 2022
Hoppy Spring! What a wonderful weekend to celebrate a lot of holidays and according to the kiddos these are going to be some wonderful family celebrations!
Reading/Writing- This week we continued our poetry unit with reading and writing some color poems and 5 senses poems. We also had an in school field trip to Ms. Pinski's 5th grade class for them to teach us about some more poems during their Poetry Slam!
Phonics- We were so excited to learn another syllable type! This week we practiced the vowel consonant e rule with a_e words! We love practicing with Mama E and helping her to remind the vowels to stand up tall and say their names! We got the new sight words: came, made and make!
Math- We are deep into chapter 13 math. This week we spent a lot of time learning to borrow in order to regroup in subtraction when you don't have enough ones to start the problem with! We used our blocks to help us understand the concept and why we trade first before we do any subtracting. We finished off the week by learning to add 3 numbers together and practicing with some word problems.
Social Studies- This week we learned maps typically show water with blue and land with green. We learned that all maps have 4 main parts: title, compass, map key and symbols. They may not be the same from map to map but they are there. We have started making our own world maps!
March 18, 2022
Spring. . . where are you?? We miss you already, please come back! We have had quite the return from Spring Break and are really working hard to finish the year strong! Did you know our principals kissed a pig? We were so excited and our class brought in a bunch of money to help the fundraiser! This was something to see!
Reading- We finished our non-fiction reading units and our biography research. This week we have started our poetry unit!
Phonics- In the last 2 weeks we have been learning about the bossy r with the ar and or combinations. R changes the sounds of it's vowel friends whenever they get together to play. We have learned the syllable rules for r-controlled vowels as well! We have added the sight words or, more, other, said, there and put.
Writing- We finished our expert writing books by creating our animal paragraphs and our biography chatterpix projects! This week we have started our poetry writing unit by learning about the poetic devices and important poem vocabulary words that are important to know before writing poems.
Math- We finished chapter 12 with numbers to 40. This week we started chapter 13 with adding and subtracting to 40. This week we have been practicing addition of 2 digit by 2 digit numbers. We have started learning to add numbers and use regrouping where we trade 10 ones in for a long.
Social Studies- This week we began our mapping unit. We read the story, Rosie's Walk and learned some position words such as across, around, behind, near, far, above, in, on, below, left and right.
Growth Mindset- This week we learned about the things we do well and the things we need to give a little more effort to.
March 11, 2022
Spring is so close we can feel it in the air! We are still enjoying the last few bits of snow too!
Reading- We have spent time learning to read encyclopedias with the use of Pebble Go! We are also learning about biographies.
Phonics- This week we learned about contractions. We learned how to add not, is, and am to other words and create new words which use an apostrophe for the missing letters. We also added the sight words: has, girl and boy.
Writing- This week we began researching animals for our expert books. We each chose an animal we know nothing about to learn about and become an expert on so that we can teach our friends about. In LMC we read about a famous person in biographies on Pebble Go and wrote our own biographies of the people we became experts in.
Math- We have finished chapter 11 on graphing and started chapter 12 numbers and place value to 40. We loved our units on graphing and think chapter 12 is pretty easy so far!
Science- This week we learned all about reflection and refraction. Light travels in a straight line but when it hits a prism, such as water, the light bends. This bending light can make pencils appear broken, objects appear larger and even flip things backwards or upside down!
Growth Mindset- We learned about the power of trying. We learned to get better at things, you have to keep trying in order to get better at things!
February 25, 2022
It is so hard to believe that February is almost over, but we are so excited for spring!
Reading- We have spent a lot of time reading to learning and learning how to use non-fiction texts to help us answer comprehension questions. We learned a lot of about some pretty cool Olympic sports! We also learned about the history of President's Day and two of our most famous presidents, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. We also started reading from our first chapter book, The Boxcar Children and so far the story is super exciting!
Phonics- This week we focused on adding -s and -es to the ends of words to make them plural to kick off Unit 3 of phonics! We also learned our 2 more sight words of the unit: your and were.
Writing- We became experts in one of our classmates and interviewed them, just like real non-fiction writers! Then we taught our class about our classmates. We also made our 2-22-22 time capsules, which we can't wait to open on 3-3-33.
Math- We finished chapter 9 on measuring and according to our long check, we were all measuring masters!!
Science- This week we learned about sources of light and how light can travel through a variety of materials. We learned the terms transparent (see through), translucent (sort of see through), and opaque (not see through).
Growth Mindset- We learned about things which are good for our brains! There are certain things we can eat and activities we can do which will help our brains grow and things that will keep our brains from growing. Ask us for some ideas to help your brain grow!
February 11, 2022
We have had an exciting week of school! This Monday, we celebrated the 100th day of school with some really fun activities!
Reading- This week we have been reading non-fiction books and looking for non-fiction text features as we read. We can identify: title page, table of contents, glossary, index, photographs, labels, captions and key words. We also have been using our non-fiction reading skills to help us read to learn. We are learning about the winter olympics and some of the sports! So far we have learned about bobsled, curling and hockey.
Phonics- This week we focused on welded sounds (ang, ing, ong, ung, ank, ink, onk, unk) and our secret stories called them bell sounds and broken bell sounds. We also learned our last 3 sight words of the unit: what, by and but.
Writing- We started learning to be non-fiction writers. We learned non-fiction writers will write about topics they know a lot about or will do research and write about topics of interest. This week we played some guessing games where we wrote clues about our classmates or places in Windsor school and then had our friends guess who or what our clues were about. Our author visit this week also helped us to see how non-fiction writing happens and we are pumped to become non-fiction writers!
Math- We completed chapter 8 at the beginning of this week and then started chapter 9. We are super excited for chapter 9 because it is all about measurement. So far we have learned when comparing two things we can use the words: taller, shorter, longer, smaller,. bigger. When we compare more than 2 items we use: tallest, shortest, longest, smallest, and biggest.
Science- This week we started learning about light. We learned light travels in waves and comes from many places. Some light is created naturally by the sun, stars and fire. Some light is manmade like lightbulbs, flashlights and electronics.
Growth Mindset- We have started learning about how our brains work and how mistakes are really great for growing our brains! We discussed the differences between growth mindset and fixed mindset.
January 21, 2022
It was so exciting to have Monday off for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day! We spent all week learning about how important he was to our history and we even worked together to create a collaborative mural. Each of us got a piece of the mural to color but we didn't know what it would make until we put all the pieces together. It was so cool to see!
Reading- This week we have been learning about biographies and how you can use a biography to create a timeline of a person's life. We also have been working our way through each student taking a reading assessment and are excited to be getting new reading groups and new levels of books to read very soon! Our goal is to be done by next Wednesday but we have really been working hard in reading and each friend is having to read at least 2 books. We are amazing readers!!
Phonics- This week we focused on final blends and specifically on the -sp, -sk, and -st final blends. Our sight words this week were: if, first, be.
Writing- This week we read the story The Snow Globe Family. Then we imagined what it would be like to live and play in a snow globe. Our writing piece this week was all about what we would do inside of our snow globes and then we created snow globe pictures to go with our writing to hang in the hallway.
Math- We started chapter 8 this week, adding and subtracting to 20. This week we practiced the addition skills of doubles, doubles plus one and making 10.
Science- This week we saw and felt sound moving. We saw vibrations with a rubber band around a cup and felt vibrations of moving sound waves using tuning forks. We also learned the different sizes and thicknesses of tuning forks will also make different sounds. We learned that sounds move in waves through the air and into our ears. When you touch the object that is vibrating you stop the noise because you stop the moving of the sound wave.
January 14, 2022
We have been so excited to be back together and back to our routines!
Reading- This week we have been wrapping up our focus on inferring. Inferring is when you use clues from a story to figure out something else. These can often be found in fiction stories in what a character says and does. Miss Krueger is also reading with friends so we can get some new reading groups and new levels of books to continue to build our skills.
Phonics- We learned all about blends. In the last two weeks we have been practicing with s, l, and r blends which come at the beginning of the word. We also got new sight words: was, get, his, from, us.
Writing- This week we wrote an imaginary story as a class about a pretend field trip we took to Disney World as a class. Then the rest of the week, we wrote stories about other imaginary field trips we could take.
Math- We completed chapter 7, numbers to 20. We learned about place value (tens and ones) and how we can make teen numbers by adding 10 to another number.
Science- This week we started our sound unit. We went on a listening walk through the school and discovered Windsor is actually a very noisy place. We learned that when we are quiet we can really hear a lot of noises. We also learned about using our bodies to make other sounds, and we made a rain storm. This week we focused on the way sound is created. Sound is created by something vibrating back and forth. The vibration is what makes the noise.
Remember there is NO SCHOOL on Monday, Jan. 17th
December 10, 2021
Thank goodness it is still nice enough to go out for recess- we really need the fresh air and chance to run!
Reading- This week Miss Krueger has been checking our phonics skills as we wrap up the first phonics unit. We have been reading many realistic fiction stories about different holidays from around the world. We even read the very silly book series about the Wonky Donkey.
Phonics- We learned all about reading 2 syllable words this week! We learned the rules for dividing two syllable words and practiced our karate chops. We also learned about making compound words this week too!
Writing- This week we read Mouse Views, a very silly story about a pet mouse who wanders the school looking at different objects up close. We wrote stories about things in our classroom that we looked at up close. We practiced writing descriptive sentences to give our reader clues about the mystery objects we were writing about. We were so proud of all the progress we have made in our writing as we finished unit 2 of our writing.
Math- This week we learned to make pictures out of flat and solid shapes. We practiced finding shapes inside of pictures and continued to work on practicing names of the solid shapes. We still get a little mixed up.
Social Studies- We continued our globe trotting ways this week to learn all about different beliefs and celebrations. We left Israel behind and moved on to Italy to learn about the gift giver La Befana (who knew Christmas celebrations could involve a witch), we moved into Germany to learn about the tradition of making gingerbread men and gingerbread houses, traveled up north to Sweden to learn about St. Lucia and tomte, back down to the Netherlands to learn about Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet (we decided we would prefer coal instead of being taken to Spain) and ended in France to learn about creche, santons and advent calendar traditions. At each stop we have learned about traditions of the celebrations and compared and contrasted these celebrations. We are learning just how connected everyone is! Be sure to ask your child what souvenir they have made each day!
We are looking forward to more travels next week!
December 3, 2021
Can you believe it is actually December? We have been enjoying the last bits of warm weather this week and appreciating extra time without all of the snow gear!
Reading- We learned about realistic fiction this week. We learned this are books that contain events which could happen in real life. They didn't actually happen in real life but it could. We read a story about a blackout that happened to a family in a city.
Phonics- We practiced the /ck/ and /qu/ sounds this week. We also got new sight words this week: of, each and back
Writing- This week we read Knuffle Bunny and talked about how Mo Willems used speech bubbles in his story. We learned to add speech bubbles to our stories. This week our stories explained a time when we had the strong emotions of mad and sad. In grammar, we reviewed nouns and verbs with a sorting fun game.
Math- This week we started unit 5, geometry. We have been playing with flat shapes or 2-D shapes this week. We learned that every shape has rules that help us to define it and classify the shapes. We also learned how we can sort shapes into categories by size, shape, color, number of sides and number of corners.
Social Studies- We have begun traveling the globe this week to learn all about different beliefs and celebrations. We started our travel in China to learn about Lunar New Year, moving to India to celebrate Diwali, up to Russia for a Russian New Year celebration with Grandfather Frost, over to Saudi Arabia for Ramadan and finally touching down in Israel for Hanukkah. At each stop we have learned about traditions of the celebrations and compared and contrasted these celebrations. We are learning just how connected everyone is! Be sure to ask your child what souvenir they have made each day!
We are looking forward to more travels next week!
November 19, 2021
What a busy, wonderful week preparing for Thanksgiving and talking about all of the things we have to be thankful for!
Reading- We learned about full and complete retells and worked as a team to create one full and complete retell for a few of the stories we have read. We also learned about fantasy as a classification of fiction. We learned fantasy books include many different elements, such as animal characters that talk, walk and wear clothes like people. Fantasy books can also contain magic, creatures who don't exist (giants) and things that can't happen in real life (walking on clouds).
Phonics- We practiced the /th/ and /wh/ sounds this week. We also got new sight words this week: they, that, them and then
Writing- This week we continued our theme of special things to write about. We read the story Growing Vegetable Soup and wrote stories about something fun we have done with our families. Then we finished the week by writing a book about things they are thankful for.
Math- This week we finished unit 4 and completed the long check for subtraction to 10. We completed the review for addition and subtraction to 10. Finally, we worked on solving a Thanksgiving Math Mystery.
Science- This week we talked more about the moon and how the phases of the moon work. We also began talking about stars.
Enjoy the week long break and we will see everyone again on Monday, November 29th!
November 12, 2021
This week we celebrated Veteran's Day. We made poppies and learned about what it means to be a Veteran. We talked about ways to say thank you to a Veteran and why they are so important to us!
Reading- We learned about comparing and contrasting stories this week. We told how two stories are the same and different as well as comparing and contrasting two subjects in the same story. We read the 3 Little Pigs and the 3 Little Dassies, and learned to make text to text connections as well.
Phonics- We practiced the /sh/ and /ch/ sounds this week. We also got new sight words this week: for, come, me, in, up, and are.
Writing- This week we continued our theme of special things to write about. We read the story Daddy Calls Me Man and wrote stories about special members of our family.
Math- This week we learned about how addition and subtraction facts can go together and make fact families. We have gotten quite good at making fact families and even can find a fact family when give 4 numbers. We are ready for our math test next week.
Science- This week we talked a lot about how the sun controls the seasons and how they feel for us. We also learned about length of days in summer vs. winter. We talked about why we have daylight savings time too.
SEL-We read a book all about how each person is perfect just as they are and we need to remember to include everyone. We also read "The Way I Feel" and "We are All Wonders" and we discussed the mood meter again.
November 5, 2021
Halloween was so much fun and it took us a few days to get back into the swing of things but we have really been working hard! This week we also celebrated the holiday of Diwali by learning about this wonderful festival of lights. We will be learning more about this celebration in a few weeks!
Reading- We continue to work on retelling stories with characters, setting, problem, events and solution. We changed reading groups around a little bit as some of us have really been working hard to improve our reading skills.
Phonics- We practice the short o and short u sounds! We learned the Secret Story of Mama E and Babysitter letters helping the vowels to know when to make the long sound instead of the short lazy sound they like to make.
Writing- We have started unit 2 and are focusing on growing our writing. Our new goal is to write 2 or more sentences for each story we write, remember to use correct capital letters and learning about when to put a punctuation mark. So far we have written stories about animals we like and why we like them. This week we wrote a story about some place that is special to us and why it is so special.
Math- We started unit 4 which is the subtraction of numbers to 10. We have been working on learning strategies for solving subtraction problems and write subtraction sentences. This week we also learned how to solve subtraction word problems.
Science- We have started our unit on Observing the Sky. We have spent the last two weeks observing objects in the sky during the day and night. We have been exploring the sun and learning about why it is so important to Earth. We have learned how the sun appears to move across the sky and we can use the position to tell time and direction. We have also learned that really the sun is not moving, but the Earth actually moves just very slowly (too slowly for us to feel) which is why it looks like the sun moves. We also read the Sun is Kind of a Big Deal! Finally, we learned about how the sun can create shadows and we can use the size of the shadows to help us figure out what time of day it might be.
SEL-We finished learning about all of the feelings in our Spot of Feelings book. Then we revisited our class charter to upgrade the types of feelings we want to have when we come to school. We also read a book to help us learn what to do when we have big, big feelings.
We filled our marble jar and had our very first class party! We can't wait to do this again!!
October 15, 2021
Another week and another ton of fun!
Reading- This week we have been working on retells with beginning, middle and end. We also have begun talking about visualizing or seeing the story play in your mind, while reading stories. We read the story "Born to Read" and "The Vanishing Pumpkin" and saw movies in our minds that we drew.
Phonics- We practice the short i sound with sorts, stories and mystery pictures! We also reviewed the sight words we have learned so far!
Writing- This week we had some fun with creating a class book based on "I Need My Monster". We can't wait for you to read about our wonderfully scary monsters when you come to parent teacher conferences next week!
Math- This week we have continued to work on unit 3 math for adding numbers to 10. We practiced strategies for addition and we learned how to solve word problems!
Social Studies- We completed our wants and needs unit by talking about how to make money and what we might save our money to buy! Next week we will start our first science unit!
SEL-This week we continued to work on being an emotional detective by learning about a variety of feeling names and physical clues as to what someone might be feeling!
Important to Know: Next week is parent teacher conferences! There is no school for students on Thursday or Friday because of this!
October 8, 2021
I did an update for last week but as I signed in to write this week's update I see it did not save. I am not sure what happened to it but I will do my best to update you!
Reading- We have finished our reading assessments and been working in our guided reading groups, having so much fun growing as readers already! We have been practicing our retell skills by talking about characters, setting, problem and solutions as well as beginning, middle and end for fiction stories. Giving a good retell is an important skill and one that is assessed in our reading tests, so learning to do this helps demonstrate that you understand what you have read.
Phonics- We complete a review of what a vowel is and learned the Secret Stories for each of our vowel sounds! This week we practiced a lot with the short a sounds and started our word family books with the -ab word family. We also added more sight words to our bags this week! We added the words: so, go, no, he, she, & and.
Writing- We have finished our first unit writing by writing our longest story yet! This week we read the book "When I was Five" and wrote a story about what they like to do with a friend. We have grown so much as writers in just 5 short weeks!!
Math- We finished unit 2 math last week and this week Miss Krueger spent helping us fix our mistakes. We also started working on unit 3, which is Adding numbers to 10. This week we learned how to turn our number bonds into addition number sentences and we learned about turn around math facts too!
Social Studies- We have been working on wants and needs, and how we get money for the things we want and need. We talked about leaders at home, school and in the community. We agreed that a leader's job is to keep the people safe and make sure they have what they need.
SEL-This week we learned to be emotion detectives so we can figure out how we are feeling. We are trying to expand our feelings and words to describe them so that we have more words than good/bad, happy/sad/mad. We also learned about the mood meter and will spend more time with practicing it.
Important to Know: Next week there is NO SCHOOL on Monday, Oct. 11th
September 24, 2021
Sorry that I missed our update last week but I will catch you up on everything we have been up to in the last 2 weeks!
Reading- We are deep into our reading assessments! Miss Krueger is reading with each child to find their just right books and this is taking some time to complete with each child. While Miss Krueger is busy with this task, the children are able to now complete reading center rotations on their own! They move from center to center completing a variety of different reading activities! This week we also learned to use Raz Kids, which allows the children to use a collection of books at their independent reading level and students work on reading, listening comprehension and answering comprehension questions. We are excited to start our last center of guided reading groups in the next two weeks!
Phonics- We have completed all of the consonant reviews! We started learning the Secret Stories by learning the story of QU. We are excited to learn more stories in the coming weeks to help us become better readers. Children were also given their book bags, and we have added our sight word cards into our book bags so these cards are kept in the same place as the reading practice materials so children can practice with both each day!
Writing- These last two weeks we read Little Critter stories and wrote some stories of our own. We wrote and shared stories about things I can do and about a time I forgot something. We have been focusing on writing 1 complete sentence using a sentence starter. Each sentence should start with a capital letter, end with punctuation and we use a finger space between our words. We also have talked about thinking about the size of our letters and using appropriately sized letters.
Math- We have been working on unit 2 math and developing an understanding of number bonds. Number bonds are a way to think about numbers as parts and wholes. We have been working on showing numbers as number bonds, writing number bonds and solving problems to discover the missing parts and wholes of a number bond. We also got a chance to work through guided math centers where children are given activities to practice in groups similar to their skills they are demonstrating in our current chapter. Children who demonstrate a strong understanding of the skill were given an extension problems packet and are working through these types of problems. Children who are struggling worked on a more supportive packet by relearning some of the skills necessary to complete and understand the work. Children who did not follow into either of these two groups were in the extra practice group, where they were given more of the same skill to help strengthen their understanding and performance on this skill. Groups will change based on the student performance in any given unit to help ensure all students are receiving appropriate support. When students were not working with Miss Krueger they were utilizing Zearn, math games and other types of practice activities. We had a lot of fun doing this!
Social Studies- We finished talking about rules at school and started learning about the helpers in our school. We learned about our principal, assistant principal, social worker, secretary and more. We learned who these people are at Windsor School and what their jobs are or what they do here at Windsor School. We also started talking about community helpers we can find in our town.
SEL-We have been talking about emotions and how they are important. We are using these discussions to help us build our classroom charter. The charter shows how we want to feel when we are at school and what we all are expected to do in order to help us feel that way when we are at school. We read Mean Jean the Recess Queen and created a list of recess expectations too!
We also practiced all of our emergency drills (fire drill, shelter in place and hard lockdown) today. We did them in LMC and then talked through these drills in the classroom as well. Just in case your child shares with you!
September 10, 2021
Wow! This week was short BUT mighty busy around here!
Reading- We have been practicing our centers! We know how to do teach my monster to read, word work, book shopping, read to self and write me a story. We even started practicing with our centers rotations chart. We had our first reading lesson on how to be a part of a reading community and what we will cover during our reading lessons.
Phonics- In vowel bootcamp we covered the letters: k, b, and d. Just a reminder, your child's baggy should have the sight words: I, a, the, at, look. If they don't, let me know and I will help them get caught up.
Writing- This week we finished our phonics assessments with letter writing and word writing. We also shared our first 2 stories as a writing community and practiced giving helpful feedback.
Math- We completed our number bootcamp book up to 10 and took our unit 1 math test! We also took our very first MAP test and we rocked taking our time and trying our best! If your child did not finish, they will have more time next week to complete the assessment.
Social Studies- This week we finished exploring how rules help keep us safe and help us to all get along better!
SEL- We talked about kindness and how doing kind things for others builds and can even reach people we have never met in places we have never been.
Coming Up:
We will take our reading MAP test this coming week. There is nothing to do to prepare for this assessment other than a good night's sleep and a healthy breakfast!
September 3, 2021
Ah!! We made it! 12 days in and we are rocking a rolling!
Reading- We have been practicing our centers! We know how to do word work, book shopping, read to self and write me a story. Miss Krueger finished our ipad set-up and we got to start playing with Teach My Monster to Read!
Phonics- In vowel bootcamp we covered the letters: h, f, r, p and g (both hard and soft sounds for g). We finished our first set of 5 sight words! Your child's baggy should have the words: I, a, the, at, look.
Writing- This week we read Farmer Duck and wrote " I help ____" stories. We discussed making our pictures match our words and how color choice can be used to match the feelings of the story. We also are able to write consistently as a class for 9 whole minutes!
Math- We completed our number bootcamp book up to 9 and have finished unit 1 in math. We talked about 1 more and 1 less, patterns and careful counting of objects. Next week, we will review and take our first math test.
Social Studies- This week we explored how rules help keep us safe and help us to all get along better!
SEL- We reviewed what it takes to be a bucket filler! This week we met our 5th grade buddies and made some name signs and read books!
Coming Up:
The end of next week will begin MAP testing (fingers crossed they work out the bugs on doing this assessment on the ipad). There is nothing to do to prepare for this assessment other than a good night's sleep and a healthy breakfast!
Enjoy the 4 day weekend and see you on Wednesday!
August 27, 2021
We are back! It feels so good to create a blog again! We are just finishing our 7th day of school and oh my have we been busy!
Reading- We are working on our new letter bootcamp camps and have reviewed the consonants: M, S, L, N, and T. We are getting the swing of how bootcamp works and love coming up with words for our circle maps. We have also started building our sight words cards bags. We are working on learning these words and learning to use orthographic mapping to help us remember how to read and write the words. We also have been learning the letter sounds using our Secret Stories Better Alphabet Song!
Writing- We have started our first story! We are writing stories about the things we like.
Social Studies- We have been learning all about our school rules, why schools have rules and how we can use cooperation to get along!
Math- We have started unit 1 which is a review unit for the numbers and number words from 1-10. We also have been reviewing the concepts of more, fewer and same.
SEL- We have been learning about being Bucket Fillers and thinking of ways to fill each other's buckets everyday! We have been learning about using expected and unexpected behaviors to help us navigate through our day and judge our own behavior to make sure we are always doing what is expected of us.
Well I missed last week's check-in but I am so glad to be back and updating you this week! We have just 9 days left together, but we still have so much fun and so many lessons to learn!
Reading/Writing- Thank you to everyone who came to our poetry share on Friday! I heard. the kids did a fabulous job and I hope you enjoyed all of our poems! This week we started our final writing unit- opinion writing! We are learning that opinion writing is our favorite because there are NO wrong answers- everyone gets to express their ideas. We learned there are 3 types of sentences in the opinion writing- 1) opinion statement, 2) reasons (this is our because sentence/s) and 3) repeat your opinion.
Phonics- This week we had a lot of sight words: could, would, way, may, day, away,-- as you can guess we started the vowel teams ai and ay which make the sound "A" with thumbs up just like Fonzi (and yes, we learned who Fonzi is)!!
Math- We completed chapter 17 and our working our way through our final long check of the year!
Science- Our fish arrived last week as we focused on learning about specialized body parts. This week we have started learning about plants. We compared the life cycles of humans, animals and plants to learn how they follow a similar pattern. We also learned about the needs of plants: sun, soil and water. Finally, we learned about the parts of plants (stems, roots, leaves) and how some of these parts are really good to eat!
May 6, 2022
My goodness! It has been a while since we checked in because we have been doing so many things! We have been having so much fun with starting our 26 day countdown to the end of the year and becoming 2nd graders in training. Thank you for all of the cards, notes and gifts this week. I really felt the love! I hope all of the moms feel the love this weekend and have a wonderful time!
Reading/Writing- This week we continued our poetry unit with reading and writing some feelings poems, acrostic poems, concrete poems, haikus (which thanks to all of our phonics work we were very independent with syllable counting), cinquain poems and finally our very favorite I AM.... poems. We can't wait to share all of our poems with you next week!
Phonics- We have been working hard to learn all of the Mama E/Magic E syllables! We also completed our unit 3 phonics check and the kids did really great at showing what they know and then showing what it is we could still use some more practice with. We also learned the vowel combinations aw/au who just think everything is so cute they will say "awww". Then we learned the eu/ew vowel team who don't like anything and say "ewwww" about everything.
Math- We completed chapter 16 in 1 week! It was place value with numbers to 120 and we just flew right through this. We started our final math chapter, chapter 17, which focuses on adding/subtracting numbers to 120 with and without regrouping. This is the 2nd time we will be practicing this skill, so it should be getting easier this time around!
Social Studies- We completed our map unit by designing maps of playgrounds, the LMC and our bedrooms.
Science- Our caterpillars arrived this week to kick off our final science unit on living things! We will be observing the life cycle of these little friends as we get to notice how they change every day. We will be observing living things (plants and animals) and learning about how they grow, what they need to survive and what makes each living being so special!
April 14, 2022
Hoppy Spring! What a wonderful weekend to celebrate a lot of holidays and according to the kiddos these are going to be some wonderful family celebrations!
Reading/Writing- This week we continued our poetry unit with reading and writing some color poems and 5 senses poems. We also had an in school field trip to Ms. Pinski's 5th grade class for them to teach us about some more poems during their Poetry Slam!
Phonics- We were so excited to learn another syllable type! This week we practiced the vowel consonant e rule with a_e words! We love practicing with Mama E and helping her to remind the vowels to stand up tall and say their names! We got the new sight words: came, made and make!
Math- We are deep into chapter 13 math. This week we spent a lot of time learning to borrow in order to regroup in subtraction when you don't have enough ones to start the problem with! We used our blocks to help us understand the concept and why we trade first before we do any subtracting. We finished off the week by learning to add 3 numbers together and practicing with some word problems.
Social Studies- This week we learned maps typically show water with blue and land with green. We learned that all maps have 4 main parts: title, compass, map key and symbols. They may not be the same from map to map but they are there. We have started making our own world maps!
March 18, 2022
Spring. . . where are you?? We miss you already, please come back! We have had quite the return from Spring Break and are really working hard to finish the year strong! Did you know our principals kissed a pig? We were so excited and our class brought in a bunch of money to help the fundraiser! This was something to see!
Reading- We finished our non-fiction reading units and our biography research. This week we have started our poetry unit!
Phonics- In the last 2 weeks we have been learning about the bossy r with the ar and or combinations. R changes the sounds of it's vowel friends whenever they get together to play. We have learned the syllable rules for r-controlled vowels as well! We have added the sight words or, more, other, said, there and put.
Writing- We finished our expert writing books by creating our animal paragraphs and our biography chatterpix projects! This week we have started our poetry writing unit by learning about the poetic devices and important poem vocabulary words that are important to know before writing poems.
Math- We finished chapter 12 with numbers to 40. This week we started chapter 13 with adding and subtracting to 40. This week we have been practicing addition of 2 digit by 2 digit numbers. We have started learning to add numbers and use regrouping where we trade 10 ones in for a long.
Social Studies- This week we began our mapping unit. We read the story, Rosie's Walk and learned some position words such as across, around, behind, near, far, above, in, on, below, left and right.
Growth Mindset- This week we learned about the things we do well and the things we need to give a little more effort to.
March 11, 2022
Spring is so close we can feel it in the air! We are still enjoying the last few bits of snow too!
Reading- We have spent time learning to read encyclopedias with the use of Pebble Go! We are also learning about biographies.
Phonics- This week we learned about contractions. We learned how to add not, is, and am to other words and create new words which use an apostrophe for the missing letters. We also added the sight words: has, girl and boy.
Writing- This week we began researching animals for our expert books. We each chose an animal we know nothing about to learn about and become an expert on so that we can teach our friends about. In LMC we read about a famous person in biographies on Pebble Go and wrote our own biographies of the people we became experts in.
Math- We have finished chapter 11 on graphing and started chapter 12 numbers and place value to 40. We loved our units on graphing and think chapter 12 is pretty easy so far!
Science- This week we learned all about reflection and refraction. Light travels in a straight line but when it hits a prism, such as water, the light bends. This bending light can make pencils appear broken, objects appear larger and even flip things backwards or upside down!
Growth Mindset- We learned about the power of trying. We learned to get better at things, you have to keep trying in order to get better at things!
February 25, 2022
It is so hard to believe that February is almost over, but we are so excited for spring!
Reading- We have spent a lot of time reading to learning and learning how to use non-fiction texts to help us answer comprehension questions. We learned a lot of about some pretty cool Olympic sports! We also learned about the history of President's Day and two of our most famous presidents, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. We also started reading from our first chapter book, The Boxcar Children and so far the story is super exciting!
Phonics- This week we focused on adding -s and -es to the ends of words to make them plural to kick off Unit 3 of phonics! We also learned our 2 more sight words of the unit: your and were.
Writing- We became experts in one of our classmates and interviewed them, just like real non-fiction writers! Then we taught our class about our classmates. We also made our 2-22-22 time capsules, which we can't wait to open on 3-3-33.
Math- We finished chapter 9 on measuring and according to our long check, we were all measuring masters!!
Science- This week we learned about sources of light and how light can travel through a variety of materials. We learned the terms transparent (see through), translucent (sort of see through), and opaque (not see through).
Growth Mindset- We learned about things which are good for our brains! There are certain things we can eat and activities we can do which will help our brains grow and things that will keep our brains from growing. Ask us for some ideas to help your brain grow!
February 11, 2022
We have had an exciting week of school! This Monday, we celebrated the 100th day of school with some really fun activities!
Reading- This week we have been reading non-fiction books and looking for non-fiction text features as we read. We can identify: title page, table of contents, glossary, index, photographs, labels, captions and key words. We also have been using our non-fiction reading skills to help us read to learn. We are learning about the winter olympics and some of the sports! So far we have learned about bobsled, curling and hockey.
Phonics- This week we focused on welded sounds (ang, ing, ong, ung, ank, ink, onk, unk) and our secret stories called them bell sounds and broken bell sounds. We also learned our last 3 sight words of the unit: what, by and but.
Writing- We started learning to be non-fiction writers. We learned non-fiction writers will write about topics they know a lot about or will do research and write about topics of interest. This week we played some guessing games where we wrote clues about our classmates or places in Windsor school and then had our friends guess who or what our clues were about. Our author visit this week also helped us to see how non-fiction writing happens and we are pumped to become non-fiction writers!
Math- We completed chapter 8 at the beginning of this week and then started chapter 9. We are super excited for chapter 9 because it is all about measurement. So far we have learned when comparing two things we can use the words: taller, shorter, longer, smaller,. bigger. When we compare more than 2 items we use: tallest, shortest, longest, smallest, and biggest.
Science- This week we started learning about light. We learned light travels in waves and comes from many places. Some light is created naturally by the sun, stars and fire. Some light is manmade like lightbulbs, flashlights and electronics.
Growth Mindset- We have started learning about how our brains work and how mistakes are really great for growing our brains! We discussed the differences between growth mindset and fixed mindset.
January 21, 2022
It was so exciting to have Monday off for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day! We spent all week learning about how important he was to our history and we even worked together to create a collaborative mural. Each of us got a piece of the mural to color but we didn't know what it would make until we put all the pieces together. It was so cool to see!
Reading- This week we have been learning about biographies and how you can use a biography to create a timeline of a person's life. We also have been working our way through each student taking a reading assessment and are excited to be getting new reading groups and new levels of books to read very soon! Our goal is to be done by next Wednesday but we have really been working hard in reading and each friend is having to read at least 2 books. We are amazing readers!!
Phonics- This week we focused on final blends and specifically on the -sp, -sk, and -st final blends. Our sight words this week were: if, first, be.
Writing- This week we read the story The Snow Globe Family. Then we imagined what it would be like to live and play in a snow globe. Our writing piece this week was all about what we would do inside of our snow globes and then we created snow globe pictures to go with our writing to hang in the hallway.
Math- We started chapter 8 this week, adding and subtracting to 20. This week we practiced the addition skills of doubles, doubles plus one and making 10.
Science- This week we saw and felt sound moving. We saw vibrations with a rubber band around a cup and felt vibrations of moving sound waves using tuning forks. We also learned the different sizes and thicknesses of tuning forks will also make different sounds. We learned that sounds move in waves through the air and into our ears. When you touch the object that is vibrating you stop the noise because you stop the moving of the sound wave.
January 14, 2022
We have been so excited to be back together and back to our routines!
Reading- This week we have been wrapping up our focus on inferring. Inferring is when you use clues from a story to figure out something else. These can often be found in fiction stories in what a character says and does. Miss Krueger is also reading with friends so we can get some new reading groups and new levels of books to continue to build our skills.
Phonics- We learned all about blends. In the last two weeks we have been practicing with s, l, and r blends which come at the beginning of the word. We also got new sight words: was, get, his, from, us.
Writing- This week we wrote an imaginary story as a class about a pretend field trip we took to Disney World as a class. Then the rest of the week, we wrote stories about other imaginary field trips we could take.
Math- We completed chapter 7, numbers to 20. We learned about place value (tens and ones) and how we can make teen numbers by adding 10 to another number.
Science- This week we started our sound unit. We went on a listening walk through the school and discovered Windsor is actually a very noisy place. We learned that when we are quiet we can really hear a lot of noises. We also learned about using our bodies to make other sounds, and we made a rain storm. This week we focused on the way sound is created. Sound is created by something vibrating back and forth. The vibration is what makes the noise.
Remember there is NO SCHOOL on Monday, Jan. 17th
December 10, 2021
Thank goodness it is still nice enough to go out for recess- we really need the fresh air and chance to run!
Reading- This week Miss Krueger has been checking our phonics skills as we wrap up the first phonics unit. We have been reading many realistic fiction stories about different holidays from around the world. We even read the very silly book series about the Wonky Donkey.
Phonics- We learned all about reading 2 syllable words this week! We learned the rules for dividing two syllable words and practiced our karate chops. We also learned about making compound words this week too!
Writing- This week we read Mouse Views, a very silly story about a pet mouse who wanders the school looking at different objects up close. We wrote stories about things in our classroom that we looked at up close. We practiced writing descriptive sentences to give our reader clues about the mystery objects we were writing about. We were so proud of all the progress we have made in our writing as we finished unit 2 of our writing.
Math- This week we learned to make pictures out of flat and solid shapes. We practiced finding shapes inside of pictures and continued to work on practicing names of the solid shapes. We still get a little mixed up.
Social Studies- We continued our globe trotting ways this week to learn all about different beliefs and celebrations. We left Israel behind and moved on to Italy to learn about the gift giver La Befana (who knew Christmas celebrations could involve a witch), we moved into Germany to learn about the tradition of making gingerbread men and gingerbread houses, traveled up north to Sweden to learn about St. Lucia and tomte, back down to the Netherlands to learn about Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet (we decided we would prefer coal instead of being taken to Spain) and ended in France to learn about creche, santons and advent calendar traditions. At each stop we have learned about traditions of the celebrations and compared and contrasted these celebrations. We are learning just how connected everyone is! Be sure to ask your child what souvenir they have made each day!
We are looking forward to more travels next week!
December 3, 2021
Can you believe it is actually December? We have been enjoying the last bits of warm weather this week and appreciating extra time without all of the snow gear!
Reading- We learned about realistic fiction this week. We learned this are books that contain events which could happen in real life. They didn't actually happen in real life but it could. We read a story about a blackout that happened to a family in a city.
Phonics- We practiced the /ck/ and /qu/ sounds this week. We also got new sight words this week: of, each and back
Writing- This week we read Knuffle Bunny and talked about how Mo Willems used speech bubbles in his story. We learned to add speech bubbles to our stories. This week our stories explained a time when we had the strong emotions of mad and sad. In grammar, we reviewed nouns and verbs with a sorting fun game.
Math- This week we started unit 5, geometry. We have been playing with flat shapes or 2-D shapes this week. We learned that every shape has rules that help us to define it and classify the shapes. We also learned how we can sort shapes into categories by size, shape, color, number of sides and number of corners.
Social Studies- We have begun traveling the globe this week to learn all about different beliefs and celebrations. We started our travel in China to learn about Lunar New Year, moving to India to celebrate Diwali, up to Russia for a Russian New Year celebration with Grandfather Frost, over to Saudi Arabia for Ramadan and finally touching down in Israel for Hanukkah. At each stop we have learned about traditions of the celebrations and compared and contrasted these celebrations. We are learning just how connected everyone is! Be sure to ask your child what souvenir they have made each day!
We are looking forward to more travels next week!
November 19, 2021
What a busy, wonderful week preparing for Thanksgiving and talking about all of the things we have to be thankful for!
Reading- We learned about full and complete retells and worked as a team to create one full and complete retell for a few of the stories we have read. We also learned about fantasy as a classification of fiction. We learned fantasy books include many different elements, such as animal characters that talk, walk and wear clothes like people. Fantasy books can also contain magic, creatures who don't exist (giants) and things that can't happen in real life (walking on clouds).
Phonics- We practiced the /th/ and /wh/ sounds this week. We also got new sight words this week: they, that, them and then
Writing- This week we continued our theme of special things to write about. We read the story Growing Vegetable Soup and wrote stories about something fun we have done with our families. Then we finished the week by writing a book about things they are thankful for.
Math- This week we finished unit 4 and completed the long check for subtraction to 10. We completed the review for addition and subtraction to 10. Finally, we worked on solving a Thanksgiving Math Mystery.
Science- This week we talked more about the moon and how the phases of the moon work. We also began talking about stars.
Enjoy the week long break and we will see everyone again on Monday, November 29th!
November 12, 2021
This week we celebrated Veteran's Day. We made poppies and learned about what it means to be a Veteran. We talked about ways to say thank you to a Veteran and why they are so important to us!
Reading- We learned about comparing and contrasting stories this week. We told how two stories are the same and different as well as comparing and contrasting two subjects in the same story. We read the 3 Little Pigs and the 3 Little Dassies, and learned to make text to text connections as well.
Phonics- We practiced the /sh/ and /ch/ sounds this week. We also got new sight words this week: for, come, me, in, up, and are.
Writing- This week we continued our theme of special things to write about. We read the story Daddy Calls Me Man and wrote stories about special members of our family.
Math- This week we learned about how addition and subtraction facts can go together and make fact families. We have gotten quite good at making fact families and even can find a fact family when give 4 numbers. We are ready for our math test next week.
Science- This week we talked a lot about how the sun controls the seasons and how they feel for us. We also learned about length of days in summer vs. winter. We talked about why we have daylight savings time too.
SEL-We read a book all about how each person is perfect just as they are and we need to remember to include everyone. We also read "The Way I Feel" and "We are All Wonders" and we discussed the mood meter again.
November 5, 2021
Halloween was so much fun and it took us a few days to get back into the swing of things but we have really been working hard! This week we also celebrated the holiday of Diwali by learning about this wonderful festival of lights. We will be learning more about this celebration in a few weeks!
Reading- We continue to work on retelling stories with characters, setting, problem, events and solution. We changed reading groups around a little bit as some of us have really been working hard to improve our reading skills.
Phonics- We practice the short o and short u sounds! We learned the Secret Story of Mama E and Babysitter letters helping the vowels to know when to make the long sound instead of the short lazy sound they like to make.
Writing- We have started unit 2 and are focusing on growing our writing. Our new goal is to write 2 or more sentences for each story we write, remember to use correct capital letters and learning about when to put a punctuation mark. So far we have written stories about animals we like and why we like them. This week we wrote a story about some place that is special to us and why it is so special.
Math- We started unit 4 which is the subtraction of numbers to 10. We have been working on learning strategies for solving subtraction problems and write subtraction sentences. This week we also learned how to solve subtraction word problems.
Science- We have started our unit on Observing the Sky. We have spent the last two weeks observing objects in the sky during the day and night. We have been exploring the sun and learning about why it is so important to Earth. We have learned how the sun appears to move across the sky and we can use the position to tell time and direction. We have also learned that really the sun is not moving, but the Earth actually moves just very slowly (too slowly for us to feel) which is why it looks like the sun moves. We also read the Sun is Kind of a Big Deal! Finally, we learned about how the sun can create shadows and we can use the size of the shadows to help us figure out what time of day it might be.
SEL-We finished learning about all of the feelings in our Spot of Feelings book. Then we revisited our class charter to upgrade the types of feelings we want to have when we come to school. We also read a book to help us learn what to do when we have big, big feelings.
We filled our marble jar and had our very first class party! We can't wait to do this again!!
October 15, 2021
Another week and another ton of fun!
Reading- This week we have been working on retells with beginning, middle and end. We also have begun talking about visualizing or seeing the story play in your mind, while reading stories. We read the story "Born to Read" and "The Vanishing Pumpkin" and saw movies in our minds that we drew.
Phonics- We practice the short i sound with sorts, stories and mystery pictures! We also reviewed the sight words we have learned so far!
Writing- This week we had some fun with creating a class book based on "I Need My Monster". We can't wait for you to read about our wonderfully scary monsters when you come to parent teacher conferences next week!
Math- This week we have continued to work on unit 3 math for adding numbers to 10. We practiced strategies for addition and we learned how to solve word problems!
Social Studies- We completed our wants and needs unit by talking about how to make money and what we might save our money to buy! Next week we will start our first science unit!
SEL-This week we continued to work on being an emotional detective by learning about a variety of feeling names and physical clues as to what someone might be feeling!
Important to Know: Next week is parent teacher conferences! There is no school for students on Thursday or Friday because of this!
October 8, 2021
I did an update for last week but as I signed in to write this week's update I see it did not save. I am not sure what happened to it but I will do my best to update you!
Reading- We have finished our reading assessments and been working in our guided reading groups, having so much fun growing as readers already! We have been practicing our retell skills by talking about characters, setting, problem and solutions as well as beginning, middle and end for fiction stories. Giving a good retell is an important skill and one that is assessed in our reading tests, so learning to do this helps demonstrate that you understand what you have read.
Phonics- We complete a review of what a vowel is and learned the Secret Stories for each of our vowel sounds! This week we practiced a lot with the short a sounds and started our word family books with the -ab word family. We also added more sight words to our bags this week! We added the words: so, go, no, he, she, & and.
Writing- We have finished our first unit writing by writing our longest story yet! This week we read the book "When I was Five" and wrote a story about what they like to do with a friend. We have grown so much as writers in just 5 short weeks!!
Math- We finished unit 2 math last week and this week Miss Krueger spent helping us fix our mistakes. We also started working on unit 3, which is Adding numbers to 10. This week we learned how to turn our number bonds into addition number sentences and we learned about turn around math facts too!
Social Studies- We have been working on wants and needs, and how we get money for the things we want and need. We talked about leaders at home, school and in the community. We agreed that a leader's job is to keep the people safe and make sure they have what they need.
SEL-This week we learned to be emotion detectives so we can figure out how we are feeling. We are trying to expand our feelings and words to describe them so that we have more words than good/bad, happy/sad/mad. We also learned about the mood meter and will spend more time with practicing it.
Important to Know: Next week there is NO SCHOOL on Monday, Oct. 11th
September 24, 2021
Sorry that I missed our update last week but I will catch you up on everything we have been up to in the last 2 weeks!
Reading- We are deep into our reading assessments! Miss Krueger is reading with each child to find their just right books and this is taking some time to complete with each child. While Miss Krueger is busy with this task, the children are able to now complete reading center rotations on their own! They move from center to center completing a variety of different reading activities! This week we also learned to use Raz Kids, which allows the children to use a collection of books at their independent reading level and students work on reading, listening comprehension and answering comprehension questions. We are excited to start our last center of guided reading groups in the next two weeks!
Phonics- We have completed all of the consonant reviews! We started learning the Secret Stories by learning the story of QU. We are excited to learn more stories in the coming weeks to help us become better readers. Children were also given their book bags, and we have added our sight word cards into our book bags so these cards are kept in the same place as the reading practice materials so children can practice with both each day!
Writing- These last two weeks we read Little Critter stories and wrote some stories of our own. We wrote and shared stories about things I can do and about a time I forgot something. We have been focusing on writing 1 complete sentence using a sentence starter. Each sentence should start with a capital letter, end with punctuation and we use a finger space between our words. We also have talked about thinking about the size of our letters and using appropriately sized letters.
Math- We have been working on unit 2 math and developing an understanding of number bonds. Number bonds are a way to think about numbers as parts and wholes. We have been working on showing numbers as number bonds, writing number bonds and solving problems to discover the missing parts and wholes of a number bond. We also got a chance to work through guided math centers where children are given activities to practice in groups similar to their skills they are demonstrating in our current chapter. Children who demonstrate a strong understanding of the skill were given an extension problems packet and are working through these types of problems. Children who are struggling worked on a more supportive packet by relearning some of the skills necessary to complete and understand the work. Children who did not follow into either of these two groups were in the extra practice group, where they were given more of the same skill to help strengthen their understanding and performance on this skill. Groups will change based on the student performance in any given unit to help ensure all students are receiving appropriate support. When students were not working with Miss Krueger they were utilizing Zearn, math games and other types of practice activities. We had a lot of fun doing this!
Social Studies- We finished talking about rules at school and started learning about the helpers in our school. We learned about our principal, assistant principal, social worker, secretary and more. We learned who these people are at Windsor School and what their jobs are or what they do here at Windsor School. We also started talking about community helpers we can find in our town.
SEL-We have been talking about emotions and how they are important. We are using these discussions to help us build our classroom charter. The charter shows how we want to feel when we are at school and what we all are expected to do in order to help us feel that way when we are at school. We read Mean Jean the Recess Queen and created a list of recess expectations too!
We also practiced all of our emergency drills (fire drill, shelter in place and hard lockdown) today. We did them in LMC and then talked through these drills in the classroom as well. Just in case your child shares with you!
September 10, 2021
Wow! This week was short BUT mighty busy around here!
Reading- We have been practicing our centers! We know how to do teach my monster to read, word work, book shopping, read to self and write me a story. We even started practicing with our centers rotations chart. We had our first reading lesson on how to be a part of a reading community and what we will cover during our reading lessons.
Phonics- In vowel bootcamp we covered the letters: k, b, and d. Just a reminder, your child's baggy should have the sight words: I, a, the, at, look. If they don't, let me know and I will help them get caught up.
Writing- This week we finished our phonics assessments with letter writing and word writing. We also shared our first 2 stories as a writing community and practiced giving helpful feedback.
Math- We completed our number bootcamp book up to 10 and took our unit 1 math test! We also took our very first MAP test and we rocked taking our time and trying our best! If your child did not finish, they will have more time next week to complete the assessment.
Social Studies- This week we finished exploring how rules help keep us safe and help us to all get along better!
SEL- We talked about kindness and how doing kind things for others builds and can even reach people we have never met in places we have never been.
Coming Up:
We will take our reading MAP test this coming week. There is nothing to do to prepare for this assessment other than a good night's sleep and a healthy breakfast!
September 3, 2021
Ah!! We made it! 12 days in and we are rocking a rolling!
Reading- We have been practicing our centers! We know how to do word work, book shopping, read to self and write me a story. Miss Krueger finished our ipad set-up and we got to start playing with Teach My Monster to Read!
Phonics- In vowel bootcamp we covered the letters: h, f, r, p and g (both hard and soft sounds for g). We finished our first set of 5 sight words! Your child's baggy should have the words: I, a, the, at, look.
Writing- This week we read Farmer Duck and wrote " I help ____" stories. We discussed making our pictures match our words and how color choice can be used to match the feelings of the story. We also are able to write consistently as a class for 9 whole minutes!
Math- We completed our number bootcamp book up to 9 and have finished unit 1 in math. We talked about 1 more and 1 less, patterns and careful counting of objects. Next week, we will review and take our first math test.
Social Studies- This week we explored how rules help keep us safe and help us to all get along better!
SEL- We reviewed what it takes to be a bucket filler! This week we met our 5th grade buddies and made some name signs and read books!
Coming Up:
The end of next week will begin MAP testing (fingers crossed they work out the bugs on doing this assessment on the ipad). There is nothing to do to prepare for this assessment other than a good night's sleep and a healthy breakfast!
Enjoy the 4 day weekend and see you on Wednesday!
August 27, 2021
We are back! It feels so good to create a blog again! We are just finishing our 7th day of school and oh my have we been busy!
Reading- We are working on our new letter bootcamp camps and have reviewed the consonants: M, S, L, N, and T. We are getting the swing of how bootcamp works and love coming up with words for our circle maps. We have also started building our sight words cards bags. We are working on learning these words and learning to use orthographic mapping to help us remember how to read and write the words. We also have been learning the letter sounds using our Secret Stories Better Alphabet Song!
Writing- We have started our first story! We are writing stories about the things we like.
Social Studies- We have been learning all about our school rules, why schools have rules and how we can use cooperation to get along!
Math- We have started unit 1 which is a review unit for the numbers and number words from 1-10. We also have been reviewing the concepts of more, fewer and same.
SEL- We have been learning about being Bucket Fillers and thinking of ways to fill each other's buckets everyday! We have been learning about using expected and unexpected behaviors to help us navigate through our day and judge our own behavior to make sure we are always doing what is expected of us.