Friday, October 18, 2013

Week in Review


Reading:

-Our sight word this week was the word “to”.

 
 
-The CAFÉ strategy we worked on this week was the strategy “Use TEXT Features”.

Non-fiction texts contain information that is true. They also contain features such as titles, headings and subheadings, captions, maps, diagrams, charts and graphs, legends, bold and italicized text, glossaries, indexes, and cutaways. These features are a common part of non-fiction reading that we often use or reference to help gain understanding of what is being read. As experienced readers, we do this without notice. When students read nonfiction material, they will also encounter text features that are different from those they come across when reading fiction. Students who have had experience and know the
purpose of text features improve their comprehension of the text.

How can you help your child with this strategy at home?


1. When reading with your child, tune in to these features and think out loud when you use them. For example, when coming across a word in bold print you might say, “I notice this word is darker than the rest of the words. It is in bold print. I bet the author wanted me to
notice this word because it stands out. I need to make sure I know what this word means.”
2. Break it down into individual text features to bring awareness to your child about these features in text. Begin by asking your child to look for words in bold. Then, have your child list any words in italics. You can also have your child look for titles, headings, charts, legends, glossaries, and captions.  
3. Guide your child in using his/her background knowledge about text features to aid in comprehension. Have your child read a non-fiction selection to you, stopping when a text feature is used. Ask your child to explain his/her thinking about that text feature to you.

-During one of our mini-lessons this week, we practiced identifying our letter sounds using an Alphabet Bingo board game! Each student sat next to a partner and as I called out a letter sound, they looked to see if that letter was on their board. We had several "Bingo's!" by the end of the lesson!


Math:

-This week we began practicing our “Number of the Day”. At the beginning of our 60
minute math block we always start off by doing this lesson. It begins by rolling a foam dice to determine what number is our special number of the day. We start the year off by writing the number, the number word, the number on a dice, drawing the number using shapes (circle, triangle, square, rectangle or hexagon), making a number line and circling the number, tally marks and a number bond. We then add addition and subtraction problems as the year goes on. We have a large board in our calendar area where we record each piece of the activity and the students also follow along and write on a dry erase board.


 


-We also introduced a new activity to Math by Myself. Using the geoboards, the students take a number card (that is made to look like its on a geoboard) and creates teh number using multiple rubberbands on their board!

















Writing:

-We practiced writing and labeling three different pictures using an app on our classroom iPad. This app is called Educreations, I wrote the words phonetically on the pictures along with the students writing on their dry erase board. We stretched the words out together to write down the sounds we heard. We then recorded ourselves rereading what we wrote. You can view this lesson on a blog post earlier this week by clicking here.

-On Friday, we then took those same pictures and wrote a story/sentence to go along with them. I wrote on the picture while the students wrote along with me on their dry erase board. You can view both of these lessons on our classroom blog!



 



Students wrote the sentences along with me on their dry erase boards!



Content:

We learned so much this week about our community and many of the jobs within it. We learned about police officers, fire fighters, mail carriers, paramedics, librarians, teachers, doctors and many more! We also talked about the sounds we hear in the city and the country and read a book about different signs that we might see while riding in our car or
out and about! We shared our community helper homework “I’d Like to Be…” pages and finished the week with making a page where we put a picture of ourselves on to the community helper we want to be when we grow up!

 

Practice at Home:

--Have your child look at family pictures, magazines or favorite books and have them create a sentence and stretch out words they don’t know and write down the sounds they hear!

Something fun!

I had a substituted teacher Monday afternoon and upon returning Tuesday morning the sub had written 6 students names down for earning the Substitute Award Winner!

Congratulations!
 
 
We also had our first nine weeks behavior celebration this week. The students who had outstanding behavior and had higher than 80% on their behavior grade were able to attend our celebration. We had a laser light show set up in our cafeteria where we saw many different lights, pictures and words! It was very cool! We can't wait to see what our next celebration will be!
 
 


 

 

Weekly Poem--Come and Listen


YouTube Video


Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Phonetic Writing

Today we practiced writing and labeling words to go with three different pictures. As I wrote the letters on the iPad, the students wrote the words on a dry erase board with me!

Press the play button below to watch our lesson in action!



 
 
Students writing along using their white boards.
 
 

Monday, October 14, 2013

Exploration Acres

We went on our first field trip to Exploration Acres! We enjoyed a tractor ride to pick a pumpkin at the pumpkin patch, finding our way through a cornmaze, jumping in a pile of hay, sorting rocks in the gem mine, climbing through a hay tunnel, eating lunch in the barn and much much more! Below is a video of several photos taken by the chaperones on the trip!