Halloween Fun!

What a wonderful way to start our day! It worked our great on our end to have our party first. Coming in costume really helped to start our day on the right foot. I hope it worked out well for all of you also. The party ran incredibly smoothly today. Students were engaged at every station, and we had many helping hands. Thank you to everyone who donated supplies for the party, as well as those that donated their time to help today. A big thank you to Katie Terpstra for organizing the party as well. Please feel free to share any feedback you have in regards to having the party first thing this morning. For those trick-or-treating tonight, have fun! I heard on the news this morning that the past four Halloweens have had rain or snow. What a beautiful night ahead! Enjoy the pictures below.

Turkey Trot

Congrats to our runners! 

Weekly Update

What an amazing fall weekend! I hope you were able to get outside to enjoy it. Please see a few quick updates below:

Coming up:

• Star Student: Logan Dirkse
• Monday, 10/24 - Friday, 10/28: MSU vs. UofM Coin War. Please send in your loose change!
• Friday, October 28: U of M school spirit day. Oops, I mean U of M or MSU school spirit day! :) 
• Monday, October 31: Halloween Party at 9am
• Friday, November 4: Early Release Day
• Wednesday and Thursday, November 9-10: Parent/Teacher Conferences (be sure to return your confirmation slip ASAP)

What we have been working on:

• Reading: We started our work with reading partners last week. We also worked on comparing two books, incorporating our vocabulary word, and searched for words that make the /o/ sound as in boat, rode, and tow and recorded them in our reader's notebooks. 
• Writing: Last week we continued work on our small moment stories. I am amazed by the work I am seeing! Continue to encourage your child to "say as they write" anytime they are writing at home. Their practice is paying off.  This coming week we will wrap up our first story, move onto a new story, and work on adding details to sentences. 
• Math: We will be wrapping up unit 2 this coming week. We are projected to take our unit 2 test this Friday. Your child will bring home their unit 2 review on Thursday. Please plan to spend some time reviewing and practicing some of the problems Thursday evening. Whiteboards are a great way to do this. 
• Science: We wrapped up our study of matter this week. Your child may have asked to become a scientist at home by exploring magnets, or seeing if things sink or float!
• Vocabulary: Or word of the week was compare, to find likeness in two or more things. 
• WEB Books: I hope this has been a successful experience for your child. Continue to have your child read each night, and return and select a new book daily. We have a few students who need to become more regular with this. I am in the process of assessing student levels for report cards. Some students may bump up a level, some may bump up several levels. Students are usually quite excited when they do, so I am sure they will let you know! 
• Whiteboard Practice: To extend our practice reading and writing words with the /o/ sound, we discussed the concept of homophones this week. Homophones are words that sound the same, but are spelled differently and mean different things. We looked at the words rode and road. When we said the sounds in each word it was exactly the same, however when we started spelling it out it was different! To help us understand the meanings and to be sure we could remember the spellings,  we first put a dot under each 1-letter sound and a dash under each 2-letter sound. Then we drew a picture next to each word. To wrap up, we wrote a sentence trying to use both words in the correct context! (see picture) This would be a great activity to do at home with other homophones such as: ate/eight, be/bee, to/two, or any others! Be sure your child is saying those sounds out loud as they write each word in their sentence. Also be sure to correct handwriting and spelling errors! 

• Halloween Reminder: Our party will be taking place first thing in the morning at 9am. Students are asked to wear their costumes to school that day. This should be over their clothes. Once the party is over, students will remove their costumes and place them in their backpacks. (Any parents in attendance may take costumes home.) Any questions, please let me know. 

Weekly Update

Last week absolutely flew by! Here is a quick update:

Coming up:

• Star Student: Hannah Blaskowski
• Monday, October 31: Halloween Party at 9am
• Friday, November 4: Early Release Day
• Wednesday and Thursday, November 9-10: Parent/Teacher Conferences

• Halloween Information: Our party will be taking place first thing in the morning at 9am. Students are asked to wear their costumes to school that day. This should be over their clothes. Once the party is over, students will remove their costumes and place them in their backpacks. (Any parents in attendance may take costumes home.) Any questions, please let me know. 
• Library Books: We had many students not return library books this past week. Please be sure to have your child return library books each week. Our library day is Thursday. 
• Vocabulary: Our word this past week was RETELL. Have your child practice retelling their WEB book to you this week. 
• Reading Workshop: Going along with our vocabulary word of the week, we practiced retelling our books this week. We also practiced using our reading finger, and sliding our finger while reading. 
• Writing Workshop: We selected topics for a small moment story. We made a plan across pages for our story, and wrote our first two pages. 
• Math Workshop: We practiced the addition strategy of counting on last week, and we began learning subtraction strategies. 
• Science: We started our science unit "Properties of Matter." We have learned about attributes, sink and float, and started exploring magnets. 
• Whiteboard Practice Idea: This week we learned about 4 different spelling for the /k/ sound: c   k   ck   ke

Here is an activity you two can do together!
Have your child say and write these four spellings for this sound on the top of their board.

Have your child go on a hunt for the /k/ sound around the house. When they find something, have them say as they write the word in the middle of their boards. You will stop them to error correct any misspellings that occur.
Then ask your child to either dot or dash the letter(s) that make the /k/ sound. Ask them what column it belongs in. Erase the word, and have them say as they write the word in the correct column. Remember to stop and correct them if any errors are made.

We've got spirit!

Between maize and blue day, popcorn, and the pep assembly this morning, I am sure you can imagine the excitement and energy that is in 1st grade today!

Thank you to everyone for sending in your $3 donation to our class parties for the year. If you have not sent your money in yet, please next week.

We have had several water bottles coming in that are not spill proof. If your child has to unscrew a lid to drink it, or if water can spill when the lid is off, please leave the bottle at home. Thank you for your understanding with this!

Coming up:

• Star Student: Mitch Behler
• Friday, October 14: Early Release Day
• Monday, October 31: Halloween Part 9:00am

Here's a quick update on what we have been up to in 1st grade:

• Reading Workshop: We have been using our Reader's Notebooks to record sound that begin with the /w/ sound, spelling /w/ and /wh/. We also practiced using and sliding our reading finger when reading. Ask your child to show you their reading finger and ask why we use it. Then have them use it while reading their WEB books! I hope the first week os WEB books has gone well for all of you. We have been reading James and the Giant Peach as a class. They are loving this book so far. Ask your child to retell what we have read so far. 

• Writing Workshop: We wrote a class story this week about the Walk-a-thon. We will select our own topics to write about next week. 

• Vocabulary: Our word of the week was IDENTIFY. Ask your child what this word means. Try to use it in conversation at home!

• Math: We had our first full week of math workshop this week. We learned the strategy of "counting on" to solve addition equations. Thank you to all of the parents that have volunteered to help during math workshop. So far it has been incredibly beneficial! 

• Science: Coming up next week we will begin studying matter with our first science unit. 

• Whiteboard Practice Idea: We have been focusing on the two ways to spell the sound /w/. On our whiteboards, we have identified those two ways as "w" and "wh." Set up the whiteboard with both of these spellings. (*see picture) With your child, go on a word hunt through their WEB books or books from home to find words that will fit under each heading. Be sure your child is saying the sounds as they write each word! Discuss the patterns they notice (a big one is that "wh" is most commonly found at the beginning of a word). 

• Reminder: Don't forget to encourage appropriate handwriting! They should be starting their letters from the TOP and moving down. If they make a mistake, they need to correct it right away. Any time a reversal is done, please erase and have them write it again. You can model the appropriate letter formation for them first and then have them try it! 

Have a wonderful weekend!