Friday, September 8, 2023

FIRST GRADE NEWS 9-8-23

 Hi! We survived the heat...hopefully we're safe from here on out! The kids did a great job at getting lots done even though it was SO hot! The popsicles everyone sent in helped a lot. I also gave the kids squirt bottles at recess to cool off with. We kept the fans going and lights dim. It worked!

Each morning after we finish our morning work we do some slides together on the board. These review Math and ELA skills. We've been practicing our days of the weeks and months of the year. We talked about how the months are numbered in order and how to write the date in shortcut form. We've also been looking for Secret Stories in each of our names. Secret Stories is a program that uses cute stories and movements to help students remember sounds. We've learned a lot of Secrets so far: AU/AW, both long and short sounds of all the vowels (and when they can't decide which sound to make they say "uh" like in was, Sneaky Y (it can make the long e and long i sound when it's at the end of a word), OO (the owl eyes say OO like in hoot but also say "uh" when it's dressed up as a pirate and has a hook), and AN/AM - (makes the whiny a sound because m and n can be bossy and mean). If you want to learn more about Secret Stories you can check out their website at Secret Stories Link. There is even an app you can get on your phone that go with the stories. These will help us in reading and writing.

During Big Book time we worked on reading words we can't sound out (I hide the various words so they can't see them to sound out.) We then use other cueing systems to figure out the words. We look at the picture. We go back and reread the sentence, skip the word and continue reading till the end of the sentence. We think of all the possibilities that would make sense. We then look at the letters. Usually we can read the word by just getting our mouth ready to say the first sound. We make sure what we read looks right, sounds right and makes sense!

We started using our Chrome books! We learned how to sign in, go to Google, use a bookmark to get to Portaportal, use Prodigy and Boggle. We add more each week. Once the kids get a little more familiar I will send home all their passwords for the programs we use incase you want to use them on your home computers.

In math we have been counting by 1s, 2s, 5s and 10s. Any help with this at home would be great. We are also practicing figuring out which number comes before or after any given number up to 100. We learned how to play Number Squeeze and Penny/Dice. We also worked on putting numbers in order and matching their number words to them.

We ended the week with a Cactus themed day. We wrote goals to put on our handprint cacti, made edible cacti, did cactus mazes, cactus dot to dots, made a 3D cacti and did a cactus themed math scoot (It's where all the problems are hanging all over the hallway and you have to find them before solving them.) We talked a lot about how we need to stick to our goals so we can achieve them!

UPCOMING DATES AND REMINDERS

*  Thursday, September 14th - Bring your baby picture to school. (Don't show anyone.) Also, know how you got your name.

* School ends at 2:30. First Graders get anxious if they have to wait to be picked up. 

*  School Picture Day - Friday, September 29th.

HAPPY WEEKEND!

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