Hi all! Happy first day of June! This week has been a busy one and next is going to get even crazier! Please take a look at the month breakdown as it is going to go by so quick! Need to knows for next week:
Monday: swimming lessons
Wednesday: Talent show and early closing
Thursday: Fort Edmonton Park field trip
Friday: Kinder and Grade One swap day.
Language:
We continue to work on sequencing and story writing this week. The students practiced writing detail about a character, how stories have a beginning middle and end, as well as a setting. When we have been working on writing the students have been goal setting, each day they choose which writing goal they would like to focus on to become better writer.
Math: We finished up some of our 2D and 3D shape prtactice at the beginning of the week. We started our grade one math review. We have been practicing basic facts for addition and subtraction to 5 as well as identifying number sequences to 100. What number come before, between and after is still sometimes tricky for the kiddos so we did some math games to become more fluent at identifying.
Science: We finished up looking at the needs of plants this week. We planted our beans yesterday, the kids were so excited to plant them. There is a few still hanging in our window in hopes that they will be a bit more successful in growing before sending home. We did a scavenger outside looking at different plants in the schoolyard. We also did an experiment with celery and food coloring to further understand the needs of plants. Next week we will start looking at animals
Social: We had the most hilarious conversation at the beginning of the week when I was showing them black and white photos. It was very confusing to them that black and white photos didn't mean that the world itself didn't have color. We looked at clothing in the past versus today, transportation as well as toys. It was quite funny to watch their reactions as I went down the list of all their toys that didn't exist in the past. Fort Edmonton Park next week will be so much fun.
Thanks for taking the time to read, Only 19 more days of grade one.
Friday, June 1, 2018
Friday, May 25, 2018
23 Days Left of Grade One
How is there only 23 days left of school!? Where did this year go. It was another busy and exciting week here in 1PB. The kids were very excited when I told them that I get to stay and be part of the East Elementary crew next year teaching Pre-K! These next few weeks are going to fly by. The kids have a very active Friday morning we are doing yoga with our buddies this morning then will also be heading out to do our Jump Rope for Heart activities later in the morning. I sent home both information pages about our field trips. If you are able to volunteer for one or two of those field trips please email me ASAP! Only three more days of swimming please remember to send their swimwear on Monday morning!
Language: We continue working with identifying various blends in words. We are also continuing our story writing this week. The students all got different illustrations of animals and pieces of a story to complete. This was tough for some to be creative in what they wanted to write about. They wrote a rough copy of their story, had it proofread, then rewrote the story in their BEST printing. I cannot lie, we had some tears as we continue to work hard to break some of our silly habits.We have also been working on their story sequencing and reading comprehension which is coming along.
Math: We are finishing up our last math unit of 2D and 3D shapes this week, they will be writing their quiz later today for it. We had a few come back from the long weekend and all of a suddenly had cylinder and sphere mixed up so we backtracked a bit to ensure that we we confident in identifying our shapes. Next week we are going to go back to the beginning of the school year and review all that we learned to really solidify their knowledge. They will be doing various activities to improve on their math fact fluency and confidence in strategies and also work out any missing blocks that some may have forgotten.
Science: This has been my favorite science unit so far. We are looking strictly at the needs of plants this week. The students 'planted' a navy bean on Monday. We used just a soaked cotton ball in a plastic bag so that the students could see first hand the seed sprout and the roots grow. I also took a picture of your kiddos, cut their foreheads off and taped them to a cup. The students then planted grass seeds in hopes that the grass will now look like their own hair. I have set out various books about animals and plants for the children to look through when it is time to read/they are finished their work. We now have a mini garden growing in the back of our room and we love it!
Social: We continue to look and the past and present this week. We were detectives this week looking at various images and trying to figure out if that is something we see in the present, or is that something we would have seen in the past.
Language: We continue working with identifying various blends in words. We are also continuing our story writing this week. The students all got different illustrations of animals and pieces of a story to complete. This was tough for some to be creative in what they wanted to write about. They wrote a rough copy of their story, had it proofread, then rewrote the story in their BEST printing. I cannot lie, we had some tears as we continue to work hard to break some of our silly habits.We have also been working on their story sequencing and reading comprehension which is coming along.
Math: We are finishing up our last math unit of 2D and 3D shapes this week, they will be writing their quiz later today for it. We had a few come back from the long weekend and all of a suddenly had cylinder and sphere mixed up so we backtracked a bit to ensure that we we confident in identifying our shapes. Next week we are going to go back to the beginning of the school year and review all that we learned to really solidify their knowledge. They will be doing various activities to improve on their math fact fluency and confidence in strategies and also work out any missing blocks that some may have forgotten.
Science: This has been my favorite science unit so far. We are looking strictly at the needs of plants this week. The students 'planted' a navy bean on Monday. We used just a soaked cotton ball in a plastic bag so that the students could see first hand the seed sprout and the roots grow. I also took a picture of your kiddos, cut their foreheads off and taped them to a cup. The students then planted grass seeds in hopes that the grass will now look like their own hair. I have set out various books about animals and plants for the children to look through when it is time to read/they are finished their work. We now have a mini garden growing in the back of our room and we love it!
Monday, May 7, 2018
Greetings!
Hi everyone! Please see this month's dates to remember. If you are not familiar with what Tutti Frutti Tuesday is the SWAT team has asked students to count how many fruit and veggies snacks they have in the lunches at snack time. They will be keeping track for the month of May and then the winning class for the most will win a healthy snack prize!
Last week we were very lucky with many special guests teaching us fun things! We had Miss. Brenda and Miss. Trystin back to work on our printing, they have noticed their formation of letters is doing much better when asked to print the single letter, however when asked to form a word/sentence that is where many lose their letter form. That will be the focus this week. We also had Miss. Angel from division office come in and work with the students on their digital skills within a math lesson that I created. The kids learned how to use Google Draw. For Education week we had a special guest come in on Wednesday and teach us Zumba. Thursday a lady came and taught us about Celtic Traditions within Canada. Then Friday afternoon we had a BLAST at the science fair looking at all the displays that the division two students completed.
Language: We continue working on our reading comprehension and building stronger sentences. The students also continued to work with R and H blends within words. We have been practices lots using the past tense verbs and I am starting to see the children use it independently in their writing!
Social: We continued to talk about family traditions. Specifically looking at the student's birthday and this also worked into our Mother's Day planning.
Science: We started our Needs of Plants and Animals unit. Last week we worked on what the difference between a living and non living things was.
Math: We completed looking at 2D shapes, this week we will introduce and move on to 3-dimensional shapes with a fun Star Wars theme.
Last week we were very lucky with many special guests teaching us fun things! We had Miss. Brenda and Miss. Trystin back to work on our printing, they have noticed their formation of letters is doing much better when asked to print the single letter, however when asked to form a word/sentence that is where many lose their letter form. That will be the focus this week. We also had Miss. Angel from division office come in and work with the students on their digital skills within a math lesson that I created. The kids learned how to use Google Draw. For Education week we had a special guest come in on Wednesday and teach us Zumba. Thursday a lady came and taught us about Celtic Traditions within Canada. Then Friday afternoon we had a BLAST at the science fair looking at all the displays that the division two students completed.
Language: We continue working on our reading comprehension and building stronger sentences. The students also continued to work with R and H blends within words. We have been practices lots using the past tense verbs and I am starting to see the children use it independently in their writing!
Social: We continued to talk about family traditions. Specifically looking at the student's birthday and this also worked into our Mother's Day planning.
Science: We started our Needs of Plants and Animals unit. Last week we worked on what the difference between a living and non living things was.
Math: We completed looking at 2D shapes, this week we will introduce and move on to 3-dimensional shapes with a fun Star Wars theme.
Thursday, April 19, 2018
Week 30
Looking at the ceiling art during our Art Walk
Hi everyone! It has been a busy week with lots of new exciting things going on here in 1PB. On Monday we had our very first swimming lesson. It was a chilly walk but the kids had so much fun. if your child has been in swimming lessons before could you please send their report cards to me ASAP to give to the instructor. Tuesday we also had the districts occupational therapist and OTA in the classroom here to work with the children on their printing skills. We worked on our 'flagpole letters.' Christine and I have been on the children this week to continue to better our printing skills, specifically starting our letters at the top. Class pictures were this week and all of the children were looking sharp! We also had the Jump Rope for Heart kick off assembly this morning and the students had a blast. You will find the fundraiser envelope in their kanga pouches tonight.
Language- This week we focused on working with R blend words. We also learned about what past tense is. Identifying the past tense verb in writing was very difficult for the children to do but we continue to practice throughout the day. Perhaps something you could do during home reading as one of your reading questions. We continue to work on our reading comprehension skills every single day. We are slowly becoming more confident in pulling out the keywords in the question to help us fine the answer in the reading.
Math: We continue to work through our various Fairy Tale math centers this week practicing our measurement skills. The students had a checklist of items in the classroom that they had to use a paperclip to determine how many units each item was in length.
Social: This week we continue to look at how family dynamics can be similar and different from our own. We have talked about and celebrated that families come in all different shapes and sizes just like us as individuals but we discussed what are some of the most important things about a family. The children came up with some beautiful answers. Next week I will need all of your help again helping your child come up with traditions your family may have.
Science: We continue to learn about the various aspects of spring. We introduced the names for certain baby animals that tend to be born in the spring and have written about why spring is so moody sometimes as it has been this year.
Friday, April 6, 2018
Week 28... I think.
Hello all! We had a wonderful first week back to school. The class has been working so hard Mrs. Cameron and I have been so impressed! Things to note for next week:
-Monday: Swimming lesson registration is due!
-Tuesday: I will be sending an information sheet home from AHS about the printing/motor movement module we will be starting in a few weeks with the Occupational Therapist assistant.
-Wednesday: Library day and Popcorn day
-Friday: Spelling test
Language: We have been working on our daily reading comprehension pages this week. We have been using the 5W question words lots this week to try and get more comfortable to pull the information out. We have been practicing pulling the keywords from the question to help us find the answer in the text. We also started working with S and L blend words. We will be continuing with this next week.
Math: The beginning of the week the students did a brief addition and subtraction review with the substitute teacher. When I returned I introduced our measuring unit to the kids. We looked at using pencils as a measuring tool this week. What inconsistencies did we come across if we used two different sized pencils, how do we accurately measure using this tool etc. We introduced the terms longer, shorter and the same when comparing two different items.
Science: We started working through our spring season workbook. We focused on the different weather changes that are going to happen as the season comes around. We also did cross-curricular looking at using and reading compound words that have rain in it.
Social: In social we have began to look more closely at our own families. We looked at our full names this week and how each of ours in unique. I told them the story of why I have the hyphenated name yet I am still a Miss, I also told them the story of why my parents chose my first and middle name. I have sent home a questionnaire today that requires your help to teach your kiddo why you chose their first and last name. On the back ignore the part about the family tree in the instructions, however please take the time to teach your child about their name as well as about when and why they moved to this community. I was quite shocked how many kiddos did not know their middle name or how to spell their last name. We had to log into good old PowerSchool to look many of them up.
Monday, April 2, 2018
Happy Easter!
Hi all! I hope that you all had a wonderful Spring break. Just a few things, unfortunately I will not be here tomorrow as I have been juror summoned. If you read this before Tuesday morning perhaps just warn your kiddos as we do not have the best track record for unexpected subs. A few more reminders for this week, please also note the important dates for the month on the side.
-Library day on Wednesday
-We will not be doing spelling this week as we get back into the swing of things
-Please sign up for swimming lessons
-Twin dress up day is on Friday
I am sending you all a big thank you! First thank you to all of you that were able to attend our student led conferences prior to the break. It was wonderful to see the excitement and pride the kiddos had to show you all their hard work. Another big thank you for all you do! In the hustle and mayhem that is 1PB I am one lucky teacher to have so many amazing parents and children to come to work to every single day!
This week we will be starting our differentiated reading comprehension in Language. I have created daily reading comprehension pages that are differentiated to your child's current reading ability. I have been so happy with how many kiddos have been bringing back their home reading consistently, I have seen a huge improvement in the last few months in a lot of their reading confidence. We will be continuing to work on basic grammar concepts when writing as well as starting to look into various blends.
In math we will be doing a quick review of addition and subtraction concepts before introducing our next unit-measurement
In science we will be taking a look at the seasonal changes that are starting to happen as we enter into spring. I have some fun activities that I cannot wait to share with the kids.
Social we will be starting our family changes, I will be needing your involvement and assistance in this unit as the children will be coming home with various questions/ activities that they will definitely need you help in answering. We will be looking more deeply into family traditions and changes.
See you all on Wednesday :)
-Library day on Wednesday
-We will not be doing spelling this week as we get back into the swing of things
-Please sign up for swimming lessons
-Twin dress up day is on Friday
I am sending you all a big thank you! First thank you to all of you that were able to attend our student led conferences prior to the break. It was wonderful to see the excitement and pride the kiddos had to show you all their hard work. Another big thank you for all you do! In the hustle and mayhem that is 1PB I am one lucky teacher to have so many amazing parents and children to come to work to every single day!
This week we will be starting our differentiated reading comprehension in Language. I have created daily reading comprehension pages that are differentiated to your child's current reading ability. I have been so happy with how many kiddos have been bringing back their home reading consistently, I have seen a huge improvement in the last few months in a lot of their reading confidence. We will be continuing to work on basic grammar concepts when writing as well as starting to look into various blends.
In math we will be doing a quick review of addition and subtraction concepts before introducing our next unit-measurement
In science we will be taking a look at the seasonal changes that are starting to happen as we enter into spring. I have some fun activities that I cannot wait to share with the kids.
Social we will be starting our family changes, I will be needing your involvement and assistance in this unit as the children will be coming home with various questions/ activities that they will definitely need you help in answering. We will be looking more deeply into family traditions and changes.
See you all on Wednesday :)
Tuesday, March 13, 2018
Week 25
Hi all! Hope you had a great and restful weekend. Here are a few of the things you need to know for this week. I am still collecting some recyclable materials if you guys still have any boxes around the house!
Wednesday: Popcorn day and Library day
Friday: Spelling test, St. Patrick's day dress up and Scholastic book orders due.
Language: We continue to learn about various letter combinations this week including 'or,' and 'qu.' We then use these words in our writing journals. We also read the story 'The Bad Mood" this week and wrote about a time when we were in a bad mood and what we did to fix it. The kids have also been looking through simple spring themed reading comprehensions that they are to do independently. This has been a struggle for some but they are getting much better at answering questions based on what they read.
Math: We looked at addition within 20. We practiced everyday how making ten or near doubles can quickly help us to answer the questions more quickly. We will continue this week and start looking at subtraction within 18.
Science: We finished up our Pinocchio puppets at the beginning of the week. Then we moved on to building a Captain Hook's ship. We used our Chromebooks and Google Draw to plan out how we wanted to build our ships. We continue to talk about the importance of fasteners and having a plan when building.
Gym: My week in gym we practiced pass and catching a ball with a buddy. We talked about when is it good to use an underhand throw versus an overhand throw. We then played some cooperative games for the second half of class.
Wednesday: Popcorn day and Library day
Friday: Spelling test, St. Patrick's day dress up and Scholastic book orders due.
Language: We continue to learn about various letter combinations this week including 'or,' and 'qu.' We then use these words in our writing journals. We also read the story 'The Bad Mood" this week and wrote about a time when we were in a bad mood and what we did to fix it. The kids have also been looking through simple spring themed reading comprehensions that they are to do independently. This has been a struggle for some but they are getting much better at answering questions based on what they read.
Math: We looked at addition within 20. We practiced everyday how making ten or near doubles can quickly help us to answer the questions more quickly. We will continue this week and start looking at subtraction within 18.
Science: We finished up our Pinocchio puppets at the beginning of the week. Then we moved on to building a Captain Hook's ship. We used our Chromebooks and Google Draw to plan out how we wanted to build our ships. We continue to talk about the importance of fasteners and having a plan when building.
Gym: My week in gym we practiced pass and catching a ball with a buddy. We talked about when is it good to use an underhand throw versus an overhand throw. We then played some cooperative games for the second half of class.
Friday, March 2, 2018
Week 24
Hi all! February flew by! I have updated our dates to remember for March. Student conferences are coming up, it's your child's chance to show you all about what we have been learning here in grade one. I will be sending out the sign up for that earlier next week on Sign Up Genius. We have been using raffle tickets this past week here in grade one.
Need to know:
Wednesday: Library day and early dismissal.
Friday: Spelling test
Language: We have finished looking at the long U sound this week. We also worked with the TH and CH sound. We read a lot of stories about standing up to bullies this week and ways we can be more kind to each other every day.
Math: We completed the numbers to 100 unit, we finished writing the quiz on Wednesday and had a quick review on Thursday about addition before we dive back into addition and subtraction to 20.
Science: We finished building out Goldilocks chairs this week. We read the story Pinocchio and started looking at a reading script of it. The students started to make Pinocchio puppets. We will use the story in language and continue building our puppets next week.
Need to know:
Wednesday: Library day and early dismissal.
Friday: Spelling test
Language: We have finished looking at the long U sound this week. We also worked with the TH and CH sound. We read a lot of stories about standing up to bullies this week and ways we can be more kind to each other every day.
Math: We completed the numbers to 100 unit, we finished writing the quiz on Wednesday and had a quick review on Thursday about addition before we dive back into addition and subtraction to 20.
Science: We finished building out Goldilocks chairs this week. We read the story Pinocchio and started looking at a reading script of it. The students started to make Pinocchio puppets. We will use the story in language and continue building our puppets next week.
Monday, February 26, 2018
Week 23
Hi all! I hope that you all had a wonderful weekend, I had a busy one moving! Here is the what you need to know for this week as well as what we got up to on week 24(time is flying by!)
Wednesday: Pink Shirt day. Kids are to wear a pink shirt for anti-bullying awareness. Also library day!!!
Friday: Spelling test and Mental Health activity day. The children will be rotating through various classrooms and going through various activities with other teachers to support taking care of our mental health. I think most of them will want to hangout with me all afternoon at my Lego room.
Language: We continue writing in our writing journals every single day, the kids confidence in independently writing sentences is coming along. A great thing to do at home is practice putting their spelling words into sentences. We finished looking at the long O and started looking at the long U. The students also started working with _sh and _ch sounds.
Gym: It was my week with them in gym, we went back to the dance unit we had started prior to Mission Impossible. The students are in LOVE with doing the cha-cha slide!
Math: We continue practicing skip counting by 10, 5 and 2s through our centers. We also working on the Chromebooks again to build a 100 chart using different shapes/pictures. We will hopefully be wrapping this unit up this week!
Social: DINOVILLE IS OFFICIALLY COMPLETE! It took us forever, it was a tad chaotic but it is finally done. We started to map it out last week, this will continue on this week and then we have a few more activities to do with it!
Science: We read the story "Goldilocks and the Three Bears" and we had the students build a chair our of paper that would be stronger than baby bear's that Goldilocks broke. Having grade ones fold things takes a lot of time and patience but we are almost complete the chairs! We also took a break from this and participated in the science challenge. I had to be as hands off as possible in this challenge and the students reviewed their knowledge from the 5 Senses unit to identify different items.
Wednesday: Pink Shirt day. Kids are to wear a pink shirt for anti-bullying awareness. Also library day!!!
Friday: Spelling test and Mental Health activity day. The children will be rotating through various classrooms and going through various activities with other teachers to support taking care of our mental health. I think most of them will want to hangout with me all afternoon at my Lego room.
Language: We continue writing in our writing journals every single day, the kids confidence in independently writing sentences is coming along. A great thing to do at home is practice putting their spelling words into sentences. We finished looking at the long O and started looking at the long U. The students also started working with _sh and _ch sounds.
Gym: It was my week with them in gym, we went back to the dance unit we had started prior to Mission Impossible. The students are in LOVE with doing the cha-cha slide!
Math: We continue practicing skip counting by 10, 5 and 2s through our centers. We also working on the Chromebooks again to build a 100 chart using different shapes/pictures. We will hopefully be wrapping this unit up this week!
Social: DINOVILLE IS OFFICIALLY COMPLETE! It took us forever, it was a tad chaotic but it is finally done. We started to map it out last week, this will continue on this week and then we have a few more activities to do with it!
Science: We read the story "Goldilocks and the Three Bears" and we had the students build a chair our of paper that would be stronger than baby bear's that Goldilocks broke. Having grade ones fold things takes a lot of time and patience but we are almost complete the chairs! We also took a break from this and participated in the science challenge. I had to be as hands off as possible in this challenge and the students reviewed their knowledge from the 5 Senses unit to identify different items.
Monday, February 12, 2018
Week 21
Hi all! I hope you all enjoyed your long weekend. I had a great few days at convention, I spent a lot of my Thursday in sessions looking at mindfulness and self regulation in the classroom. A few things for this coming week I want to ensure everyone is aware of.
Wednesday: Crazy Valentine's outfit day. The kids are to wear their Valentine's best this day. We will be having our special snack day this morning also but they are still to come with a lunch. I sent home a class list last week with all of the names of the students, I will put it below if that somehow did not make it home.
Wednesday: Crazy Valentine's outfit day. The kids are to wear their Valentine's best this day. We will be having our special snack day this morning also but they are still to come with a lunch. I sent home a class list last week with all of the names of the students, I will put it below if that somehow did not make it home.
Atticus
Ben
Skylar
Isabella
Colten
Reese
Cadence
Brady
Hunter
Dominic
Mersayde
Ivan
Declan
Kudrat
Daniel
Julianna
Owen
Derrick
Miss. PB and Mrs. Cameron
Friday: Pancake breakfast will be starting at 8:00am. There will be a pancake station
right outside of our class for the kiddos to drop off their stuff, grab some breakfast and relax.
It is also 100 Day AND pajama day(busy I know). I sent home a note today but for Friday
I have asked you to send on Friday a Ziploc bag of 100 items that your kiddo has counted out.
I stressed to them by no means do they need to go out and buy items, we had a discussion of
ideas for things they could find at home.
right outside of our class for the kiddos to drop off their stuff, grab some breakfast and relax.
It is also 100 Day AND pajama day(busy I know). I sent home a note today but for Friday
I have asked you to send on Friday a Ziploc bag of 100 items that your kiddo has counted out.
I stressed to them by no means do they need to go out and buy items, we had a discussion of
ideas for things they could find at home.
Language:
We finished up working with the long I sounds. The students practiced everyday putting these words into sentences, slowly but surely we are getting better at creating sentences. We also practiced some reading comprehension as we learned about Groundhog day.
Math: We continue to work with counting to 100, specifically skip counting by 2, 5, and 10. The students worked through some counting activities on the Chromebooks as well as we worked through various math centers.
Science: in our Building Things unit we worked through some explore time building towers using various materials we see everyday. Then we sorted various items based on what kind of material it was made of. We also learned about what a joiner/ fastener does and the various ones in which we use regularly here in grade one.
Social: Dinoville is still under construction. We have completed building houses, we each made a business that our community would need. We are still working on adding all of the other items that will be needed.
Gym: The students were over the moon about the Mission Impossible course myself and Mrs. Giles created in the gym.
Tuesday, January 30, 2018
Week 20
Odds and Ends:
Hi all! It has been a busy few weeks getting back into routine and finishing up the report cards. Those got sent home today in your kiddo's kanga pouch. Please sign the envelope and send it back to the school, you can enclose any comments within the envelope for me. If you would like to sit down and discuss anything after taking a look at the report card let me know and we can plan time! I am asking if you have any sort of recyclables at home smaller than a cereal box, paper towel rolls, toilet paper rolls, those odd craft items you aren't using to please send them to school for our Building Things unit. I sent home an order form for Pink Shirt day. For those of you that do not know Feb 28th we ask students and staff to wear a pink shirt to symbolize that we are against bullying.
Language Arts:
We have finished looking at the long A, and long E vowels. This has been tricky for the class, they have done a wonderful job at reading these words, but writing them independently has been tricky. We took down our social bulletin board and have now put up word families posters to try to get the children independently trying to identify some of those sounds. We have been also working hard at creating sentences independently. This has been a challenge but with the fun topics we have been writing about they are showing improvement in the independence of this.
Math:
We finished up our patterns unit and have moved on to numbers to 100. We have played a roll and color and a bump it game with a buddy. We just started our math centers yesterday and the students were very excited to get to work on these!
Science and Social:
We completed the winter unit and have just started looking into the Building Things unit. We talked about the different tools that builders would use and what kind of tools we can use here in Grade One. We also talked about how to be safe when building. We combined this building introduction with social studies as we are building our own community. We had a vote and decided to name it Dinoville. Yesterday we each built our own home, today we came up with the ten rules of Dinoville as a class, I apologize now if they try to tell you that sleeping does not happen on the weekends 😄. We have put two big tables in the back of our classroom where we will be building this.
Gym:
Last week in gym I started a dancing unit with the kids, they will be continuing on with this with Mrs. Derechey this week.
Hi all! It has been a busy few weeks getting back into routine and finishing up the report cards. Those got sent home today in your kiddo's kanga pouch. Please sign the envelope and send it back to the school, you can enclose any comments within the envelope for me. If you would like to sit down and discuss anything after taking a look at the report card let me know and we can plan time! I am asking if you have any sort of recyclables at home smaller than a cereal box, paper towel rolls, toilet paper rolls, those odd craft items you aren't using to please send them to school for our Building Things unit. I sent home an order form for Pink Shirt day. For those of you that do not know Feb 28th we ask students and staff to wear a pink shirt to symbolize that we are against bullying.
Language Arts:
We have finished looking at the long A, and long E vowels. This has been tricky for the class, they have done a wonderful job at reading these words, but writing them independently has been tricky. We took down our social bulletin board and have now put up word families posters to try to get the children independently trying to identify some of those sounds. We have been also working hard at creating sentences independently. This has been a challenge but with the fun topics we have been writing about they are showing improvement in the independence of this.
Math:
We finished up our patterns unit and have moved on to numbers to 100. We have played a roll and color and a bump it game with a buddy. We just started our math centers yesterday and the students were very excited to get to work on these!
Science and Social:
We completed the winter unit and have just started looking into the Building Things unit. We talked about the different tools that builders would use and what kind of tools we can use here in Grade One. We also talked about how to be safe when building. We combined this building introduction with social studies as we are building our own community. We had a vote and decided to name it Dinoville. Yesterday we each built our own home, today we came up with the ten rules of Dinoville as a class, I apologize now if they try to tell you that sleeping does not happen on the weekends 😄. We have put two big tables in the back of our classroom where we will be building this.
Gym:
Last week in gym I started a dancing unit with the kids, they will be continuing on with this with Mrs. Derechey this week.
Monday, January 15, 2018
Happy New Year!
It was a long, cold first week back here in 1PB. It has taken us some time to settle back into our routine but by Friday we were doing much better! We have been practicing slowing down when we are working so that our work is nice and neat. Using the lines to print on and coloring with detail has been a focus in grade one.
Language Arts: We have started to look at the different ways in which a long A vowel can be presented. We learned about the bossy e and the rule 'when two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking." We will continue practicing this next week. We have also been working hard at building simple sentences with all the words we have learned so far this year. This requires a lot of independence and lots of students struggle. I suggest when practicing spelling words have your kiddo come up with a sentence using that word! We also read a new story called "Favourites" which sparked our journal writing activities for the week.
Math: We started the week with a review of all of the concepts we have worked with so far. We then continued on with centers, we had lots of fun making our own pattern on the computers, with stickers, stamps, and so many other ways!
Science: We are looking at the winter season, how is it different from Fall. What do animals do in the winter was a big interest for the class. We will continue on with this next week. We finished our week drawing a winter scene using oil pastels. The kids were not fans of the way the oil pastels made their fingers feel but they turned out quite beautiful!
Social: We spent our first few days back doing a big review. We talked about what a group is, groups we are part of, rights and responsibilities, what a community is, as well as the difference between rural and urban communities. We spent time looking at a map and identifying their city, province and country names. This was very tricky for the children but we will keep practicing! We also did some community map work looking at how to read a comprehend instructions on a map.
Language Arts: We have started to look at the different ways in which a long A vowel can be presented. We learned about the bossy e and the rule 'when two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking." We will continue practicing this next week. We have also been working hard at building simple sentences with all the words we have learned so far this year. This requires a lot of independence and lots of students struggle. I suggest when practicing spelling words have your kiddo come up with a sentence using that word! We also read a new story called "Favourites" which sparked our journal writing activities for the week.
Math: We started the week with a review of all of the concepts we have worked with so far. We then continued on with centers, we had lots of fun making our own pattern on the computers, with stickers, stamps, and so many other ways!
Science: We are looking at the winter season, how is it different from Fall. What do animals do in the winter was a big interest for the class. We will continue on with this next week. We finished our week drawing a winter scene using oil pastels. The kids were not fans of the way the oil pastels made their fingers feel but they turned out quite beautiful!
Social: We spent our first few days back doing a big review. We talked about what a group is, groups we are part of, rights and responsibilities, what a community is, as well as the difference between rural and urban communities. We spent time looking at a map and identifying their city, province and country names. This was very tricky for the children but we will keep practicing! We also did some community map work looking at how to read a comprehend instructions on a map.
Friday, December 22, 2017
Merry Christmas!
Language: We have completed looking at all of the short vowel sounds. In the New Year we will do a review of that the first week back before going into the long vowel sounds. We also did some Christmas themed reading comprehension activities. We read a passage then looked at taking the information from what we had just read to answer questions. We did lots of Christmas writing between our daily Elf journals.
Math:We completed subtraction from twelve last week. We also started looking at Christmas themed patterns. We will continue on looking at patterns briefly in January before continuing on with addition and subtraction all the way to twenty.
Science: We had so much fun finishing our Christmas themed senses unit. We finished looking at each of our senses separately. Talked about how some work together. Ways that we protect our senses and how each sense helps to keep us safe. We learned about how animals use their senses. They wrote their quiz yesterday and they did awesome!
Social: We looked at Reduce, Reuse and Recycle and continued looking at ways we can be good citizens. This is also where we took a break and looked a bit at our own Christmas tradtions and how they were different from ones in other countries.
On behalf of Mrs. Cameron and myself, have a very Merry Christmas, enjoy your break and I will see you all in the New Year.
Monday, December 11, 2017
December 4-December 8, 2017
- Our Christmas concert will be next Wednesday, December 20 at 6:30.
-Ask your kiddo how their pencil crayons are doing, I went through our 'lost crayons' and returned to the rightful owner if their names were on it, however a good number of the students crayon collection is looking quite sad- still learning the whole pencil box/ sharpening pencils thing.
Language
We had a new visitor in our classroom, Mimzie the elf! Every morning we have been writing in our Elf journals about the trouble Mimzie gets up to every day. We have been working on the short O sound this past week. We have been looking at Christmas themed short stories and working on our comprehension skills.
Math
We have moved in from addition and have been working hard on our subtraction skills. We played "Hulk Smash" with play dough as an introduction to the concept. We also used a winter themed mitten manipulative to work through problems.
Social
We had another community helper come to visit us on Friday-firefighters! The children were so excited to see all of the bunker equipment and work on what to do in case there is a fire. We have been looking on what the students can do right now to be a 'community helper' until they grow up.
Science
We are working on our sense of smell. We watched a video on the way in which our nose affects our daily life. We did a smell test activity last week, we will be continuing on with this for half of this week before moving on to the next sense.
Friday, November 24, 2017
November 20-November 24
Odds and End
-No spelling next week
-Dental Health presentation Monday afternoon
-November 30 is wear a mustache/beard day
-No school December 1
This week we were very excited to welcome not one, but two new faces into our classroom! We had a new friend join us on Monday, we also have a new adult in the room. Mrs. Cameron will officially be with us Monday-Thursdays for the rest of the year. Also your child will all be coming home today with a book called "Good Morning Canada" that was donated by TD Bank to all Grade one students.
Language
This week in language we worked completed our short e- work. The students played a rhyming game with short A and short E rhyming words. We also spent some time looking at a book called Apples. In this book we analyzed the words and the pictures to find words/items that started with a specific sound, then we used the words we brainstormed in a sentence starter and had discussions about 'making sense' when we are writing. We did a cut and paste activity that also went along with this.
Math
We continue on with addition. We worked through more strategies, looking at drawing pictures, counting on and using a number line. The students loved playing I Spy having to find all of the addition problems that I hid around the room.
Science
This week we focused on our sense of sight. We did a graph looking at eye colors in our class. We talked about the different things we use our eyes for. We also talked about near-sighted and far-sighted people, they were quite amused at testing me without my glasses on. We also looked at braille. We looked at some pictures that made our eyes play tricks on us-optical illusions.
Social
In social we learned about the difference between rural, suburban, and urban communities. We discussed which kind of community Leduc is. The students did a writing activity describing their neighborhood and what their house looks like. We also started looking at what it means to be a community helper this week. We looked at the first community helper in our reader- a police officer.
Monday, November 20, 2017
November 13-17
Coming to you a couple days late, if you have had the luxury to hear the current state of my voice you would know why! Last week was a busy week, the class has loved to continue to develop our computer skills on various assignments on the Chromebook.
Language
We finished up working with the short A sound and introduced the short E. We did many rhyming activities, reading activities, writing in our writing notebooks, picture sorts, you name it! I also introduced the children to the website Starfall where they worked through at their various activities working on those two vowel sounds.
Math
We have introduced addition to 10 last week. We will be only going up to ten here so that we can go through the various addition strategies with ease. We only practiced last week using ten frames and pictures. The students are doing wonderful so far. Next week (technically this week) I will be showing them different strategies in which to use during addition. My goal with my current approach is to ensure they are all confident before we move on the the bigger numbers in the new year.
Science
Time to learn about our senses. The children were introduced to the vocabulary and the parts of their bodies that they use in each sense. Last week we practiced hard at recognizing these new science words, for example how the word eye is not spelled like the I that we use in writing everyday.
Social
We finished looking at rights and responsibilities last week and introduced the concept of community. We defined a community as a place where people live, work and play. We will be continuing on with this concept this week.
Friday, November 10, 2017
November 6- November 10
This week we had two special guests in our room. The division's tech coach Tarynne Angel came in to help the students learn how to work with their Chromebooks. They have picked it up quite fast! We also had Miss. Rachel come in again today to teach the students more about the Mind-Up curriculum. The students learned two different breathing activities to do when they are upset. We also looked again at the glitter jars settling and compared it to being mad/frustrated. We ended the session with a really fun Jelly Belly activity. I am really happy with how well the students are responding to the program so far. The kids were very respectful today during our Remembrance day ceremony. We still have had to have lots of conversations this week about being kind to one another and being 'hands off.'
Language
We worked on Raz-Kids listening to reading this week. We will be wrapping up out short A study on Monday and then be moving on the E. The children also got to explore the short -a activities on Starfall. We did readers that had us look at the short A sound, we did a matching activity looking at the -an, -at and -ap word families. We also got to work with and manipulate letter tiles in two different making words activities that worked with the short -a vowel.
Math
We wrapped up out number representation unit this week, finishing the unit with an assignment the student completed on Google Slides. We will be introducing addition to 10 next week!
Science
The students have officially completed their Creating Color unit this week. I had to have almost all of the students rewrite the exam today for not following the substitute teacher's directions. I am so excited to start our Senses unit with a Christmas swing on it.
Social
We have finished the "Belonging in my World" unit the students just need to complete a Rights and Responsibilities assignment on Monday then we will be moving on to "Taking Part in my Community"
Monday, November 6, 2017
October 30-November 3
Odds and Ends:
-You will see at the top I have added in a 'parent resources' tab for you all. There is math and language websites/apps there that may help you in getting in that extra practice at home.
-Winter is here! Please ensure you are sending your kiddos with everything that they need to play out in the cold.
Language: This week we started looking at writing and reading words that word with the short a vowel. We did a number of Halloween themed journal entries this week practicing using our color words. We also had a visit from Mrs. Rachel and see will be back every Friday for the next few weeks to teach our class the Mind Up curriculum. We looked about our guard dog(amygdala) and wise owl(pre frontal cortex) that live in our brain and what happens to them when we get mad. We looked how to calm our guard dog by smelling the flowers and blowing out the candles.
Math: This week in math we continued practicing working through math centers. This week they were Halloween themed which the kids loved!
Social: We introduced the concept of rights and responsibilities to the students. We looked through our big book and had many discussion on the rights we have and responsibilities that come with it. This theme fit right in with the hands off conversation we continue to have in grade one. We also started talking about the importance of Remembrance day. We discussed why we wear poppies and finished our week by starting our Remembrance day craft.
Science: Color mixing fun! The students had many opportunities to mix the primary colors together. They had to try to match a color that I created. It was messy but the children absolutely loved it! We will be finishing up this color unit hopefully this week.
-You will see at the top I have added in a 'parent resources' tab for you all. There is math and language websites/apps there that may help you in getting in that extra practice at home.
-Winter is here! Please ensure you are sending your kiddos with everything that they need to play out in the cold.
Language: This week we started looking at writing and reading words that word with the short a vowel. We did a number of Halloween themed journal entries this week practicing using our color words. We also had a visit from Mrs. Rachel and see will be back every Friday for the next few weeks to teach our class the Mind Up curriculum. We looked about our guard dog(amygdala) and wise owl(pre frontal cortex) that live in our brain and what happens to them when we get mad. We looked how to calm our guard dog by smelling the flowers and blowing out the candles.
Math: This week in math we continued practicing working through math centers. This week they were Halloween themed which the kids loved!
Social: We introduced the concept of rights and responsibilities to the students. We looked through our big book and had many discussion on the rights we have and responsibilities that come with it. This theme fit right in with the hands off conversation we continue to have in grade one. We also started talking about the importance of Remembrance day. We discussed why we wear poppies and finished our week by starting our Remembrance day craft.
Science: Color mixing fun! The students had many opportunities to mix the primary colors together. They had to try to match a color that I created. It was messy but the children absolutely loved it! We will be finishing up this color unit hopefully this week.
Friday, October 27, 2017
October 23- 27
Happy Friday! We had a wonderful week again this week. We had a fire drill this week and they did amazing! Make sure if you have no signed the consent form for Tuesday that you log onto Power School and do that!
LA: We talked lots this week about good fit books, we used the acronym "I Pick"
I choose
Purpose
Interest
Comprehend
Know
We also talked about what to do if we do not know how to spell a word during writing time. We worked on reading and answering questions about Halloween themed sentences. We finished looking at the individual sounds (there is a phonics book in their kanga pouch you do not need to send it back). Next week we will begin looking more into the short vowel sounds.
Math: Still working on our 1-20 knowledge we have been talking lots about odd and even numbers. We also practiced working with these numbers by working through our math centers. The students are getting much better at doing their 'jobs' during center time and transitioning with ease between centers.
Science: We had our Fall quiz earlier in the week and finished that topic up. We switched back to looking at creating color. Many of the kiddos had a hard time identifying color words again so we spent some more time on that. We also looked at primary and secondary colors. We talked about mixing colors and next week we will get to do it ourselves. We used color paddles to look at mixing colors too and learned a fun song to remember the primary colors.
Social: We continued to talk about our groups by looking at how some of our groups fit into other groups we are part of. For example their family and our school are all part of the community of Leduc. This was an amazing realization to them.
Keep a look out this weekend I will be posting a page with their Raz-Kids passwords as well as some apps/ websites you guys could work with at home. Many of you stressed to me how difficult it is to get them to do work at home. Perhaps some of these apps and games could help ease that for you.
LA: We talked lots this week about good fit books, we used the acronym "I Pick"
I choose
Purpose
Interest
Comprehend
Know
We also talked about what to do if we do not know how to spell a word during writing time. We worked on reading and answering questions about Halloween themed sentences. We finished looking at the individual sounds (there is a phonics book in their kanga pouch you do not need to send it back). Next week we will begin looking more into the short vowel sounds.
Math: Still working on our 1-20 knowledge we have been talking lots about odd and even numbers. We also practiced working with these numbers by working through our math centers. The students are getting much better at doing their 'jobs' during center time and transitioning with ease between centers.
Science: We had our Fall quiz earlier in the week and finished that topic up. We switched back to looking at creating color. Many of the kiddos had a hard time identifying color words again so we spent some more time on that. We also looked at primary and secondary colors. We talked about mixing colors and next week we will get to do it ourselves. We used color paddles to look at mixing colors too and learned a fun song to remember the primary colors.
Social: We continued to talk about our groups by looking at how some of our groups fit into other groups we are part of. For example their family and our school are all part of the community of Leduc. This was an amazing realization to them.
Keep a look out this weekend I will be posting a page with their Raz-Kids passwords as well as some apps/ websites you guys could work with at home. Many of you stressed to me how difficult it is to get them to do work at home. Perhaps some of these apps and games could help ease that for you.
Thursday, October 19, 2017
October 16-20
Odds and Ends
You will see that my blog has changed a bit, I had a technology guru come and help me in hopes to make it more functional and efficient for myself and for you all. If there is something you would like to see on here I am open to suggestions! At the top of page you will see a Kid Zone tab, this is where I will be putting links for the kids to click on and work with once we start with Chromebooks next week. Many of the links there will not work for you at home, if you would like some websites I will be putting a tab for you all up in the future. There is also a tab with the list for class party sign ups. If the date that I signed you up for does not work please let me know as soon as possible. Also if you are willing to fill one of the spots e-mail me to confirm I know many of you said you were willing which is greatly appreciated! I also added a spelling list tab which has the spelling words for the entire year! That way it is always there for you in case you cannot read it in the agenda(grade one printing is sometimes like solving a puzzle) or your kiddo was absent.
Language Arts
We are still working on the printing and individual sounds each letter makes.We have also been practicing lots with taking CVC words, stretching out the sounds we hear and putting those sounds down on paper. I have completed their testings that I will be sharing with you at parent teacher conferences. If you have specific concerns send me a note in their agenda so that I am prepared with the best resources/answers I can provide you.
Math
We have been practicing our counting by 2 skills more this week and are getting much more fluent at it. We are still working to build our number sense for 1-20. We also practiced the rules and responsibilities for working in math centers with activities we are familiar with. Next week we will be continuing with new centers.Science
We have wrapped up learning our the Fall season. Next week the children will have a quiz on their knowledge.Social
Still working on building our classroom community we read the story "What it Means to be Kind." We had scenarios that we worked through and had conversations. We brainstormed ways we could be kind to each other every day. The students also watched a Franklin video and had to identify the groups that Franklin was part of in the story, they also had to brainstorm groups Franklin was part of that may not have been in the story.If you have not signed up for conferences next week please do so! If you cannot make it next week but another time in the future works please let me know. Thank you for all you do have a lovely weekend!
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