In honor of Halloween we read the story Spookley the Square Pumpkin. This is one of my favorite stories with such an important theme: Everyone is unique and special. After reading the story we had a class discussion about the main character Spookley. We talked about what he was like on the outside as well as on the inside. The kids did a great job describing this adorable, square pumpkin. We talked about how Spookley's feeling changed throughout the story. Events in the text can cause characters to change. In this story Spookley felt sad because he was different. He was sad when all of the round pumpkins teased him because he was square. He was happy on the windy, rainy night when all the other pumpkins were rolling into the bay and he stood his ground. He felt proud and happy at the end when he saved the pumpkin farm. The students did an excellent job of providing evidence from the text that supported how Spookley was felt. At the end of the story Spookley the Square pumpkin the farmer plants more unique seeds. His pumpkin patch is full of special pumpkins. They are all different shapes, sizes and colors. The students created their own creative pumpkin out of construction paper. During writing we talked about adjectives. The class learned that adjectives are words that describe. Their task was to write a descriptive writing piece describing their special pumpkin. The next day I read their writing to the class and we had to see if we could identify their pumpkin in the group. This was a great activity for them to learn that the more descriptive words they use the easier it was for us to find their pumpkin. They learned a lot and had fun!! Below are a few other picture from this week!
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We met each morning in small reading groups and worked on reading nonfiction books. On Tuesday students went on a hunt for nonfiction text features (heading, bold words, captions, labels, index, glossary, table of contents, etc) in a book of their choosing. They used the Seesaw app to take a photo of the page of the book with the nonfiction text feature. They then used the drawing tool to circle it and the microphone and typing tools to tell which feature they found. They loved it! It was a great way for me to see their level of understanding of these nonfiction text features. We had a beautiful afternoon so we did the second half of one of our writer's workshop outside. Students really enjoyed writing and sharing their pieces in the sunshine. We did our first SOLE in science this week! After discussing what we already know about the sun, I posed the question "What might Earth be like if we didn't have the sun?" Students organized themselves in groups. They used their chrome books to go on search engines geared for kids and began their research. We used the read and write app for google chrome which read the article to the students as it highlighted the word it read. This is an amazing feature for our first graders!! I also provided them with nonfiction books. Students were provided with large sheets of paper to draw/write what they learned to help answer the question. Then each group shared with the rest of the class what they found and we had a great class discussion. They were extremely engaged and I was so pleased with our first experience doing research. Way to go first graders!! Compound WordsToday we learned about compound words. Compound words are words created from two smaller words. For example bath + tub= bathtub, space + ship= spaceship. After creating compound words on the smart board I read the story "If You Give a Pig a Pancake." As I read the students listened for compound words. We found 7! The students made their own recipe card combining two words together to create a new word. They had a lot of fun. They couldn't wait to search for compound words in their own reading. DoublesIn math we continue to learn addition strategies that will help us because more fluent with our math facts. Today we learned about doubles. The students learned the importance of memorizing their doubles facts! To help us with doubles we listened and sang the doubles song. We made our own i-pods and sang the doubles rap. Keep working on those doubles first grade! NOnfiction text featuresWe continued to learn how to identify nonfiction text features in our reading. This morning we read the book The Sun together as a class. While reading we pointed out the table of contents, the glossary, headings, photographs, diagrams, labels, and the index. The students had the opportunity to read a variety of nonfiction books and hunt for nonfiction text features in their own reading. They were so engaged and excited! The students explored thick and thin questions during genius hour this week. We used the topic of spiders to provide practice at generating both thick and thin questions. Students are learning that thick questions are more complex and will take some time to research. These are the type of questions we want to think for our genius hour projects. Great things are happening in small group reading! Students are working hard at applying strategies to improve their reading. Students are learning that even when we are working hard at decoding the words, reading is about making meaning. We are practicing stopping and asking ourselves if we understood and can summarize what we read. We are also working on making sure the words that we are reading make sense with what is going on in the story. Many students at this age believe that reading is saying the words and saying them quickly and with expression. Of course reading fluently is an important piece, but it doesn't mean much if we don't understand what we are reading. It is exciting to see them applying this to books at their level. In writer's workshop we started writing our first informative pieces. Students need to have a topic sentence, at least 3 facts/details, and a closing sentence. They also learned how to add labels to their drawings to give more information about their pictures. We will continue to work on informational (all about) pieces for the entire month. The SunThe students have been learning all about the sun in science. Last week we created a chart about what we already know about the sun (using our schema) and what we want to learn about the sun. With the weather calling for sunny and 75 today it was the perfect day for a sun experiment. We discussed how the suns rays provide light and heat for the Earth. In order to see the suns heat energy in action we did an experiment. In a cupcake tray we placed ten objects: butter, ice, an eraser, a crayon, cheese, a chocolate kiss, a fruit snack, a lego figure, a quarter, and a marshmallow. The objects were placed in the sun all day. During science the students learned the scientific word "hypothesis." They each made their own hypothesis about which objects would melt with the sun's heat. We gathered outside to check the results. While outside we sat and enjoyed the sun's warmth. We discussed the importance of the sun and what would happen to the Earth if the sun didn't exist. I read the story Sunshine. The students went back into the classroom to record the results from the experiment and write one fact that they learned about the sun. Commutative property for additionToday in math the students learned about the commutative property. The commutative property states that it doesn't matter the order that you add the addends, the sum is always the same. For example 3+5=8 so 5+3=8. We practiced solving addition problems and then used the commutative property to show the flip flop fact. The students made their own flip flop with addition problems modeling the commutative property. They explained this strategy and drew a cube train model. In chapter 3 the students will learn a variety of addition strategies to build fluency. We had a great week. The work that's starting to happen in small group reading is exciting to see. Students each have an individual reading goal and at least one strategy to meet that goal. Students are working on applying those strategies during independent reading, small group reading, and individual reading conferences. We started using seesaw this week! This is essentially a digital portfolio. Each student has this digital portfolio with folders for writing, reading, math, and genius hour. In a few weeks we will be sending home a link to parents so you can view your child's portfolio. This week the students used the video tool to record themselves reading their September narrative. We will finish doing these on Monday. On Tuesday, the students will begin to use some of the other tools in Seesaw to do individual responses to our small group reading books. Very exciting and engaging! Many of the pictures below are from our first Genius Hour lesson. A letter was sent home this past Monday explaining the details. This week students began brainstorming ideas about what they would like to learn about during our Genius Hour sessions this year. I was so pleased with their enthusiasm and great "I wonder" questions! During the month of October we will be working on writing information pieces. Mentor texts will be used to teach students about nonfiction text features such as photographs, diagrams, labels and captions. We will have a variety of nonfiction text books for students to read and learn from. This week I introduced what it means to write to inform. The students activated their schema and came up with topics that they already know about. They generated pictures on an information map that they will add to and use to help them with their future writing. |
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