Happy New Year!
I hope you all had a wonderful and relaxing holiday season! As usual, we have been very busy the last two weeks in 1st grade! Check it out!
Last week was all about setting goals making resolutions. We made some fun projects to share our goals and resolutions to display in the hall.
We spent most of the week reviewing the Stormonth Way and revisiting our classroom expectations. We are hoping for an amazing 20171
This week we got back into full swing in all curricular areas.
Writers' Workshop
We launched opinion writing this week. This is my absolute FAVORITE writing unit! First graders learn to state their opinion and support it with reasons and details. We launch this unit by inviting first graders to bring in a collection from home. To begin, we put on our 'judge's' hat and learned how to judge our collection in order to determine a winner.
After we determined our 'winner' it was time to convince others by writing our opinions. Throughout the week we learned that in order to convince, or persuade, others we must give reasons and details.
Reader's Workshop
We continued our study of nonfiction reading. We focused on reading our nonfiction books aloud like 'experts'. We are practicing being fluent readers by adding feeling to our voice and sharing our learning in a teaching voice.
Math Workshop
We began Unit 4 on place value. We started the unit by exploring addition facts with teen totals. We are working on making a ten group when we add numbers with a total in the teens! WOW! This will make adding much easier :) So what does this mean? Take a look:
We are learning to 'find the ten group' in the addition sentence. Children are beginning to learn that they can can break apart the number partners in different ways. For example, in the above problem this children realized that 8 needs 2 more to make a ten. If you take 2 from 7, you are left with 5. So the number sentence reads 10 + 5 = 15. This is much easier to add than 8 + 7!
Here are ways we practiced finding the ten!
Adding on with dots
Using a double ten frame.
Using our grid to add: 9 + 9 = 18
WOW!
SAVE THE DATE
Our First Grade Parent Picnic is scheduled for June 6 from 11:30am-12:40pm. This is a time for children to share many of the things they have done throughout the year. Pack a blanket and picnic lunch to enjoy with your child! (More information to come!) This is always a special 1st grade experience. (In the event of rain the picnic will take place inside.)
