November 21-22 and November 28-December 2

                                        Week of November 21-22 and November 28 – December 2
Dear Parents,                       

November is already coming to a close!  Students have been very busy at school learning and creating wonderful things!  Please remember that Tuesday, November 22 is a half day and there is no school on Wednesday the 23^rd.

Here is a look at the week ahead and the week we return from Thanksgiving break:

Reading:  We are continuing to work in our reading groups and centers.  Next week, we will practice retelling to the other first grade class as well as review our reading strategies.  We encourage students to try as many strategies as they can while reading before asking for help.  The week we return from break, we will discuss the strategies that we can use to check our comprehension and ensure that we understand what we are reading.  We will revisit setting, characters and retelling while paying close attention to evidence in the text to support and clarify our retells.

Word Work/Handwriting:  Next week, we will practice our letter formation.  We will be working with capitals H, K, and L.  When we return from break, students will be reviewing how to write capitals H, K and L as well as numbers 1-10.  We will also work with the beginning sounds of words and the vowels that are found within different words.

Writing:  Before Thanksgiving, students will be writing pieces about what they are thankful for.  We will be discussing the meaning of Thanksgiving and will give students time to reflect and connect through writing!  When we return from break, students will begin a new unit; Realistic Fiction!  Students will be introduced to this genre and will generate topic-lists and story maps to help begin drafting their own realistic fiction piece.   

Math:  Students have been doing a wonderful job with story problems!  They are enjoying all of the math games during centers and are sharing wonderful solution strategies that work for them!  Next week, we will continue working with addition story problems through whole group discussions and center games.  When we return from break, we will dive into a new section of Unit 3; Subtraction!  Students are eager to share subtraction strategies and are already thinking in terms of subtraction!  We will discuss subtraction story problems and different strategies for using subtraction.

Social Studies: Students have been working very hard on their own map creations!  They are excited to finish them up to share next week!  When we return from break, we will be finishing our unit on maps.  We will discuss how to locate places and objects on a map and how to use vocabulary words like “nearer”, “farther”, “on”, “under”, “next to”, and “in”.

We hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving and a safe holiday break!

~Your first grade teachers: Miss Field and Mrs. McIntire

The Week Ahead- November 14th to November 18th

Dear Parents,                                                      Week of November 14^th-18th

  We had a wonderful time on our field trip and students were thrilled to learn about the living things among their environment.  We also had great discussions about what we were sensing as we were on our nature walk and walking through the apple orchard.  Our Veteran’s Day assembly went very well and every student showed great respect and thanks to our Veterans.

Here is a look at the week ahead:

Reading: We are continuing to work in our reading groups and centers.  We have been practicing reading fluently and communicating appropriately in a reading partnership.  We will be discussing strategies for retelling a story and how to think and share thoughts with a partner.  This week we will focus on retelling settings and characters.   As always, we continue to practice using our strategies to ensure that our reading looks right, sounds right, and makes sense.  

Word Work/Handwriting: This week, we will practice adding “s” to different words to make them plural.  We will also practice changing and adding beginning and ending sounds to make new words.  For handwriting, we will continue to practice letter and number formation; focusing on M and N and numbers 1-4. 

Writing:  Students have cleaned out their writing folders and are ready to start collecting and selecting pieces to work with!  We will discuss the importance of selecting pieces to edit and publish.  We will also discuss how to share our writing and give constructive feedback to others so that we can go back and add details.  Students will review using the word wall as a tool and writing their name, date and title on each piece.   

Math:  We have started our new math unit; Solving Story Problems.  This week, we will be solving problems with multiple solutions and number combinations.  We will also play addition games with numbers and dot cubes.  Students will practice the strategy of “counting on” in order to help solve word problems and find missing quantities.  We will revisit some games to help explore the strategies. 

Social Studies: This week, we will continue exploring and labeling maps.  We will be labeling, identifying locations, and using numbers on a map to show sequence.  Students will also be creating their own maps of the classroom or their bedroom. 

Have a wonderful long weekend! 

~ Your First Grade Teachers: Miss Field and Mrs. McIntire