What We've Been Up To This Week

The Falcons have been writing how-to books for the past several weeks. This week, they picked one book to revise, edit, and start publishing! Soon, the published books will be hanging in the hallway for your enjoyment. Here are just a few of the topics covered in room 108:
How to Jumprope
How to Brush Your Teeth
How to Build a Snowman
How to Ski
How to Sing the Alphabet
How to Play Top-It

 In science this week, we used the earth materials we've been studying to make sand sculptures and clay beads. Students then compared and contrasted their creations using a Venn Diagram!
 

In readers' workshop, students are continuing to read non-fiction books and use text features to get more information out of the book. We even compared and contrasted the pictures in a fiction and a non-fiction book! Students noticed that while fiction book illustrations have detailed pictures, non-fiction books have zoomed in pictures with labels and captions.
 Instead of guided reading groups, I have been reading with each student individually and assessing their accuracy, fluency, and comprehension to determine their independent reading levels. I will talk more about this with each of you at conferences in the coming weeks.

 As of now, it is looking like the 100th day of school will fall on Tuesday, February 11th! That is, of course, if we don't have any snow days between now and then. There will be information about our 100th day celebration coming home soon!

 Your conference confirmation slip will be coming home in red folders on Monday! Please let me know as soon as possible if the date and time on the slip does not work for you. I look forward to chatting with you all very soon!

Snapshots from our week

We had a great week experimenting with sandpaper, making dice roll graphs, writing with our kindergarten buddies, and learning about the important work of Martin Luther King Jr. Here are a few photos from the week!






Next week I will be sending home winter conference sign up sheets.  Please pick your top 3 slots and send the sheets back/email me with your top choices as soon as possible.  I will do my best to have a schedule ready by the 27th of January.  I look forward to showing you all the great work that has been happening in our classroom!

Happy MLK Day!

Hello, 2014!

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a great vacation and 2013 wrap-up!

We started the new year with new student-made class rules and a lot of new learning!

In readers' workshop we've started reading and studying non-fiction texts.  We've been practicing using text features such as table of contents, diagrams, captions, and bold words to help us learn more about the book's topic.

In writers' workshop we are writing how-to books!  Students made lists of things they are experts at, and are writing step-by-step instructions to teach their skills to their readers.

Place value has been our focus in Everyday Math. We've played lots of games with base-ten blocks to help understand this concept. We've also learned how to properly use the <, >, and = signs to compare numbers. 

More next week!