Sound Energy Lab

As a part of our study of energy, the students visited the science lab to experiment with different forms of sound. The students rotated through various stations to explore the sounds that can be made from tapping, rubbing, shaking, and vibrating.

Light Energy Lab

Last week we visited the science lab to learn about light energy. The students explored with various types of light including lamps, flashlights, and poplights. We also read about and looked at pictures of various uses of light such as fireworks.

Family Tradition Quilt

A few weeks ago in Social Studies, we discussed family traditions and the students shared a few things that make their families unique. With the help of their parents, the students wrote down at least one of their family traditions on a paper quilt square. They then illustrated their work and shared them with friends.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Last week we learned about the sounds /sh/ and /ch/. To help the students remember /ch/, all of the first grade teachers taught a collaborative lesson in how to make chocolate chip cookies. Along with our phonics connection, we reviewed the purpose of entertainment texts and informative texts. We first read the recipe for chocolate chip cookies and discussed that it was meant for information because it teaches you how to make the cookies. We then followed the directions step-by-step. While the cookies were baking, we read Who Took the Cookie from the Cookie Jar by Vivana Garofoli and  The Doorbell Rang by Pat Hutchins. The students discussed why these stories were for entertainment. And, as perfect timing, right at the end of the reading of The Doorbell Rang, the oven timer rang and the cookies were ready. The students then enjoyed their sweet treat!

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Rainbow Day Lessons

Each Friday for the last several weeks and for the future few weeks, the students will be taught character education lessons by a guest teacher, Ms. K. She visits our class for about thirty minutes to teach social skills lesssons such as how the brain is the boss of their body, where safe seats are in a car, etc.

Skip Counting Practice

To help the students practice skip counting, we kicked off our shoes and counted them by 2's. They then traced their hands and added them to sentence strips. They then counted them by 5's. For independent practice, the students then created their own skip counting patterns using computer clipart of shoes and hands. The students used critical thinking and critical writing to determine which would be faster - to count by 2's or to count by 5's. They learned the technology skills of click, hold, and drag along with adding and editing text boxes.

Pumpkin Writing

Through our writing program, Write From the Beginning, the students are learning to write descriptively. This week the students wrote about a pumpkin. They wrote about what a pumpkin looks like, what it has, and what it can do. They used a Circle Map to brainstorm and then organized their thoughts on a Tree Map. After using the Tree Map to help them write sentences, we worked together to edit and revise the sentences. The students then wrote a final draft of their writing on pumpkin writing paper and colored it.

How Do Apples Grow?

Over the last two weeks we have been talking about different types of media and their purposes. Two of the main purposes we talked about last week were reading for entertainment and information. One of the books we read to learn more about the purpose of reading for information was How Do Apples Grow? by Betsy Maesto. After reading and discussing the book, the students wrote about what the topic of the book was and then identified whether the text was for entertainment or information. And, of course, they created an apple to go along with their writing!

Humpty Dumpty

A few weeks ago we studied various Nursery Rhymes. One of the Nursery Rhymes that we practiced was Humpty Dumpty. To help the students practice retelling a text including the beginning, middle, and end, the students took a two sentence strips and folded them in half. They wrote one part of the Nursery Rhyme onto each piece of the sentence strip including the title. The students then put them in order on a piece of construction paper. This became Humpty Dumpty's wall. They then placed Humpty Dumpty on top of the wall.

M&M Patterns

As a part of our study of repeating and additive patterns, we had a little fun with M&Ms. The students first used paper M&Ms that I made. They made several color repeating patterns and used craft sticks to divide the repeating sections. We then said the letter labels for each pattern and discussed how they were the same or different. On the next day, the students used the paper M&Ms to create positional patterns. The students were a little stumped at first when I gave each group a set of single-colored M&Ms but they soon figured out that if they turned the M's different ways they could create positional patterns. And, of course, it is even more fun and tasty to create patterns with real M&Ms!

Each Peach Pear Plum

This week in reading we have been learning about Nursery Rhymes. Along with reading traditional nursery rhymes such as Hey Diddle Diddle and Humpty Dumpty, we have been reading books based off of Nursery Rhymes. One of the books we read was Each Peach Pear Plum. In this book, different characters from different nursery rhymes "spy" one another. The story lends itself well to retelling using a Flow Map. Using a foldable, the students wrote and illustrated the order of the characters in the story and who they "spied." They then glued them in order on sentence strips and practiced retelling the story in small groups.

Patterns, Patterns, and More Patterns!

This week we have been working on all types of patterns. The students created their own original patterns, created patterns based out of set letter patterns, and extended patterns based off of picture cards. They patterned with macaroni, color tiles, pattern blocks, and computer manipulatives. The students had to identify the pattern core of each pattern, how many times the pattern repeated, where the pattern repeated, and whether it was a repeating pattern or an additive pattern. Click below to see a slideshow of their pattern adventures.

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