It's official--our "extended day" begins today!! For the next 25 school days, we will have school from 7:50 am to 3:25pm. That's a long school day, but we will make the best of it we can. Actually, it's a good week to have the extra time on hand because I was not able to complete all of the testing (Reading and Math) that I wanted to get done last week, but was reluctant to miss any more Reading Group time. So, my plan for this week is to do the testing in the morning when the kids are freshest, and to hold my Reading Groups in the afternoon during our "extra" time. That way, I get what I MUST do done, and we don't have to miss any more of our Reading Group time. Once the assessments for the report cards are DONE, we will use the extra time in the afternoon to have a bit of fun with Reading and Math. Hopefully, that storm which is threatening to move into our area on Tuesday night/ Wednesday day will fizzle out, and we can have another full week of school. Though there will NOT be any fluency sentences to study for homework this week (there won't be time to incorporate them in our day this week), there WILL be homework of "little readers" to practice reading each night, and 10 sight words to learn to read AND SPELL. The words your child will work with this week are the "demon" words for spelling for first grade. I teach them together because it's important for the kids to learn that many "question words" that begin with the sound of /w/ (in the English language) actually start with the letters wh-- who, what, where, when, why, and which. The other words on this week's list are other words the children often confuse. We will certainly practice them at school, but it would also help to have them practiced at home.
We have been working with money in Math class this past week--specifically, US coins. We reviewed their names and values first, and then began activities to practice adding them. We started with pennies, and then worked with pennies and nickels. By Wednesday, we were working on adding pennies, nickels and dimes. On Thursday, I "assessed" your child's knowledge of US coins--their names, their values, and your child's ability to add together small amounts of coins. The results of these evaluations were sent home to you on Friday. Most of the kids have learned the names and values of the various coins (though "nickels" and "quarters" are still occasionally confused), but many continue to need practice adding the money together. This coming week, we will add "quarters" to the mix, and then practice adding different combinations of coins together. We also have an activity we will do fairly often which involves being able to represent a value (for example, 23⍧) using different combinations of coins. It's challenging, but kind of fun, too.
Last week, we temporarily returned to our study of maps. When we learned about them in the fall, we neglected to discuss the different types of map features-- "physical" vs "human" features. Since this knowledge is something on which the children are to be assessed for the report cards, we needed to learn this material now to know it before the next reporting period. For any of you who might not know, a human feature on a map is any which a person needed to construct: highways, roads, buildings, parks, playgrounds are all examples of human features. A physical feature on a map is any feature which would be there regardless of the existence of humans: mountains, lakes, rivers, volcanoes, and oceans are all examples of physical features. The children practiced doing a sort of features on Thursday, and will find and identify them on a map this coming week. Once we are done learning about map features, we will return to our Social Studies unit of "Then and Now"--comparing life as it was during the pioneer days to life the way it is now. I "center" this study around a read-aloud of Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder. We have already shared the pictures books created from various chapters in Little House in the Big Woods in the last month or two, and have "met" Laura, her Pa, her Ma, her big sister Mary, and her baby sister Carrie, and their "good old bulldog Jack". We decided that the little grey cat ( who appears in the book but is never identified) needed a name, so we agreed on "Smokey". Sharing these picture and chapter books provides us with many opportunities to talk about life during the pioneer days--what family life was like, what people worn, how they got around, how they obtained the food they ate, and how they occupied their time. We have decided that our bulletin board will reflect what we are learning--The children are going to draw and color posters comparing aspects of life during the Ingalls' time with their own life today. We will add them to the hallway as they are completed.
We also need to return to Science, and our investigation of the human body. We have already learned about three of the six systems in the human body: the skeletal system, the muscular system, and the circulatory system. We understand what these systems to within our body. We have talked about why people need blood, and how it helps us to stay alive. Our goal is to have our study of the human body completed before April vacation.
Before I leave this newsletter for the week, I want to suggest that for these extended days that your child brings TWO snacks to school (one for our 9:30 am snack, and I will add another snack period around 1:45 pm). Please keep sending in snow pants, boots, hats, and mittens until the snow is gone from the ground. We have outside recess every day possible, and wet clothes and shoes are not comfortable to sit in all afternoon. I also wanted to remind you that next Friday, March 17th, is no longer a "Teacher Workshop" day. Your child will be expected to attend school on that day. Finally, we are still expecting to go to Sunday River for a day of skiing on March 24th. We will provide more details as the date approaches. Have a good week. I will be in touch again next weekend.
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