October 25th, 2016

Go Cubs Go! 

Today we are celebrating the Cubs first World Series game since 1945! Such an exciting time for our city and Chicago sports :) Please take a minute to read a few important updates and take a look at what's going on in our classroom.

Parent/Teacher Conferences

Thank you to everyone who has signed up or contacted me regarding parent teacher conferences. If you have not signed up yet, please visit our classroom SignUp Genius Account to schedule your time. am looking forward to meeting with you to discuss your child's progress thus far. Please remember that each conference is scheduled for just 15 minutes and many conferences are back-to-back. At the end of 15 minutes if we feel we have more to discuss we can schedule another time to meet. We appreciate your help and understanding in making sure we have enough time to meet with each family.

Halloween Information

Please see my previous blog posts regarding Halloween Information. Also, please be sure to read the Principal's Message for school guidelines around appropriate costume attire for our Halloween festivities. If you are unsure about whether or not something in your child's costume is appropriate, please contact me. Also included in Mrs. Gluck's blog are the guidelines around students going home for lunch on Halloween. If you plan on picking your child up for a costume change, please be sure to review the procedures. Thank you.

**Please note that due to recent events with clowns, clown costumes will not be allowed at school. We appreciate your cooperation in making the Halloween fun and safe for everyone!

Dressing for the Weather

With fall comes chilly temperatures! Please make sure your child is dressed for the weather. Students will be going outside each day. As the temperatures get colder, you may also want to send hats, gloves, and other items to stay warm. It's helpful to have everything labeled as things fall out of pockets and backpacks easily!

Writing

This past we we wrapped up our opinion writing unit and have moved onto informational writing. We independently listened to a story on PebbleGo about the Statue of Liberty and read a short non-fiction text together. We were given a writing prompt and analyzed it with the TAK model and brainstormed important information. We came up with our topic and conclusion by using the Core 4 sentence types and will continue to plan by organizing our writing with a T-chart this week. We will also be looking at our writing for conventional pieces such as uppercase letters at the beginning of our sentences, finger spaces, and end marks at the end. 

Word Study

Please remember to have your child sort their word sort each night. It is important that they say the word first and then lay it in the correct group and explain why it belongs there to really internalize the spelling patten. As mentioned in my previous blog post, I will not be collecting any word study homework until the beginning of the following week. Some families choose to use the weekend to complete homework and this helps me stay organized. Also, please remember to have your child put their names on the blue paper! Many children have turned in their word study homework without names on it and there's no way to identify who it belongs to. 

                                   Reading

We recently began a new text titled Going to School. This is a non-fiction informational text about how children around the world go to school. We will focus on identifying important text features that deepen our understanding such as labels, captions, and photographs. We will also identify the main topic and supporting details while asking and answering questions. Students are encouraged to go back into the book to answer questions. Answering questions may include making inferences as well - using the text and background knowledge to make an informed conclusion. During the next few weeks we will continue to differentiate between fiction literary texts and non-fiction informational texts. 

**Don't forget to be reading at home each night! It is expected that each first grader reads for 15 minutes a night. It may be independently, with a sibling, with a parent, or even on RAZ-kids. October reading calendars will be due next week and the November reading calendar will be sent home. 

                             Math

We have been building our numbers sense with addition and subtraction! We are continuing to work with fact families and number bonds to deepen our understanding of the relationships between numbers. We have also recently revisited word problems. We are looking closely at the situations and looking for key words that help us identify whether to add or subtract when given a situation. We also have been looking at a new type of number story - comparing. When we look at comparing number stories we are being told one part is greater or less than the other, but we need to find out by how many. When solving for these types of problems we can choose to subtract the parts that are the same or think addition and fill in the missing part to reach the greater number. See the example below:

Sam has 4 action figures and Jim has 1 action figure. How many more action figures does Sam have than Jim?

I can choose to subtract:

or I can choose to think addition:

 In either situation, we are comparing the two numbers. We will continue to work with number stories this week and identifying key words to determine what kind of problem solving steps we should take. In the coming weeks we will being working with multi-step word problems.

Social Studies

We have talked more in depth about the roll of our president and the important jobs he has to keep our county safe. We will continue to talk about what kind of character traits leaders should have and how we can be responsible citizens.

Science

This week our science focus was on how animals protect themselves and how engineers use nature to design things that humans use. For example, turtles have a shell to protect themselves. A bicycle helmet was designed to protect our heads with a turtle's shell in mind.

           Please check the IH School Calendar for other events that may not be listed.

October 25 - Early Release - 2:00PM Dismissal

October 27 - Literacy Night 6:30PM

October 31 - Halloween Parade and Class Party

November 8 - NO SCHOOL (Election Day/Institute Day)

November 17 - Family Reading Night

October 10th, 2016

I hope everyone is enjoying their long weekend! Please see some updates and friendly reminders below to see what's going on in our classroom!

MAP testing reports were sent home on Friday. Please make sure to check your child's take home folder for their reports. For additional information you can visit the Parent Letter from the district and the MAP Parent Guide. 

Picture retakes will be Thursday, October 17th. If you would like your child to have their school picture retaken, your child will need to return the entire original package to school on or before that date.

Our first Scholastic Book Order was sent home on Friday! Scholastic Book Order is a great resource where you can find a wide selection of quality children's books that are just right for your child's reading level and interests. Many of these books are at a lower cost than you would find in a book store too! If you would like to purchase books for your child, please see the attached note on the flyer for more information.

Halloween is approaching! Please see my previous blog post regarding Halloween
information. If you'd like to pick up your child to help them into their costume, it must be during our lunch time (11:00-11:40). Please send a note to school that you plan to pick up your child.

Our classroom is still looking for a few volunteers for our classroom parties. Please visit this link to sign up. You can visit the PTO Blog for additional volunteer opportunities as well.

Parent/Teacher conferences will be held November 21st and 22nd. This year we will be using an online program called SignUp Genius to push out our conference sign up sheets. You will be receiving an email in the next few weeks which will allow you to pick a time that works best for you. 

                                               Writing
We are continuing to build our foundations in opinion writing! With a new season upon us and the weather changing, we discussed the pros and cons to each season. Each child then chose their favorite season to write an opinion piece about. We began our planning by analyzing the prompt using the TAK model and then brainstormed using a circle map. We took our ideas and organized them into a T-Chart. Students were introduced to a color coding system to help them keep their ideas organized. This planning process helps ensure that students are staying organized with their thoughts. In the coming weeks we will look closely at our paragraphs and analyze our writing for interesting words, word choice and number or words in each sentence. 

Word Study

We have been working hard with in our word study groups! I sent an email last week regarding Words Their Way homework. While sorting, it's important to have your child say the word or picture first and then lay it in the correct group and explain why it belongs in that group. Please remember to only send the blue homework sheet back at the beginning of the week. With a shortened week this week, we will not be getting new sorts. 

                                                                                      Reading
We were introduced to a new shared text this week called The Recess Queen. This is a fictional story about a girl named Mean Jean who bullies other kids on the playground. A new kid comes to school and challenges Mean Jean who then realizes that bullying kids is not the right thing to do. As a class we've been analyzing the characters and the choices they make and the lessons they've learned to help us understand the central message of the story. In the next few weeks we will transition back to non-fiction text and work on identifying the main topic and supporting details. 

Math

We have been working on several strategies that help us build fact fluency. Fact fluency is being able to answer a math fact quickly. Counting on from the bigger number is one strategy that helps us build fluency. Here are some other strategies that help us build fact fluency:

• +0 Facts: Anytime you add 0 to a number, the number will not change
• +1 Facts: A quick count up strategy
• Doubles: Doubles facts stand out to us. Memorizing these facts helps us build fluency
• Doubles +1: Once we memorize doubles facts, we can then quickly answer facts like 5+6 by thinking of the double 5+5 and adding 1. 

We are continuing to work with number bonds and were introduced to fact families this past week. A fact family is a collection of addition and subtraction facts made from the same numbers. This will also help us understand the relationship between numbers and build our foundation of number sense. We will use these tools to help us solve word problems with missing parts in the next few weeks. 

Social Studies

We are coming to the end of our symbols study. Students have looked at many different symbols that stand for strength, freedom, and liberty. We also have discussed the president and his role in our country. We will continue discuss our president in the coming weeks.

                               Science

Our hermit crabs have arrived! We were so excited to finally get our class pets! We have been talking about how all living things need food, air and water to survive. Students watched short clips of animals and had to decide what it was that they were taking in to survive. We have also been watching our bean plants grow! Both of these are authentic experiences that help our children understand how living things grow and change. 

           Please check the IH School Calendar for other events that may not be listed.

October 10 - NO SCHOOL - Columbus Day

October 11 - NO SCHOOL - District Holiday

October 12 - NO SCHOOL - District Holiday 

October 13 - Math Night for Parents (1st & 2nd Grade) 6:00PM

October 18 - PTO Special Lunch (pre-order required)

October 25 - Early Release - 2:00PM Dismissal

October 27 - Literacy Night 6:30PM

October 31 - Halloween Parade and Class Party