The Blogcat

Nov. 22nd

Cindy O'Dwyer — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 23:40:53 +0000

Hi all. We have had a busy week and I am still trying to catch my breath. We spent a lot of time on Social Studies and comparing life long ago to today. We focused on Colonial Life. The children went back in time as Colonial children. We made hats and collars and dressed the part. We made lemonade, butter, cornbread, quill pens (and wrote with real ones too), hornbooks and more. The children learned how their lives would have been long ago. Our trip to Hagley is later in time than Colonial Times, but it demonstrated how life was like and the children loved it. Our class is also going to be learning about maps. We are participating in a special project where we are making holiday cards and we will send our cards to 24 different classes around the United States and Canada. We created pictures in paint and the children are using these pictures to be the cover of their card. We are making our cards in Publisher. After we complete our cards we will write about our school and our state so the other classes can learn from us. This is an exciting project that I am glad to be a part of. As the project gets underway, we will be integrating technology such as Voicethread and we might even Skype. The bookmark strategies continue to be a focus and the children are using these more independently each day. We are working on long vowels, especially those with the silent e at the end of a word. We are also working on looking at a word and taking of the ending (s, ed, ing) to read the word and then adding the ending back on. These endings are tricking some children and this strategy works well. We continue to identify the main idea of stories and this is something that you can reinforce at home when you discuss books. Continue to talk about characters, setting, problem and solution of fiction stories too. In writing we learned not to use the word ”and” too much and we continue to work on using punctuation correctly. In math we are working on addition and understanding that addition is part + part = whole. We are making up addition and subtraction stories. It’s hard to believe that there are only two more days of learning until Thanksgiving. There is a lot to do in those two days. I wish you and your family a Happy Thanksgiving.

Nov. 15th

Cindy O'Dwyer — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 15:20:31 +0000

Hi all. It has been a while since I sat down to write. I was busy working on report cards. I enjoyed looking through your child’s portfolio while doing report cards and it amazing to see the growth that has occured in such a short time. I am proud of all the children. Things have been going well and we continue to learn a lot. We had a great week this past week. We have been working on being kind to one another and to follow the rules of the class and the school. The children have done a much better job with this over the past week and I am encouraged that it will continue. Every child tried hard and we accomplished so much more due to their efforts. We have been working on long vowels. We know when we see an e at the end of the word it probably makes the vowel before it say the long sound and the e is quiet. We continue to work with the word wall words. This week we learned how to play mind reader. During writer’s workshop I continue to encourage the children to look at the word wall word to spell these words correctly. The more you work with the word wall words the easier this will be for your child. If you say a word wall word your child should automatically know it is a word wall word. In reading we are working on story elements of characters, setting, problem and solution of a story. Please talk about these elements when you read stories at home. We are also learning about main idea and retelling a story. In math we reviewed the concept of odd and even numbers. We know that an odd number is missing a partner and an even number has partners. We also learned how to tell animal stories and how to represent these stories with addition sentences. We are learning that addition means part + part = whole. In science we added guppies and snails to our aquariums. We continue to observe our aquariums and terrariums to see how they change. This week coming up is a very busy one for us. Wednesday we will do Colonial Life centers to help us learn about life long ago. Please send in the item(s) that were assigned to you last week for this event. Thursday is our feast and we would love to have you join us. Friday is our field trip to Hagley Museum so dress for the weather. The sun is finally out so enjoy the shine!

Oct. 31st

Cindy O'Dwyer — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 14:36:26 +0000

Happy Halloween. We had a great time yesterday at our Storybook Character Parade and party. Thanks to all those families who contributed to make it so successful. Special thanks to Kim Roberts for coordinating it all. The children really enjoyed themselves. If you get a lot of candy and would like to donate it to our class it would be extremely appreciated. This week was another busy week. We added millipedes to our terrarium and we continue to observe the terrariums to see if there have been any changes. We went on our organism walk and looked at many habitats and discussed what many organisms would need to survive. We looked for organisms and found crickets, grasshoppers, worms, and salamanders. The weather was nice and the children learned a lot. In reading we continue focusing on the vowels. Focus has been on the short vowels. We looked at plurals and how adding s means more than one. The children are using the bookmark strategies more independently and they are enjoying seeing their TLC number increase. For comprehension we are retelling stories and looking at the beginning, middle and end of the stories. When doing this we tell the most important things from the beginning, middle and end of the story. This is easier than it sounds. Have your child tell you the beginning, middle and end of stories that you read at home. We are also talking about main idea. In writing we are showing our feelings and actions rather than telling you the action or feeling. When your child writes please hold them accountable for spelling the word wall words correctly. Correct short vowels should be represented in words. Many children are using a for all the vowel sounds or they are not including vowels. We have worked hard on this. We have also worked on using capital letters correctly. We threw the capital letters out the window and only invite them back when we start a sentence or write a name. In math, we partitioned a number several ways. We continue with missing pockets and this is very difficult for the children. Our Race for Education walk is Nov. 6th and we hope you join us for this walk. Thanks to all those families who provided name labels. We have raised a lot of money. Have fun trick or treating! I can’t wait to hear all about it on Monday. Be safe.

Oct. 25th

Cindy O'Dwyer — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 18:41:00 +0000

Hi families. The rain has stopped and it is a beautiful day. We have had a very busy week and we have another busy week ahead of us. Before I tell you what we learned this week, I want to go over some upcoming dates. We have our organism walk on Tuesday so please dress for the weather. Friday is our Storybook Character Day parade. We made our costumes in school. All your child needs to do for that day is to wear black or dark colored clothing. The parade begins at 2:00 with our party directly after. You are welcome to join us. We made terrariums and added moss, tree seedlings and pill bugs so far. We have one more organism to add to our terrariums and then we will make aquariums. We keep working with our bookmark reading strategies. We have reading partners and we the children have selected a reading spot for reader’s workshop. We continue to work on the vowels. We also worked on beginning blends. We have been focusing on what a sentence is and the naming part of a sentence. Punctuation and starting our sentences with a capital letter is another area of concentration. We are working on characters and setting. Summarizing was the comprehension strategy we worked on. In writing we continue to add details to our small moment piece. We are using the strategy of show not tell to show our feelings or actions rather than just coming out and saying our feelings or actions. We are also trying to better understand what a sentence is so we can put our punctuation in correctly. The children are using the word wall more and more to spell and I love this. In math we are partitioning numbers into two and three parts. We are making all different number sentences for the same number. The children are learning that addition means part plus part equals whole. We enjoyed the movie, Where the Wild Things Are, on our field trip and we used a Venn diagram to compare the movie to the book. We discussed the characters and setting as well as the parallel between the characters Max and Carol. Not much else to report. We really did a fun week!

Oct. 18th

Cindy O'Dwyer — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 19:04:23 +0000

Hi families. Things are rolling along and there is a lot going in our class. I enjoyed meeting with the famies that were seheduled for October conferences and I look forward to meeting with the rest of the families in December. I always enjoy having the time to focus on one child. I enjoy learning more about the family members of the children in my class and I learned so much from each conference. Thanks for taking the time to arrange your schedule and meet with me. Since they split conferences this year, if you did not meet with me, we will meet in December. I am always here if you need me or have any questions. In reading we have working with our bookmark reading strategies. The children really use the bookmark in class and they are increasing their strategy base each day. Please remember to use the bookmark at home when reading TLC. We have started reader’s workshop and the children are reading books on their level during this time. They are applying the reading skills taught in class. We have talked a lot about characters (main character) and setting of a story. We have begun talking about the problem of a fiction story. We are exploring nonfiction books as well as fiction books. We continue focusing on vowels and we have learned all the short and long vowel sounds. At this point in the year, the children are using the short vowel sound first and if that doesn’t work then they are using the long vowel sounds. I have taught that if there is one vowel in the word to use the short sound and if there are two vowels in the word then use the long sound. If there are two vowels in the word then the first one does the talking (says its name- the long sound) and the second vowel is quiet. In writing we continue writing a small moment story. We are adding details by using sound words, dialogue and the inside stroy. Ask your child what the inside story is. The class is coming together nicely and the children have worked hard to be nice friends and work like learners. Now that this is developed I am able to take more reading groups on a daily basis. In math we are working with a ten frame. This enables children to count in different ways and to develop different counting strategies. We are working on the concept of addition and we will introduce missing addend next week. We have a busy week ahead of us. We have bookfair and our field trip. All the information is listed on the homework. The rain has finally stopped so enjoy the dry weather. Talk to you again soon.

Sept. 25

Cindy O'Dwyer — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 03:50:34 +0000

Happy Friday. We have had a very productive week. The class continues to work together to be kind friends. We continue to use active listening and I am proud of the progress each child has made in this area. We celebrated our first pompom party with game day and this was a huge success. The children have almost met the second goal and stuffed animal day is quickly approaching. A Race for Education packet went home this week. In this packet there is a blank label sheet. Please fill this out by providing at least five names and addresses. Please participate and show your support. We have learned a lot this week. We are working on a special project (getting to know you) to share with you next week at Open House. The children used a digital camera and a little computer called an axim for this project. I will discuss the first grade curriculum and the classroom procedures on Monday, October 5 from 6-7. This is a very important night and I hope you can all attend. This week in writing we worked on understanding what a small moment story is. We are learning to stretch out one small moment in time and tell it long. We learned to plan our writing by telling it across our fingers. Small moments will be a focus for the next couple of weeks. We worked on our new word wall words and our new vocabulary words. In phonics we worked on short i and adding s to words. Centers are going nicely and the children are working more independentally each day. I have begun reading groups and it is nice to have them underway. We are learning the bookmark strategies, which will come home soon and be discussed at open house in more detail. These strategies help us when we get stuck on a word we don’t know when reading. We will be focusing on understanding each strategy nesxt week as well. These are the strategies that we will be applying all year. In math we learned about shapes and how shapes can be put together to make new shapes. We started our first science unit on organisms. As you can see it has been a busy week. Enjoy the long weekend!

Sept. 18

Cindy O'Dwyer — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 20:51:25 +0000

September 18, 2009-It’s hard to believe that it is Friday already. We had such a busy week. We continue to build our classroom environment as we make new friends and get to know one another better. The children are working on being kind friends and making good first grade choices. Active listening continues to be an area of focus. Focusing during learning time and keeping our bodies under control has been an area of concentration. The children are doing better with this, but we will continue to work at it to increase our learning. To help us learn to focus we play a game called the electric hug. We were able to set a new record of 17 seconds this week. Yeah! Ask your child how we play and why they think we were able to get our time down this week. The electric hug also teaches us to work together. During our day the children often work in pairs or in groups so it is very important for us to learn how to do this in a productive way. We reached our goal of 20 PomPoms and we will have a game day on Tuesday. Your child may bring a game of their choice to class on Tuesday. We set our next goal of 25 PomPoms. When we reach our goal we will have stuffed animal day. We have learned some much that I hardly know where to begin. We added new words to our word wall words and worked with the “ake” and “and” chunks. We worked with short i and the ending sound of x. I finished assessing the children in reading. Reading groups are ready to roll next week. Centers are a favorite and I am impressed with how quietly the children are working during this time. I continue to reinforce how important it is for centers to be quiet so reading groups can focus. Whisper voices are being used and I love it! During writer’s workshop we began learning about small moment stories. We are learning to write about something that happened in our lives. We are learning to stretch out the moment by adding details and by zooming in. The next couple of weeks will continue to develop the concept of a small moment. Writing conventions is another skill that we have been working on. The children learned that a sentence is a complete thought, it starts with a capital letter and ends with punctuation. This is a hard concept and one that will be revisited throughout the year. In math we are learning about shapes. The children are exploring shapes that are put together to make new shapes. We are comparing how shapes are alike and different. We have also begun using math journals. Number of the day is an activity that we do in these journals. We write as many different number sentences for a specific number as we can think of. For example- if the number is 10 we would write all the number sentences (addition and subtraction) that equal ten that we could think of. In our journals we have also started math word problems. The children learned to read the problem, draw a picture, answer the question in a complete sentence, write a number sentence, and use words to tell how they got the answer. I was amazed at how well the children did with this. We certainly have some mathematicians in our class. We started working on a special project called Getting to Know You. Information and homework relating to this project will be coming home next week. Paperwork for the Race for Education went home today. This is a big fundraiser for our school so I hope you will all participate. Please fill out your labels and return to me before Sept. 28th. I feel like I have gone on and on. Have a good weekend!

Websites

Cindy O'Dwyer — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 14:12:10 +0000

We will be adding to this list as we are introduced to new websites in class. As the children become ready to use one of the links I will also add a link to the list. Have fun reinforcing learning in school with these sites.

http://www.randomhouse.com/kids/junieb/

Homework

Cindy O'Dwyer — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 13:39:24 +0000

Homework is posted on Monday for the entire week. Although word wall homework is only given once a week, please spend some extra time to practice the word wall words as needed. I suggest practicing the words each night.

“Children are made readers on the laps of their parents.”

— Emilie Buchwald

Reading with your child and to your child are two of the most important things you can do to foster your child’s reading development. First graders are not too old to have you read to them. Let your first grader read to you (TLC) and then read to them. Picture books and easy chapter books are great to share aloud. Have fun reading together!

Word Wall

Cindy O'Dwyer — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 13:36:42 +0000

It is important to practice your word wall words nightly. You should be able to read the words and you can look at the word wall to spell the words correctly when writing. The word wall words can help you read and spell other words too. Be creative when you are practicing and have fun learning your word wall words!

Do you like to do word searches? Try making one to practice your word wall words. http://puzzlemaker.discoveryeducation.com/