Hope you are having a wonderful time with your families and friends. Remember to use RAZkids and Xtramath over your holiday break! Help your child keep his/her skills growing! The end of the 2nd trimester will be here before you know it!
During this holiday season please continue with Random Acts of Kindness! Every Thursday the Ponderosa First Graders perform random acts of kindness for someone in our Ponderosa Elementary School building. In the wake of the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., NBC anchor Ann Curry expressed her wishes for people to honor the 20 children lost by doing 20 random acts of kindness (or 26 random acts of kindness). Remember an act of kindness doesn't even need to cost a penny~even a smile for someone in need is an act of kindness. Enjoy your holidays with your awesome children!
A little thought and a little kindness are often worth more than a great deal of money.John Ruskin
Enjoy watching this as you see how one small random act of kindness is "paid forward".
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Here is a song we sing every Thursday when we perform a Random Act of Kindness at school! Have your child sing this song for you!
You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late. Ralph Waldo Emerson
We look forward to seeing you in 2013! Have a wonderful time with your families and friends! Enjoy all of the extra hugs and just spending time together! You are truly the best! Love, Ponderosa's First Grade Team! Janelle, Jody, Melissa, and Sandi
Our thoughts are with the families, children, friends, staff, neighbors, and all of those effected at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut! Ponderosa Families and First Graders~Your First Grade Team loves you with all our hearts!~ "Hugs can do great amounts of good, especially for children!"
Princess Diana, Princess of Wales
We are learning about winter holidays around the world. To begin our learning this week we started learning the names of the 7 continents to give the children background schema about where the countries are that we will be learning about and where they are in relationship to Colorado. We learn about other countries and different cultures and how they celebrate so that we understand different points of view. Using our critical thinking helps us better understand everyone. As a global school it is very important that we understand that we are a small part of a large world around us. We can understand other people better if we first understand ourselves. Please take time to talk with your child about your family beliefs, values, and how you celebrate winter holidays at your house. So far this week we have viewed a video about Christmas around the world and have also learned about Hanukkah. Stay tuned to find out what other countries and cultures we are learning about in our "travels around the world". We are also doing "close reading" about each of the countries that we are visiting and writing paragraphs about what we have learned about each country. As we do "close reading" we use our pencils to read. On the paper we are reading we pay attention to vocabulary words we think are important, we write down what we are wondering, we write questions we are having as we read, and we also write what connections we are noticing as we read. Be looking for the holidays reading and writing that we have worked on to be coming home during your holiday break! You will become a "close reading" expert as your child teaches you about "close reading". We will be using what we have learned from our "close reading" to write paragraphs about each country and culture we learn about. Children will be citing evidence from what is read as they write paragraphs about what has been learned. First graders at this time in the year should be able to write a paragraph using: * a topic sentence "topic, topic, a topic, topic sentence" * a transition word to start each big idea "transitions, they move our writing along" * 3 big ideas "big, big, big idea" * an additional sentence telling more about each big idea. "stop and tell me more, tell me more about about the big idea" * and end with a conclusion "conclusion, conclusion, this is how we end. 7 Continents Song
A video showing many different countries that celebrate Christmas!
Enjoy this Hanukkah song the children loved singing as we learned about Hanukkah.
The Carol Deck the Halls originated in Wales. This song in sung in Welsh and allows the children to recognize the connection between the Welsh words and the English words. We hope you enjoy learning about holidays around the world right along with us.
As we traveled to Mexico we learned about the poinsettia, a pinata, the Posadas which takes place nine days before Christmas. Nativity scenes are the most common Christmas decorations in Mexico at Christmas time.
A site we watched to learned about a Swedish Christmas.
Oh, Tannenbaum is a song we listened to when we were learning about Germany!
We play a game called SPIN IT TO WIN IT!!! We watch Between the Lions a phonetic video and we take notes as we are watching. We know what skills we are looking for before we watch and then we take notes on a T-Chart! Yes, your child is learning about note taking! Children are even able to state their own learning targets before we begin! This week we have had 4 learning targets: * I can find words with a short ( a, e,i, o, and u). * I can spell words with a short ( a, e,i, o, and u). * I can segment words with a short ( a, e,i, o, and u). * I can add a silent e to short vowel words and turn them into a long vowel word. ex: man=mane, can=can, not=note We write the 4 learning targets on the board and put our magnetic spinner in the middle of all 4 statements. The children get a change to come to the board and spin the spinner. Which ever learning target the spinner lands on the spinning child gets to give an example for the learning target. When the student correctly gives an answer he/she gets a cheer "Hey,______________! You met your learning target!
2 dimensional shapes and 3 dimensional shapes are an important component in math this trimester! Children should know the difference between 2D and 3D shapes. They should also be able to compose and decompose shapes and be able to state the shapes that are used to make new shapes. These are a few of the songs we listen to as we are learing about shapes. Children need to be able to apply and transfer their learning in all mathematical areas.
Our
first graders are on a Daily 5 and CAFÉ adventure! This is the reading
and writing structured routine implemented in our classrooms.
Daily 5
is the structure we use to plan our 90 minutes
of uninterrupted reading block. Children are busy completing meaningful
literacy tasks. The choices are:
·Read
to self
·Work
on writing
·Listen
to reading
·Read
to Someone
·Global
Awareness, Current Events, and Critical Thinking (A
new implementation we created that we are doing whole group)
During
Daily 5 we are focusing on increasing our stamina to work independently during Read
to Self time. The children can read independently for 30 minutes at
this time. Children also Read to Someone in EEKK
style-(elbow to elbow, knee to knee). Children Work on Writing during
this time and Listen to Reading. Each first grade teacher is meeting
with small groups and conferencing with individual students. Word Work Wednesday is flexible grouping spelling groups. At this time we have 5 spelling groups working on: beginning sounds, short vowels, blends, digraphs, and long vowels. Each child took a pre-test to see exactly what spelling skills he/she should be working on. Daily 5
is how we schedule our language block. CAFÉ is what we study during this time. CAFÉ is
an acronym for the four major components of reading.
They
are:
·C for Comprehension
·A for Accuracy
·F for Fluency ·E for Expanding Vocabulary
The children learn reading strategies within each category. These strategies will become tools for the children to use to help themselves become better readers and writers. We will keep you informed through FIRST NEWS when new strategies are introduced. Then, when you read with your child at home, you will be able to reinforce these concepts.
It is exciting to watch your child's reading and writing skills blossoming.
Our learning target this week in math is to be able to identify and name 2D and 3D shapes! We told the children that this week they are to talk at dinner time about 2D and 3D shapes and to find real world objects around your house that represent these shapes! Have your child sing the Shape Name Game song to show you what we have learned this week!
Wow! We are looking forward to having our Grandparents come and eat lunch with us on Friday, November 16th! We will have special projects hanging in the hallway down by our classrooms for our Grandparents to see. We will also sing this special Grandparents Day song to our Grandparents! The children are all so excited! Grandparents are a gift! Yes, the words to this song will be in our I Can Read Notebooks!
Enjoy this Veterans Day video! The Ponderosa First Graders all have a copy of the words to this song in their I Can Read Notebooks. Have your child read and sing along with this video. For any of you who know a Veteran or have one in your family, have your child sing this song to him/her as a special gift!
Have a blast this weekend finishing up your Ivan projects. Remember, what would your perfect domain look like for one of the main characters in the book?
This blog will be used for all 4 first grade classrooms at Ponderosa. We will be using this blog to share important information with you! Please become a follower of this blog so that you and your child can easily access our important information. We will include many items on this blog that can be revisited and used over and over again to help your child have a successful year in first grade.
Our first graders just finished listening to the first grade teachers read aloud The One and Only Ivan written by Katherine Applegate. You may ask: Why a "Global Read Aloud?" Global collaboration is necessary to show children that they are part of something bigger than themselves. The world needs to be protected and we need to care for every living creature. We can show children pictures of kids in other states and countries, but why not have them speak to each other? That's how the caring begins. We just Skyped with a first grade classroom from Ohio on October 27, 2012 and a 3rd grade classroom from Michagan. We gave them background schema about Ponderosa Elementary School and they told us about their schools. Then we asked them the following questions:
1. From whose point of view was this story told?
2. Can you name 5 important characters from the story?
3. Why did the protesters come?
4. Describe one time in the story that "it tugged at your heart and mended it again."
5. What would Ivan's favorite subject in school be?
6. What was Ivan's favorite thing to throw at people?
7. How did Ivan know that Ruby was safe at home?
8. Who was Ivan's last visitor?
9. Name 3 objects that Ivan had in his domain at Exit 8?
10. Who was Ivan's "BELLY WARMER?"
11. What were Ivan and Ruby both afraid of?
12. What does it mean to be a "temporary human?"
Have your child answer each of these questions for you.
Watch the following video to see the author of The One and Only Ivan answering questions that children who were involved in the Global Read-Aloud asked her. She answered questions that children have sent her and thanked the children for reading her book. Enjoy
