Week 11

Please read the OB Newsletter!

Trunk or Treat is still on, but they are still in need of cars decorated. As of now, there are 13 cars signed up, three of which are from OUR CLASS! Thank you to the Soshniks, Tuckers and Marsdens. It seems many people are going out of town this weekend so we are at low participation.

It was so nice to meet with everyone at parent teacher conferences. I really appreciate you taking the time to meet with me and chat about your child.

In reading this week, we practiced our blends chart and making words with beginning blends.  We also practiced writing sentences with lots of high frequency words (sight words.) We also continue to read out of our book boxes and read with fluency and try and decode tricky words using all of our reading super powers.

 

Coach Prange came in and helped us read our sight word poem one day this week after recess. It was great fun to have him help us learn to read.

Science: This week, we talked more about plants and their needs. We planted radish seeds and put it in the window to observe. We are excited to see what happens when we come back on Monday. 

Math: This week, we compared numbers and looked at how many more there were. We also talked about composing numbers to make new numbers. 

 Music class with Ms. Ladue!

Free Choice: We spent most of our days outside at free choice because the weather has been so beautiful!

Reminders:

- Fall Party is Thursday at 2:40. Costumes may be worn to school as long as they are "appropriate." Nothing scary and no painted faces or hair please. 

- Please send in a change of clothes and label all jackets.

Happy weekend! 

Week 10

Please read the OB newsletter. The details about the upcoming Trunk or Treat are in the newsletter. It is a fun event. They are looking for people to sign up to decorate your car for the event, so if you are interested please click here for the signup link.

This week in our social skills lesson, we talked about how people can have different feelings about the same situation. I listed various situations and students showed me with their facial expressions how it would make them feel. We saw some of us were excited about the event and others were not. 

We also read a book about empathy, since that is a word we are learning about in our social skills program.

This week, we had a Leah from the NCADA (National Council of Alcohol and Drug Association) come and do a lesson with us for our counseling time. They come every year and do four lessons with the kids in all grade levels. In kindergarten they focus on friendships. We met two friends, a porcupine and a teddy bear. We learned that we want to treat people like teddy bears and not like porcupines. Ask your child about it!

In reading this week, we learned about book talk power. We learned that with our partners we can talk about the book before we read, introducing the book title and a little summary of what it is about. We also learned about five finger retell, and how to retell a stories details across our fingers from beginning to end. 

Students go to their literacy centers every day after our reading lesson and ind/partner reading time so I can meet with small groups. 

In math, we worked on counting sequencing, one to one correspondence, using numbers to show one more and one less using our number lines, and counting using our fingers to help us. 

In science, we started a new unit on living and non-living things. We explored pictures cards and groups sorted them into two piles of whether they thought they were living or not. Then, we read a book and watched a video to learn more. Then we went back through those pictures and decided if they need food and water, can move on its own, and need air to breathe then it is a living thing. We went outside to sketch in our science journals things that we found were living. 

In writing, we continue to work on showing and telling in our writing. This week, we worked more on writing stories about our favorite places to go. Students are working on drawing a picture and writing words to tell where there favorite places are and why it is their favorite place. 

A few more friends shared their show and tell this week, too!

I have added a tab on our class website that has links to websites that your child could go to on a device to practice his or her reading and math skills. I will be adding more as I find them! 

Have a great weekend!

Caroline McGee

Week 9

Please read the OB Newsletter to make sure you know about all the important information going on at OB!

Regarding Halloween costumes, Mrs. Taggert shared, "Students can come to school wearing their costumes as long as they do not interfere with their school day. We will not be taking time to change into or out of costumes. No weapons, masks, or overly scary costumes will be allowed." If students need to add something to their costume for the party that they can quickly put on, that will be ok. We just cannot send students to bathroom for full outfit changes. Please no face paint or hair paint. Our  Fall Party is on October 31st starting at 2:40 that is organized by our wonderful room parents.  
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This week for our Second Steps lesson we learned more about recognizing feelings. We studied this boy's face and talked about how he is angry. We talked about how being angry is an uncomfortable feeling and how people show anger in different ways. We discussed how it is ok to be angry, but that we may not lose control and harm others or ourselves. We talked about what to do if a friend is angry, including give them space, ask them if there is anything they need, ask them if they need help solving the problem or offer a hug 

Friday morning, we gave compliments to one another and then it was time for Show and Tell. I told a few students who forgot they can bring it on Monday. 

Reading: This week we looked closely at various ABC charts. We talked about how we can use any ABC chart to help us learn our letter sounds. We continue to identify words and their beginning sounds. 

We also looked closely at punctuation this week and learned that the different symbols mean and how it affects our voice. We also learned to look closely at character's emotions and change our voice accordingly. We practiced reading Super Mouse while changing our voices according to how super mouse was feeling. Each student received a copy to practice.

 

We practiced reading our sight words he and is this week. Many students are picking up on these quickly. Some would benefit from daily flash card practice at home. I will provide them to you at conferences if I feel like this would be a useful tool for your child. 

Math: This week we began learning about composing and decomposing numbers. We looked at all the possible ways to make numbers up to 5. For example, 1 and 4 make 5, 2 and 3 make 5, and 0 and 5 make 5. We used lots of different visual representations to learn this concept. 

Writing: This week we continued writing our Show and Tell books. We are working on thinking and writing our ideas down on paper, stretching out our words using our letter sound knowledge. We also learned we need to be brave spellers and use all of resources. I've taught them they are not to ask me how to spell words, but trust themselves to use their letter sound charts and write they hear. 

Parent Teacher Conferences are October 22nd and 24th. Here is the schedule below. I look forward to talking with you.