Wow! We can't believe that we've been in school for a month! The students have been working hard learning the rules and routines to help them succeed in first grade at HSES. Here are some of the areas we focused on this month:
Reading- In reading, the students have been learning about the characteristics and behaviors of a good reader. We have introduce all aspects of the Daily 5 (Read to Self, Read to Someone, Listening to Reading, Work on Writing, and Word Work). The students have been working on building their stamina in order to due these activities for longer amounts of time independently. We've also talked about the different strategies that readers use when they come to a word they don't know. Some of these include: cross checking, chunking the word, skipping the word and coming back, looking at the word endings, using the pictures, and flipping the sound.
Writing- In writing, the students have learned about the three main areas that we will be focusing on the entire year: Narrative, Opinion, and Informational. We spent a few days on each area so the students were able to learn about the characteristics of each one. We practiced each area by doing journal writing. We also focused on sentence structure. The children reviewed that all sentences must start with a capital letter, end with punctuation, have a "who", and tell "did what". We started expanding our sentences by including when the event happened, where it happened, adding describing words, and adding feeling words.
One important thing discussed this month in writing was spelling. We talked about how good writers use their resources when they come to a word they cannot spell. Each child got a Quick Word Dictionary to help them. Students practiced circling words they "sounded out" and, most importantly, KEEP WRITING!
Social Studies/Health- In social studies, students learned about our classroom community. They generated a list of rules for everyone to follow. They also discovered how they are alike and different from their classmates. We also discussed friendships and things that we do that help us make and keep friends, and things we might do that discourage friendships from forming. This led into learning about tattling vs. telling and how we can DeBug to solve kid-sized problems. The students also talked about Growth Mindset and how it's ok to make mistakes, that challenges help our brains grow, and how we should put extra effort into all we do. We ended the month with a special teamwork unit, where the students had to complete different challenges as teams and learned the importance of working collaboratively.
Math- First grade math focused on reading, writing, and recognizing numbers 0-120. We reviewed place value and representing numbers by building and drawing tens and ones. Place value is a critical unit and one that we will be referring to throughout math during the year. We also have worked on comparing numbers and identifying greater than/less than/equal to. The important aspect here is having the students explain how they know which number is greater or smaller.
Special Days- Apple Day was a huge hit this month! The students all brought their favorite apple to school and we did a lot of exciting activities. We read books, completed apple writing, measured with our apple, weighed our apple, and compared our apples to our classmates. We ended the day by tasting red, yellow, and green apples and graphing our favorite apple flavors!
We're excited to see all of the learning and fun the students will have in October! - First Grade Teachers
Reading- In reading, the students have been learning about the characteristics and behaviors of a good reader. We have introduce all aspects of the Daily 5 (Read to Self, Read to Someone, Listening to Reading, Work on Writing, and Word Work). The students have been working on building their stamina in order to due these activities for longer amounts of time independently. We've also talked about the different strategies that readers use when they come to a word they don't know. Some of these include: cross checking, chunking the word, skipping the word and coming back, looking at the word endings, using the pictures, and flipping the sound.
Writing- In writing, the students have learned about the three main areas that we will be focusing on the entire year: Narrative, Opinion, and Informational. We spent a few days on each area so the students were able to learn about the characteristics of each one. We practiced each area by doing journal writing. We also focused on sentence structure. The children reviewed that all sentences must start with a capital letter, end with punctuation, have a "who", and tell "did what". We started expanding our sentences by including when the event happened, where it happened, adding describing words, and adding feeling words.
One important thing discussed this month in writing was spelling. We talked about how good writers use their resources when they come to a word they cannot spell. Each child got a Quick Word Dictionary to help them. Students practiced circling words they "sounded out" and, most importantly, KEEP WRITING!
Social Studies/Health- In social studies, students learned about our classroom community. They generated a list of rules for everyone to follow. They also discovered how they are alike and different from their classmates. We also discussed friendships and things that we do that help us make and keep friends, and things we might do that discourage friendships from forming. This led into learning about tattling vs. telling and how we can DeBug to solve kid-sized problems. The students also talked about Growth Mindset and how it's ok to make mistakes, that challenges help our brains grow, and how we should put extra effort into all we do. We ended the month with a special teamwork unit, where the students had to complete different challenges as teams and learned the importance of working collaboratively.
Math- First grade math focused on reading, writing, and recognizing numbers 0-120. We reviewed place value and representing numbers by building and drawing tens and ones. Place value is a critical unit and one that we will be referring to throughout math during the year. We also have worked on comparing numbers and identifying greater than/less than/equal to. The important aspect here is having the students explain how they know which number is greater or smaller.
Special Days- Apple Day was a huge hit this month! The students all brought their favorite apple to school and we did a lot of exciting activities. We read books, completed apple writing, measured with our apple, weighed our apple, and compared our apples to our classmates. We ended the day by tasting red, yellow, and green apples and graphing our favorite apple flavors!
We're excited to see all of the learning and fun the students will have in October! - First Grade Teachers