Wow, how fast the weeks have flown by!  It has been a very exciting time here in the first grade as we continue to get to know one another.  I have enjoyed learning about the students and am eager to continue out learning together over the next several months.

This is what we have been hard at work on these past few weeks:

Literacy

This weeks' lessons focused on the elements of retelling a story.  We re-read The 3 Little Dassies and the students then re-told the story in their own words.  We also focused on finding the author's message.  We learned about several different messages found within stories and how we can identify them.  We revisited Poppleton and read the chapter entitled "The Pill."  Students were able to find several messages including friendship and caring.

Guided Reading

I used guided reading time to assess student reading levels as well as to confer with students independently on their reading. Students were encouraged to tell me about a story they were reading and also to read a portion to me to help me evaluate their reading progress.

Writing

Our writing focus has been on opinion these past few weeks.  Students wrote several stories about Thanksgiving including what their favorite food is and what they think their lives would be like as a turkey.    They were asked to write a minimum of three sentences and to use capital letters and proper punctuation.  Many students wrote more than the three sentence minimum and were excited to share their stories with me.

Math

The students have been busy learning to tell time to the half hour and also counting money.  They enjoyed using clocks to help learn to tell time.  Students also enjoyed using their coins to count money.  The students learned that a dime is worth ten cents and is small while a nickel is worth five cents and is more thick.  They then counted coins and traded between pennies, nickels, and dimes to show amounts using the least possible coins.

Royal Readers

We had several Royal Readers come in during the month of November.

A special thank you to Julia's mom, Mrs. Tita, for reading us a very funny story entitled Sill Frilly Grandma Tilly by Laurie Jacobs.  Some of our students enjoyed sharing their own silly experiences with their grandparents.

A special thank you also to Grace's dad, Mr. Lisy, for reading us two stories, including one that he wrote! Mr. Lisy is the author of Twas the Night Before Fifth Grade.  He also read us a story entitled The Mysterious Mr. Tadpole by Steven Kellogg.

Finally, a special thank you to Piper's mom, Mrs. Skidmore, who shared three stories with us.  The first story was entitled The Underpants Zoo.  The second story was The Day the Crayons Came Home, and the third story was Dragons Love Tacos.  The students voted on their favorite story and the winner was Dragons Love Tacos.

                                                           Happy Thanksgiving!

*Please know that pictures will be posted to the blog soon*