We survived our first week with full days!!! We were all very tired and definitely needed the long weekend. During the first week, I had everyone color this coloring page that says, “I can do hard things.” This was such an encouraging reminder for the kiddos to see throughout the week. Full days can seem very long after having half days, but they made it through and they did an amazing job!
A Look at What We Learned
Word Study: We went outside and sat in a circle to practice snapping and clapping the beats in our friends’ names! It was so fun for them to have all of their classmates say their name and figure out how many syllables their name has. We then practiced blending the syllables back together to say the word smoothly. On Wednesday we played a game to work on sound (phoneme) manipulation. The kiddos told me some things they ate for lunch that day and I wrote them on the whiteboard. I picked some volunteers to come pick a letter from my secret basket, and we had to replace that letter with the beginning letter of one of the words on the whiteboard. For example, one kiddo pulled out the letter m, so banana became manana. Lots and lots of laughs from this activity!
Math: We worked on writing numbers 1-10 and how to write out equations. On Tuesday, we used Unifix cubes to show all the ways to make 10. To practice skip counting, the kiddos all had a turn to come in front of class and skip count by 2’s and 5’s. They were responsible for holding up their number at the correct time as the class counted. The more we practiced, the faster and faster they got!
Technology: Everyone was able to get logged into their computer! Phew!!! They each have a red folder with all of their login information that we will need throughout the year. After everyone was logged in, we practiced using our Clever badges and they had some free time to play games on ABCya!
Rule #4: The kiddos learned our last classroom rule which is: Be kind. To help understand this rule, we read the book Words and Your Heart by Kate Jean Neal. This taught them that the words we tell people can leave an everlasting impact on the people we say them to. I demonstrated this by showing them a flat, paper heart and told them to imagine that the heart was theirs. As I was holding the heart, I said that people were saying unkind words to them at recess and I began crumpling the heart. After going through this process a few times, I asked the students if the heart looked the same. They told me that the heart was now broken. This was a great example of why we need to be careful with what we say to others to help protect their hearts!
Quote of the Week
Each week, our class learns a new quote and what it means to embody it. This past week our quote was: The only way to have a friend is to be one. Throughout the week, I pay close attention to who embraced the quote best, and this week Sydney was awarded with the quote. Way to go, Syd!
Reminders:
- Please send in two snacks for your child each day. It works wonderfully if these snacks are in a spot in their backpack and not in their lunchbox; this saves first graders any confusion about what they should be eating for snacks and lunches! 🙂
- Gym shoes should be kept at school so we can try and limit them being worn outside as much as possible. Thank you!
Next Week:
- Tuesday, September 8 – celebrate Gabba’s birthday (9/6); Art
- Wednesday, September 9 – STEAM
- Thursday, September 10 – Music
- Friday, September 11 – Gym