Layers of the Forest and More

We have been busy in first grade! Here's what we've been up to:

We learned that you can add horizontally or vertically! The sum is the same if the numbers are the same... they just look a little different! (Ask your first grader what "vertical" means... it was one of our signal words this week!)

This week, we learned about the layers of the coniferous forest.

We learned about different ways to start our stories. We were inspired by a few books we've read.

We read a story with lots of cool science vocabulary, and we talked about its characters and setting. This story is stars a bald eagle looking for his mother. The chart and the pictures help us to remember and retell the story!

Now instead of just reading independently, we sometimes "read to someone!" Ask your first grader to tell you what "EEKK" means. :)

We worked with our teams to get all of the words needed to make a sentence about skunks. This involved trading words with other teams, lots of problem-solving, and lots of patience. :)

A special delivery for our classroom library... Thank you Logan and family!

For Fun Friday, we did an art project showing the layers of the coniferous forest. Scientific AND artistic! :)

The kids each wrote informative pieces about one of two North American animals: the bald eagle or the striped skunk. They were so much fun to read!

Every day I am so amazed at how much thinking these kids do as they read! They are constantly noticing things we've learned about or talked about during their own reading time! 

Each team set a responsibility goal, something they are working on and want to earn bonus points for. Next week there will be a fresh team points chart. These kids are just too responsible... they earned too many points over the last few weeks, and we ran out of room! :)

Just for fun: 

Ask your child to tell you about one of this week's signal words: vertical, constitution, solution, layers, or behavior. 

Thanks for reading! Leave us a comment! What stuck with your first grader this week?

Bald Eagle Week!

"What did you do at school today?"
"Ummm..."

Does this sound familiar? :) It's a long day at school each day, and your kids have been working SO hard! (When I get home from school, I have trouble remembering what we did all day, too!) Our weekly posts are a great tool to jog your child's memory. Here's what we did at school this week:

We played "Roll and Add" again with our partners, this time with... you guessed it! Bald eagles!

Everyone worked together to write a paragraph about black bears. (Ask your first grader to tell you what informative means!) Miss Kloczko wrote the topic sentence, each team wrote one fact, and we wrote the last sentence together. The kids learned that an easy way to give your writing closure is to write a "feeling sentence." (We'll learn lots of other ways later in first grade!)

Math during science time!

Scientific illustrations in our poetry folders for I Know a Bald Eagle!

There are many ways to show a number! We learned a few ways this week. We'll learn some new "challenge ways" soon!

One of my favorite authors helped us with our writing this week! Mo Willems' pigeon (and Elephant and Piggie) helped us with punctuation. Ask your first grader to tell you the meaning of the word "exclaim." :)

After practicing with our teams earlier in the week, we were ready to try informative writing on our own!

Bald eagle art for Fun Friday!

Ms. D., our student teacher, was our very first mystery reader!

We read this book twice, once reading the pictures, and once reading the words, and we made a story map! 

We are now members of the Kind Kids Club! Thank you, Ms. Hines!

Our classroom library is officially open, now that we know how to take care of our books, how to pick ones "just-right" for us, how to put them away in the right place, and of course... now that we have a little reading stamina! Reading in first grade is EVEN better now!

Thanks for reading! What did your first grader love the most about this week? Did you learn anything new while reading our post? Leave a comment below! :)

*All comments must be approved by Miss Kloczko. Remember to sign your name, so we know who is commenting!