Week 27 in Review

Greetings from Room 119!  Spring has sprung and we've had some warm temperatures mixed in with our cold days.  Please remember to send us with boots and extra socks.  As the snow melts, our playground gets really wet!  Monday, March 31st is Opening Day for the Tigers, so feel free to wear a Tiger shirt (Mrs. Doran, Miss Coe and Mrs. Hill will).

We were excited to have another author come in and talk with us.  Maria Dismondy did a great job talking with us.  Although we may be different on the outside, we're very much alike on the inside.  To check out her website or order books (if you didn't), you can click HERE.

We were excited to celebrate Landen's birthday last week.  He's now seven and knows that it's like heaven to be seven.  Happy Birthday!

We finished up Unit 6 in math and took an end of the unit test.  We did a great job and are getting much more independent with our test taking skills.  Our tests will come home next week.

We started Unit 7 with Miss Coe and Mrs. Doran late in the week.  We learned what attributes are and then talked about different attributes of shapes.  Ask us about it!

 In reading with Mrs. Doran, we finished up our study of nonfiction text.  We know a lot of Non-fiction text features and learned how they can help us learn even more about a topic.  Ask us about these Nonfiction Text Features.

Please remember to continue to have us read our paper books daily.  Repeated readings of the same text really helps us with fluency.  Mrs. D. has been working with some of us on our fluency.  Next week homework will not be sent home (because of the break) but books will be sent home in the everyday folder.  Feel free to check out Mrs. D's LINKS on the blog for ways to keep learning!

 We took our spring pictures on Friday (inside because of the cold).  All students had their pictures taken (and Mrs. Doran and Miss Coe popped in for the group picture too).

With our buddies we designed records of our favorite books because Reading Rocks!  Since most of us didn't know what records were, Mrs. Turek got out an old record player to show us!

We ended the week with one of Mrs. Doran's FAVORITE books, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs.  Massimo's Grandpa came in to read to us and did an outstanding job!  We were a great audience and LOVED the book!

As always, this is just a snapshot of our week.  To see more pictures, you can click HERE.

Week 26 in Review

Greetings from Room 119!  We had a great short week.  Mrs. D. didn't take a lot of pictures this week so is not going to be doing an 'extra pictures' video.  Please note that an important note about an upcoming field trip is coming home Monday in our Everyday Folders.  

When we got to school on Monday we learned that a mischievous  leprechaun had sure made a mess!  Thankfully we were able to pick up the mess in no time.  He left some gold which we agreed we should put in the prize bucket.

Miss Coe read us a book teaching us the story about St. Patrick; his history and legend.  We found the story very interesting and did a good job retelling it and remembering important details.

In reading with Mrs. Doran, we continued to work on nonfiction text features.  We are able to talk about what a heading is, why it is important and how to find one.  We did a good job locating headings in workshop.

 Mrs. Doran has also been able to read with some of us individually.  She is checking out a new program in which we can read the take-home books she makes on an iPad or computer.  We can listen to the books being read and we also can read and record ourselves reading.  We really like it!  It costs money but is something she's looking into.

We celebrated a special birthday this week in our class.  Jaydan turned seven and had a great day with our Birthday Owl, Ollie.  Miss Coe also read a birthday book for him.

In math Miss Coe is finishing up Unit 6 and we will be taking the test next week.  She and Mrs. Doran have created exit slips (a few problems on a page to see if we understand our target lesson) so they know if they need to spend a little more time with us on a concept.

In Science we have enjoyed watching insects that go through a pupa and larva stages and those who grow as nymphs.  Our mealworms/Darkling Beetles are also ready to come home.  If you would like them to come home with us, please send Mrs. Doran an email or note letting her know and we'll bring them home.

Be sure to check out lost and found!  There are a lot of items that have been lost!

Week 25 in Review

Greetings from Room 119!  We had a busy week which included a Snow Day and our Insect Museum.  Thanks to everyone who came.  If you were unable to make it, but would still like to check out all of our insects, click HERE to see a video Mrs. D. made!

Usually out teachers are behind the camera but we were surprised to see them on Monday's broadcast.  Miss Coe did a great job pulling PBIS tickets with Mrs. Doran and we even had some members from our class get their tickets pulled.  To learn more about PBIS or see who had tickets pulled on the morning announcements, you can check out their blog by clicking HERE.

 As mentioned, the Insect Museum was the highlight of our week.  We had students and teachers from other classes come visit our museum throughout the day.  We enjoyed teaching them about the insects we researched.  At the end of the day parents also came to see all of our hard work.  One of Mrs. D's former students wrote a note to us.  It's good to know that our hard work was noticed by others.  Way to go Room 119!

It wasn't just insect models that came to our room this week.  We also now have crickets in our room.  We also had a couple of our wax worms turn into moths (which is really exciting because Mrs. D. said they usually die before completing the life cycle).  She brought them home on weekends in hopes that some would make it.  We got to show our moths to the other first grades too.

In reading, we have been learning about nonfiction and focused again on captions and being able to identify captions in a book.  We also continue to read fun Dr. Seuss books and made "Horton" elephants with our buddies.  We talked about the character traits of Horton, too.  They will be on display outside our classroom.

 In Writer's Workshop, we are writing "All About Me" books with Miss Coe.  We are learning to brainstorm and we will also be drawing pictures and adding captions to our books.  We look forward to working on them more next week.

In math workshop, Miss Coe continues to work on fact families with us.  We are all doing very well on this concept.  We know that from three numbers in a fact, we can make four math problems~ two addition and two subtraction.  We also know that in addition problems the biggest number is last and in subtraction problems the biggest number comes first.

 We ended our week the way we love to!  Jenniah's mom came in and read us a great book called, "Scruffy." She did a wonderful job and we were a great audience.  If you haven't been a Mystery Reader yet, we would love to have you!  We are in need of a Mystery Reader on March 28th.

Because we will not have school on Friday, March 21st (the teachers are in meetings), there will be no bagel sales.  Don't forget to wear Green on Monday and bring a dollar for popcorn!

As always this is just a sneak peek at what we did this week.  To see more, click HERE.

Week 24 in Review

Greetings from Room 119!  Did you know that March is Reading Month?  A school calendar was sent home to help us keep track of our reading.  In school we are going to be focusing on one of Mrs. Doran's favorite authors, Theodore Geisel (also known as Dr. Seuss).

 We met another author earlier in the week and this author happens to be the father or one of Mrs. Doran's former students.  Dan Roth wrote a great book called Princess of the Peas.  He talked with us about writing and had some great tips.  It is a great book and we have it in our own classroom.  Order forms went home if you would like your own copy.

 In Reader's Workshop we've been looking at nonfiction text features.  We can talk about what diagrams are and many of us shared diagrams we found in our books during workshop.  We also are learning more about captions and how they (like diagrams) can tell us more about a topic.

 Miss Coe has been teaching us about fact families in math.  We learned that with just three numbers, we can make four different math sentences (two addition and two subtraction).  Of course we learned that in order to make the sentences FACTS they have to make sense.  We had to defend our math thinking and came to the conclusion that in addition, the big number has to come last and in subtraction, the big number has to come first.  We will continue working on this next week.

Did you hear?  We got our first Darkling Beetle from our mealworms!  We also got some new insects this week.  We now have milkweed bugs.  We set up two class habitats for them and then drew our own diagrams of those habitats. Next week we are going to get another insect and have our Insect Museum!  We can't wait!!  Some of the models have already come in and we can't wait to teach each other about the insect we researched.

 In writing we are going to start writing "All About Me" books.  Miss Coe is teaching us how to write more details on a topic.  This week we learned how to 'brainstorm' and make webs of our ideas.  On Friday (to go with Dr. Seuss's Fox in Socks) we met with our buddies and came up with rhyming words.  They are now hanging on lines outside our classroom.

 To end the week, we had a Mystery Reader! Michelle's sister came in and surprised everyone (especially Michelle) by reading one of their favorite books.  She did a wonderful job and we were a great audience.  We love having those who love us come in and read!  We have a lot of open dates so if you haven't come in to read, we'd love to have you.  Click HERE to see available dates!

As always, this is just a glimpse!  To see more, click HERE.

Week 23 in Review

Greetings from Room 119 where we had a very busy week!  We had a visit from a dentist, celebrated our 100th day of school and packed in a ton of learning.  Just a reminder that Insect Reports are due THIS MONTH.  Check out the blog HERE (if you are getting this via email) for important dates on the blog.  We also got new mealworms on Friday (Mrs. D. forgot to take pictures).  They look much healthier so we're hoping they'll do better than our last batch!  We are getting a new insect next week!

 On our 100th day of school, we only had 47 acts of kindness turned in and only 13 students who had participated.  After one final push (and a one day extension), we turned in a total of EXACTLY 100 acts of kindness and had more students participating!  To see what we did (and who did what), you can click HERE.

February is Dental Health month!  We learned about dental health in our Scholastic News Magazines but we also had a special guest.  Dr. Beattie (who is also one of the doctors who put on Mrs. Doran's son's braces this week) came in to talk to us. She did some cool experiments.  She also gave us each a coloring book, a pencil and a book for our class.

 We thought Thursday was Fun Friday because it was jam-packed with FUN!  We celebrated our 100th day of school with a special visit from "Zero the Hero."  Everything we did on Thursday had something tied to 100 in it. Mrs. Doran took so many pictures that she put them in a video all by themselves.  You can click HERE to see it!

In math this week, we have been learning with Miss Coe that numbers can have a lot of names.  We can show one number (12) in many different ways (6+6, 20-8, one dime and two pennies, 12 tally marks, one dozen... etc.).  Though Miss Coe has taken over math, Mrs. D. is still pulling us out to do some work with her.

In Reader's Workshop, we continue to practice in our 'just right' books.  We are learning about the nonfiction text features and also practicing our fluency to help us becoming better readers.

In writing we have been learning to write about a big idea (topic) and then add details.  Miss Coe had a great lesson to help us understand this.  We also worked on a portfolio piece this week.  We had fun aging ourselves 100 years (if you didn't see the video, click HERE) and we wrote about what we will do when we are 100.  These pieces will be on display in the hallway.

We ended our week with a special Mystery Reader and it was someone we all knew!  Kaden's mom came in and read us a wonderful book that is one of their favorites.  We know Kaden's mom because she works with us every Monday during math workshop.  It was great to hear her read to our class and she did a wonderful job.

As always, this is just a snapshot of what we did this week.  To see more pictures from the week, click HERE.