Sunday, March 10, 2013

Week of March 4-8

We had such a fun week! This week we read the book Chicka Chicka Boom Boom. We did some Chicka Chicka Boom Boom writing and reading activities to go along with this theme. On Friday we had our Chicka Chicka Boom Boom celebration. We broke open real coconuts and tried them! We also tried shaved sugary coconut and coconut milk. What a treat! We watched the movie to this story and ate Chicka Boom Boom soup which we made as a class with ABC noodles. What a fun way to kick off March is Reading Month after celebrating Dr. Seuss's birthday!

Getting ready to break open a coconut for tasting!

Passing around the coconuts.

Enjoying our Chicka Chicka Boom Boom soup!

In reading this week we reviewed all of the short vowels as we wrap up learning about the short vowels. We will continue to review and use these all year. Students completed their very own Short /u/ books where they wrote words with the short /u/ sound and crossed off pictures that did not contain the short /u/ sound. We also continue to practice a few fix-its every day to learn about proper punctuation. I am so proud of these kiddos! By now your child should be able to recognize, use and explain what a period, exclamation point, question mark, quotation marks and commas are. I am even beginning to see students using these marks in their writing! We continue to study sight words on a daily basis which is one of the foundations in reading as your child progresses. This week we focused on the words you and see.

Completing our short /u/ books.


In writing this week we learned about how writer's stretch out one small moment, how they stretch our words when writing an how they sketch rather than draw. We practiced brainstorming a small moment and really stretching it out across all four pages of our booklets. This was the example I demonstrated for the students, I told them I would be writing about getting my flu shot.

I went to the doctor to get my flu shot. I felt scared as I hopped up onto the metal table.
The nurse told me to pull up my sleeve. I closed my eyes and I felt a tiny prick.
"You're done!" said the nurse. I opened my eyes and she was smiling.
I smiled back. The shot did not hurt so bad after all!

Students were able to see me stretch out each event of the one small moment across four pages.  In another lesson we learned about sketching rather than drawing. Students learned to sketch out their ideas on their paper, write their words with details, and finally go back to add more to their drawings when they were done writing. We are transitioning into spending the majority of our time on writing words. Drawing and "fancying up" should be left for the final completion of a writing piece.

Writing our small moments!
In math this week we practiced creating equations from pictures and we also studied shapes, including 3D shapes. In one lesson, I would put counters on the board using the "sleeping bug" concept. For example: "Ten bugs are sleeping. Two wake up. What is my equation?" Students would then write 8+2=10 on their white boards and show me. They did such a great job with this! They are beginning to form their own equations and apply math to a real-life situation. We also learned about 3D shapes. We sorted shapes and discussed attributes of shapes such as roundness, corners, sides, flat, 3D, etc. Students learned what a sphere, cylinder,  and cube are.

Maylee helping us see differences in shapes.
Writing equations!
In science this week we continued to study motion, force and gravity. This week we focused on gravity. Students observed different things falling down. We discussed how when you drop something or throw it in the air, it will come down due to gravity. As we observed the objects falling, we predicted which would fall the fastest and the slowest and why. We used a golf ball, ping pong ball, paper and a bean bag. These little scientists did a great job with this experiment! Later, we wrote about and labeled our findings in our science journals.

Brody brought his German Shepard dog to school for show and tell!



Notes/reminders:

-Please send your child with a change of clothes they can keep at school

-Please send your child with a snack, even if they have hot lunch

-Please continue to review spelling and sight words every night. Sight word testing is on Tuesdays and spelling tests are on Fridays

Have a great week!

Ms. Monica

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