Ms. Smith's Fabulous Firsties: November 2015

Tuesday, November 17, 2015

November 16-20, 2015

It is that time of the year when we give thanks and count our blessings. I could think of so many things that I am thankful for, my health, my children, my family, many wonderful friends, this great community that I am part of... But I am especially thankful for all my wonderful 21 students. Each special, sweet, bright and talented in their own way. I am also thankful for you! You, the wonderful parent, for sending your child to school well prepared each morning, for supporting his/her learning at home, and for teaming up with me to make a difference! I am thankful to all of you!

FIRST GRADE FIRST FIELD TRIP!!! YAY!!!
Our first field trip to Austin Nature Center will be on Monday, December 7th. This week in your child's Tuesday folder, you will receive a Field Trip Permission Slip. More detailed information are included in permission slip. Please sign the permission slip and send it back by Monday, Dec. 2nd. Thank you!

This week:

READING/WRITING

Yesterday, we read a fiction book and a non-fiction book about Thanksgiving. We wrote 3 facts about Thanksgiving in our Response Notebook, and now we are in the process of creating a Google Doc so we can share what we've learned! We are learning how to log in to our gmail accounts (yep, your kiddo has their own student gmail account!), how to navigate our drive, how to create a Google doc, and working on our typing skills as well! This is a big undertaking, so I am very proud of the kiddos!

MATH
This week in subtraction we will work on the concept "part-part whole". Addition is adding the parts and subtraction is taking away a part from the whole to find the other part. We will work on problems that involve finding a whole, or a missing part. we will also re-visit the number line and use number line to solve the problems that involve subtraction. I have attached a youtube link about part, part, whole. Please sit with your child and have your child watch this video. It is a good practice.

Part-Part- Whole Video

SOCIAL STUDIES
This week in social studies, we will learn about the concepts of time and chronology. We will describe and measure calendar time by days, weeks, months, and years and create a simple classroom calendar and timeline. We want our students to understand and distinguish among, past, present, and future.

THANK YOU!

Thank you for stuffing the folders, and being willing to help in the classroom or outside the classroom. Your helping hands and hearts are greatly appreciated!

More than anything, thank you for supporting your child's learning at home. Your child's success and education is a result of, us working together! So thank you for being a partner in your child's learning!

IMPORTANT REMINDERS:
*Tuesday folders come home. Please sign and return the folders the next day.

*Agendas: Please initial the behavior calendar and send it back every day.

*Snack: Please send a healthy snack with your child every day.

*PE: Group A will have PE on Monday, Wednesday, Friday.

Group B will have PE on Tuesday, Thursday, Friday.

*Please make sure your child wears Tennis shoes on those days*

*You can see what group your child is in on the right side of this blog*

*Next library day is Tuesday, December 1.

*Homework bags come back to school every day. Please leave the books and response notebook in the bag. We will use them during the day at school!

DATES TO REMEMBER:

Nov. 23-27: Fall Break/No School

Dec. 2: Early Release @ 12:45

Skate Night

Dec. 7: Field Trip to Austin Nature Center

Dec. 7-11: Book Fair

Dec 10: International Festival

Dec. 17: Class Holiday Party

Dec 18-Jan 5: Winter Break/No School

Monday, November 9, 2015

November 9-13, 2015

Wednesday, November 11th is Veterans Day! For all the brave men and women who have served in military, we say thank you! You are our heroes!

Tomorrow is Library day! Don’t forget to send your child’s library book with them tomorrow!

This week:

READING

We will continue learning about non-fiction/expository texts. We will be reading different nonfiction texts about spiders. We will be recording facts that we learned by reading the different texts. We will also be focusing on the main idea, supporting details, and author’s purpose.

WRITING
We will continue writing facts about topics of interest. We will be focusing on the difference between fact and opinion. As we write, we make sure we go over the writing conventions: Starting with capital letters, forming the letters correctly, leave one finger space between the words, write sentences with corrects grammar and structure and put punctuation (periods, exclamation points or question marks) at the end of our sentences.

MATH
This week we will start subtraction. Subtraction names a missing part by taking away, removing or comparing to find a difference. We will use concrete and pictorial models including ten-frames, math racks, Base Ten blocks and other manipulatives to represent word problem situations involving separating or comparing sets of whole numbers up to 20 where the unknown may be start, change, or result of separating problems.

SCIENCE
We will continue learning about energy. We will explore the objects around us and observe different kinds of energy that these objects use or produce. We will discuss the importance of energy and saving energy.