Field Study and Exploring Personal Choices

What a great week we had! We prepared for our field trip to the Barberville Pioneer Art Settlement, spending some time learning about the early American and Pioneer life style only to get to experience it first hand. It was a fun learning day where the students participated in hands on activities such as candle making, butter making, spinning, weaving, farming and word working. Below is a look into the past where our class participated in all of these things on our wonderful field study!

I would like to take this time to thank all of the wonderful parents who participated in this field trip and made it possible.

In other news a congratulations are in order for our Kindergarten students. This past week we studied our very first word family, the -an family, and took our very first spelling test. None of the words were sent home to study, but were covered in class and every single one of the students showed mastery of reading, writing and spelling the words chosen from that word family. This week we will be working with the -ap family found in words such as map and tap.

Since this is a week 6 review week in our reading curriculum I have decided to use this week to implement some new teaching practices that allow for more creativity and enhanced meaningful and personal student achievement in literacy. Today was our first day starting a Writer's Workshop. Within the Writer's Workshop you can expect your child to think of and write about their own ideas and in the formats that they prefer. The students will learn about the full writing process from brainstorming through drafting, peer conferencing, teacher conferencing and creating a final writing piece. All of this writing will be supported by mini-lessons on different genre writing and an emphasis on grammar and techniques.

As a counterpart to writing I will also be implementing some of the techniques of the Daily 5 in our reading class. The daily 5 focuses literacy instruction through 5 components in the classroom. Those components are 1. reading to self, 2. reading to someone, 3. listening to reading, 4. working on writing (writers workshop), and 5. spelling/word work. All of these essential literacy components will be worked on each day along with specific skill instruction from myself. As the students and myself become more comfortable with the new approach to teaching and learning literacy the students will be able to explore self directed learning by choosing reading books and reading "best-fit" books and also creating and working towards meeting their own reading goals.

In mathematics Kindergarten has finished their number study, reading, writing and counting orally to 100. This week we begin our unit on measurement which will be followed by time and money. This week we will focus on specific concepts such as length, weight and capacity. In first grade we continue to practice our addition and subtraction facts daily and are now working with larger numbers and therefore larger sums and differences.

In science we will be reviewing movement and studying more in-depth how movement can be affected, increased, changed and stopped.

As always I am looking forward to another great week here at Samsula Academy!

Miss Ellis

A New Year and a New Week

Happy New Years to all and welcome back!

Now that we are all back from our winter vacations we are jumping right back into the thick of it and are hitting the ground full seed. In first grade math this week we are furthering our understanding of addition and subtraction. We are adding more than 2 numbers and using multiple methods to solve mathematical problems. In Kindergarten we are reviewing number 0-90 and will be working our way up to 100 by the end of the week.

This week our reading unit focuses on families and we are reading a play called Smile, Mike! in reading class. We are focusing on generating questions to ensure understanding while reading. Our comprehension skill for the week is making predictions and confirming them. First grade spelling is on long /i/ words spelled i-e. Spelling words for the week are: bike, hide, like, mine, ride, and spike. Spelling words can also include previously learned spelling words and high frequency words. First grade high frequency words to know are: how, there, so, more, funny, and call. Kindergarten is currently reviewing short vowel sounds this week in reading. Kindergarten sight words for the week are: ride, saw, say, she, and so.

In social studies we are preparing for our first field trip to the Barberville Pioneer Arts Settlement on Thursday January the 13th, 2011. We are learning about the life style of Pioneers and how that life style is similar and different to our own today. We are very excited for this trip and I remind you that field trip permission forms and money are due the beginning of next week.

As always I am looking forward to another fun week of learning with your children!

Miss Ellis

Happy Holidays

As the Holiday Season is coming to a close I have compiled a few pictures to show some of the fun Holiday activities our class took part in during December. Just to mention a few we weaved Kwanzaa placemats, made our own Christmas wreaths and had fun opening up our Holiday gifts at our party.

I have also included some span shots from my own winter vacation. Enjoy!

Here Comes December!

Another holiday down and a new month just around the corner. There are only 3 weeks of school left before our winter break and we have a whole lot of fun things to get done.

In Math first graders are now starting their unit on measuring. This week we will be focusing on length. We will measure with nonstandard units such as paper clips and blocks as well as standard inches and centimeters. We will uses these measurements to compare lengths identifying which objects are longest and shortest. In Kindergarten we are continuing to progress through our number identification and writing and hope to reach 100 before the winter break. We will also be measuring some objects with nonstandard units.

This weeks science concept is: Change in Matter. This concept lends itself to a lot of fun activities such as paper folding and clay modeling. We will learn how you can start with one thing (or medium) and manipulate it to create something brand new. We will compare and contrast what we started with and what we were able to create.

In Reading we will continue our compare contrast theme with that being our main focus skill for the week while we continue to practice retelling. Students will be reading Kids Can Help. In this book a boy and a girl each help their parents cook. We will compare and contrast the two characters to see how they are alike and different. First graders will focus their phonics and spelling on words with s-blends. The spelling words for the week are: sled, slip, snap, spill, spin, make, game, people, and water. High frequency words are: girl, boy, together, when, people, care, and water. Kindergarten is still reviewing all of the letters, their names and sounds and we are adding to our sight word reading. This week Kindergarten sight words are: must, new, no, now, and on.

There is a lot to be thankful for...

I hope everyone enjoyed their Thanksgiving holiday and had time to spend with family and friends. Here is a look at some of the fun Thanksgiving related things we did over our 2 days last week.

A thank you is given to Hailey's Grandmother for making our class some Thanksgiving treats. We took that idea and made it our own taking some fun snacks and turning them into turkeys. We also used some pinecones to make our own thankful turkeys.

We learned a Thanksgiving song, "Tommy Turkey" and loved to turkey around when we got the chance!

Friends are Great!

Friends are great, and in our classroom we have lots of friends!

This past week was a review week in reading. We review the past 5 weeks of learning and had a spelling bee where not a single student misspelled a word! This week our reading theme is on friends and friendship. Our reading skill for the week will be making predictions where we make a good guess about what will happen next in a story. At the end of the story we always check to see if our prediction was right or wrong. Phonics for the week is based on words with a-e. Spelling words for first grade are: take, make, came, game, and gate. High frequency words are: hello, could, walk, pull, all and oh.

CONGRATULATIONS!!!! Kindergarten has been introduced to all letter names and sounds at this point and we are starting our in-depth letter/sound review which will take us all the way to the winter holiday. When we return from break we will start working on word families. For most of our kindergarten students we are on our second book in a bag, working on sight words: good, have, he, into, and like this week.

Writing and Grammar: In Kindergarten we continue to work or producing written words and sentences. We are trying our best to use finger spaces and make sure to have capital letters at the beginning and punctuations at the end. In first grade we are writing, making sure to include a beginning, middle and end. In grammar we are learning about verbs which are the words that show action or what is being done.

In first grade we have started our "Mad Minute Math" where we only have 1 minute to find the sums to 15 addition problems. We are working through our addition facts starting at +1 and moving up. Our regular math class has us working on subtraction skills and the relationship between addition and subtraction. It is important that 1st graders are working and practicing their addition facts and committing them to memory. In kindergarten we are identifying and writing number 1-60 this week. As the Thanksgiving holiday approaches we are also doing holiday math which incorporates a review of many of the math concepts previously covered.

Talking about the holiday Samsula will have their Thanksgiving lunch this Thursday. If you would like to join us you are more than welcome! Please send in your RSVP ASAP so we have enough food for everyone!

Kindergarten's Family Project: Turkeys in disguise :)

H-A-double L-O-W-double E-N spells Halloween!

Happy Halloween to all!

What a fun Halloween centered week we had this past week.  Our K-1 class did a cross-curricular study using our 9 classroom pumpkins.  Our literature piece was "Pumpkin, Pumpkin" which describes the life cycle of pumpkins.  In reading class we used this life cycle to sequence the life cycle and created our very own books.  In math we had fun counting the pumpkin seeds that came out of our classroom pumpkins.  Our 3 large pumpkins had 419, 508 and 516 pumpkin seeds in them.  In science we used our pumpkins to explore hypothesis and predictions.  We predicted whether or not pumpkins would float in water.  It is a whole lot of fun studying many different subjects all centered around one common theme.

Along with pumpkin/Halloween math we finished up our 2nd chapter on subtraction concepts in 1st grade.  Over the next few weeks we will be practicing our addition and subtraction facts making sure we have these committed to memory and know them to mastery.  In K we continue to add numbers to our number sense and count in groups of 2's, 5's and 10's.

In reading we finished our 4th week in our second unit on singing and dancing.  Along with the curricular materials we supplement singing and dancing to some our of favorite Halloween songs.  This upcoming week our theme is all about school, something we are very used to at this point.  Our reading skills we will continue to practice are visualizing and sequencing.  Sequencing  is telling things in the order that they happen.  1st grade spelling and phonics will center around words with /l/ blends.  Spelling words for the week are: black, block, clock, flag, clip and flip.  High frequency words to know are: today, way, school, late, away, and why.  Kindergarten sight words for the week are: did, do, eat, get, and for.

Over the next few weeks in Social Studies we will be studying jobs, working, money, needs and wants.  To be followed by thematic units on the upcoming holidays celebrated here in America and other places around the world.  

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Story Book Parade Update!

Friday was such a fun day!  If you were able to make it out to school you saw how wonderful everyone look dressed up for the parade.  Our classroom presented Eric Carle's, "The Very Hungry Caterpillar."  We practiced and had a blast. I would like to continue to thank all of the parents, family members, and friends who made this day possible.  Below are some photographs of our practice.  More photographs  from the actual parade to come soon!