Bring in a Collection

We are moving into a focus on opinion writing for the next few weeks. To start off, we are going to "judge" some of our own collections. I know that most 6- and 7-year-olds are natural collectors! We will be deciding which item in a collection we think is the best or the worst, and learning and practicing some ways to convince others of our opinion. We will have the chance to judge items in another person's collection and decide whether we agree or, respectfully, disagree with that person. To do this work, it would be great if each student could bring in a small collection by Friday. Here are a few details:

• Please bring a small collection of items (just 3 - 5) by Friday.
• Don't send anything your child will miss too much at home-- I hope to keep these at school for a week or so. 
• The items should be small enough to be stored easily in a sandwich bag or small box, and to be lined up on a student's desk and still leave room to write. So 5 teddy bears would probably be too large. Some ideas could be: rocks, stickers, bracelets, interesting hair accessories, trolls, etc...                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         Thank you! Let me know if you have any questions. (If any student forgets or doesn't have a collection, they will instead be able to to write a list in class of a "collection" of favorite books, movies, songs, or places.)

Valentine's Day Joy

One of the things I love about teaching first graders is the joy that Valentine's Day brings. We had a Valentine's Day party as you know. The students were as excited to give as to receive. They delighted in delivering cards to one another and then unpacking theirs and discovering them. There were shouts of "Thank you so much!" "This is so pretty!" "Look at this!" flying around the room. I attempted to capture some of the happy chaos in these photos.

Tad's Number Line

This week each of the students made a number line from 1 to 100 that will go home soon. They also made a frog pointer to go with it. I encourage you to have your child use his/her number line for some math skills practice such as:

• number identification (point to random numbers you say, or have them name numbers you point to)
• identifying number families (show me the twenties family, show me the teens, etc.)
• counting forward and backward (starting at any number, not just 1 or 100) 
• skip counting (by 2s, 5s, 10s) 
• starting at numbers other than 10 and counting by 10s (start at 3 and count by tens: 3, 13, 23, 33, 43...)
• ten more/ten less (find 59. What is 10 more than 59? Find 91. What is 10 less than 91?)
• addition and subtraction (what's 45 plus 8? What's 52 minus 3?)
• rounding/estimating (point to 58. What decade number is that closest to?)
• finding the lowest and highest number in each number family

Read on the Beach this Friday

This Friday, February 16 is our annual WRS tradition called Read on the Beach! On this day students can wear t-shirts or bring sunglasses or hats to wear to the “beach” if they wish. (They should not wear flip flops or spaghetti straps or bathing suits.) They can bring a few books from home if they wish, as this will be a time when the whole school relaxes and settles into some great reading. If they don’t bring books from home, they will be able to bring books from the classroom. They also can bring a beach towel from home to stretch out on if they wish. 

Coming up...
February vacation is next week, Feb. 19 - 23.

Parent-Teacher Conferences Next Month

Parent-Teacher Conferences

March parent-teacher conferences are coming up on March 22 & 23. Look for a sign-up sheet in backpacks today or tomorrow where you can select a time for us to meet. Please return it as soon as you are able. Thank you!

100th Day of School

Last Thursday was our 100th day of school this year! We had fun celebrating "hundredness" throughout our day. In the morning, we warmed up by writing numbers from 1 to 100-- a lot easier and quicker for us to do than it would have been earlier in the year! 

In Number Corner, we have been recognizing "decade days" all year long. So on the 100th day, we celebrated our tenth decade day by counting by tens to 100, practicing writing the number family we had just worked our way through (the nineties), and ordering some random numbers between 1 and 100 from least to greatest.

We also practiced locating and identifying numbers efficiently in a hundred grid by coloring in the numbers that were called out. Gradually, students figured out what the picture was and could call out numbers for the class to color as well.  

We made a trail mix snack of 100 little items. We had to first figure out how many of each to use if we wanted equal amounts, since there were five snack foods. We figured out that two groups of ten of each would work.

We got out the collections some students had brought in and had to prove that there were indeed 100 items in them. We grouped them in piles of 5 or 10 in case we lost track counting along the way, and some of us wrote equations to go with our groupings. We counted and recounted one anothers' tracks, Legos, pennies, Cheerios, gummies, sea creatures, and puzzle pieces.     

During writing time we took a break from the serious informational writing we've been working on to write and share about things we wished we could have 100 of.

During reading time, it was a treat to nibble on our 100-item snacks while getting absorbed in our books.