RESPECT.. Find Out What It Means to Me

To help build community at the beginning of the year, we studied the meaning of respect. Students learned the importance of classroom manners and proper communication in their daily interactions with others. Not only the importance but ways to communicate and work together.  
We read books about respect.

We sorted pictures of respect and wrote how we could show respect.

We also wanted to share respect with the school by creating respect posters.

Lastly, we became respect detectives and took pictures of our class members showing respect. The students sorted the pictures of their peers and wrote about the pictures showing respect. 

Creative Thinkers Through Play

You might hear your child say, "We played today!" or "I love math play!" Did you know "play" is much more than just having fun?

Play..

• Enables children to make sense of their world
• Develops social and cultural understandings
• Allows children to express their thoughts and feelings
• Fosters flexible and divergent thinking
• Provides opportunities to meet and solve real problems
• Develops language and literacy skills and concepts

Play also encourages cognitive development through problem solving, mental planning, self monitoring and evaluation. Play Article

Our Creative Thinking During Play

Block Center:

This is a hotel in Los Angles. Can you find the Hollywood Sign?

Construction Zone

Geoboards

Today in class we learned the vocabulary word, "represent."  Lyric said the flag represented the United States.

The dramatic play center made cheese pizza

Come to the Art Museum

Can you find the letters to spell "Parker"

Snaps:

Together the students made a camp using snaps and then created a blueprint to show their creation

Bryce created a motor for his car

Pattern Blocks:

Practicing symmetry 

Dramatic Play:

The students made food for the "birthday party." The brownies and smoothies were delicious!

Lighting the candles on the birthday cake.

You can purchase jewelry from our jewelry store.

Room 103 Post Office

POST OFFICE IS NOW OPEN!!!

The students are continuing to write for a variety of purposes. After reading, "Dear Juno" and "How the Mail Works" the students showed interest in writing letters to each other, so I created a post office in the dramatic play center. I also sent letters to the students over spring break, they were so excited to get their own mail!

Students write and send letters to each other, teachers and staff. They even created signs for the post office. 

Ask your child what is included in a letter (date, greeting, body, and closing).

While writing in the post office, students learned how to address an envelope and create post cards. 

Next week we will start writing to first grade pen pals in Nebraska. Ask your child what they should include in their letter...

PREFIXES!!!

The students have been learning how to identify prefixes and root words. To help students practice the meaning and how to identify a prefix, they collaborated with a partner to make a game.

 Ask your student to recall a word with a prefix and root word.
Want a challenge???
Ask your child to recall a word with prefix, root word and suffix.

Then ask them to tell you the meaning of the word, for example, "unkindly" (not in a kind way).

100th Day of School

Today we celebrated the 100th Day of School. We made stories using "100" of anything. We made hats using our understanding of place-value and necklaces out of 100 Fruit Loops!

First grade had a special visit from a local Chicago author, Natasha Tarpley. Ms. Tarpley was kind enough to come share her books and teach us more about the writing process.

Her children books include, I Love My Hair, Bippity Bop Barbershop, Destinys Gift, Joe Joe's First Flight and her newest book, Princess Tiana and the Royal Ball.

We've read, I love My Hair and Bippity Bop Barbershop. Ask your child to tell you about the stories and how Ms. Tarpley develops writing ideas. 

Where do you get your writing ideas from???

How-To Books

We recently started making How-To books. Use this chart at home to create more How-To books. Help your child brainstorm ideas and give clear directions. Bring to school any How-To books you make and we will share them with the class.

Here are some of the How-To books being created in room 103

After we write our How-To book, we  recheck our directions with a partner to make sure they are clear, detailed and make sense.

 Once we've practiced our How-To directions we make any revisions using sticky notes.