Busy Times in First Grade!

We have had a busy time back from winter break! I hope the New Year is finding you all well and rested! Here are a few highlights of the things that have been keeping us busy…

Reading- In Storytown we have been working on R controlled vowels. We practice these many ways in class including practice during Daily 5. This week we are looking at words that end in –le. Thank you for continuing to practice these words with your child at home and have them turn in a spelling practice every week! Our comprehension skill we have been working on is main idea. We have been building on the skills of beginning, middle, and end to understand what the story is mostly about. This is a tough skill to pinpoint, so we are working on this through Storytown, Daily 5, in reading groups, and in writing!
Writing- In writing we have published our first writing pieces of the year! We have read MANY books about snow in class. Using these stories as inspiration each first grader composed their own “snow story” and created a sparkly snow globe scene to go with it! These are proudly displayed in the hallway. Our next project will have us looking at the structure of a friendly letter.
Social Studies- Last week and this week, we have taken a look at the lives of the plains Indians. As a class we have studied the clothes they wore, things they ate, where they lived… and other details about their lives. This will lead us into Kansas history this week in preparation for Kansas’ birthday at the end of the month!
Math- We have been working very hard the last couple of weeks on place value. We’ve been counting groups of tens and ones, representing numbers, identifying which number is more and less, and using our 100s boards to solve number problems. We will assess on this tomorrow and begin studying “greater than” and “less than”.
Last Friday we had a guest speaker, Trisha Williams, come speak to the class about healthy eating, getting enough exercise, and staying well. The kids loved hearing about germs and ways we can take care of ourselves in the winter. Thank you Trisha for taking time to come speak with the class!
Our 100th day of school is coming up at the end of the month. A note will be going home soon with information on a special class activity.

Spelling 1-9 1-13

Spelling words:
her, fur, turn, bird, girl, first, quit, when, name, and work

Just a note to pass along:
“The USD231 Bond Issue election ballots will be mailed to registered voters between January 11 and 14. The school district bond issue is extremely important to our students and the future of Gardner Edgerton School District. Please take a moment to vote and mail in your ballot. Every Vote Counts! For more information, visit usd231.com. Thank you!”

I hope you all had a wonderful break... we are finally back into the swing of things here. I will update out blog later this week with all of the fun things we have been doing here!