Jumping into January!

It is good to be back from winter break! These snow and ice days off of school are throwing a wrench into the momentum of things to get done and fun to be had in the classroom! Please be sure to help your child stay in the school mind-set, and continue to develop their love of reading, even when we are not in session. At any age, when students stop practicing (even for a small amount of time), they slide backwards in skill and ability. Let's continue to support our students in their learning, building academic confidence, and showing them that education is a very important to all of us! At this point in the year, students and families should continue to work on:

* sight words (ball words)

* reading fluency (reading a story or passage 3x's to become very fluent readers (pacing--- not too fast, not too slow), using expression)

* spelling/phonics

* number sense (knowing the true value of each number 0-20....ie: 5 is five ones, 11 is one group of ten and one extra.)

* Counting to 120, reading/writing numerals up to 120.

* addition and subtraction fluency within 20.

If your child is needing extra practice in some areas, you may see some activities or reading passages added to your child's book bag for math or reading. Most all first grade students will receive reading fluency practice because that is where we are at developmentally this time of year.

If you are looking for fun ways to work on these things with your child, and incorporate it into your daily routines and home activities, please let me know! I am happy to share ideas! It is much more meaningful to find real world ways to practice and/or make a game out of it, rather than set aside extra work time at home (with the exception of reading-----time should be set aside for reading, as well as incorporating it into daily living).

The beginning of January involves updates on testing that gives us a lot of information about student growth and performance. We will finish up reading level assessments that were started before break, as well as DIBELS (early literacy assessment screener), sight word assessments and i-Ready online assessments for math and reading. We will also be completing Language Arts common assessments that are required by the district and/or State. In between all these things, we resume regular lessons as well.

Now that the important business is out of the way, here are a few things that we've been up to!

In Science, we were challenged with the question "How to animals and people adapt to winter climates?" The easy part was discussing that people have a lot of options: we go into our homes for shelter, we have shoes and clothes for all types of weather, blankets, food that is easy to buy at the store, fireplaces, heaters, shovels, snowplows.....all of that makes life easier in the winter months. But.....what about animals? I mean, look at these guys? It looks C-O-L-D, COLD! Brrrrrr!

We also have enjoyed checking in on this live polar bear web cam from Manitoba, Canada! http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/explore/nature/polar-bear-cam/

Click the link to check it out!

After our observations, we continued to learn more with this fun video!

Then, we wanted to try it for ourselves! Does blubber really make that much of a difference? After we stopped laughing about the words 'blubber' and 'fat' (because that is what first graders do!), we investigated!

We each held a large bag of ice (with added kosher salt) for as long as we could with our bare hands! It didn't last long.....too cold!

So, we put on blubber gloves! We discovered that the blubber is a really good insulator and keeps our hands warm. When we hold the bag of ice with blubber gloves, the cold doesn't bother us anymore.....just like the blubber on a whale, for instance!

Want to make your own blubber gloves? Check them out here! This is a great experiment for at home, too! EASY!

And for those days where is it just too cold to go outside, we enjoy inside recess together! This crew LOVED working together to build this very tall tower. Taller than Mrs. Powell....not hard to do, but taller than Mr. Brown was a challenge...and they did it! Good teamwork and perseverance, friends!

Additionally, we are in the middle of a folktale unit for Language Arts. We are piloting a potential new reading resource for the district. We have worked hard to analyze and compare the characters and events from The Fox's Foray (a poem), a book The Fox Went Out on a Chilly Night, and a video version, Fox went out on the Town. We have learned about the qualities that make a story a folktale, and are learning what the fox character is like. Coming up we will read, The Gingerbread Man, Henny Penny, and Chicken Little and see how those folktales and characters compare to the stories we've recently read.

Ask your child what the fox character is like----what is good about him, and what is not so good?

Ask your child to define a folktale. What is it?

Ask your child to tell you the differences in the poem, video, and book