SCIENCE FAIR - March 20

You aren't going to believe how quickly March 20 will roll around.  Please refer to the attached sheet for information and ideas regarding the event. At this level it should be very simple.  A display board would be helpful for your findings.  On the board you should have the following:
A question
How you observed and got information
A prediction of what you thought would happen
The experiment
What you found out.
We will be doing a class project as well so please consider doing one of your own at home.
DOING SCIENCE HELPS YOU LEARN ABOUT SCIENCE!!!
http://school.discoveryeducation.com/sciencefaircentral/

SPELLING Jan. 30 - Feb. 2

Go spellingcity.com for a collection of games and activities that will help your child gain understanding of the spelling words.  
username:  scarey1  password:  mollyd


little, are, here, have, by, way, from, said, who, what
Bonus:  thirteen, third

Family Math Afternoon: February 2

On Thursday at 3:45 - 5:00 we will be having a Singapore Information event.  Please plan on bringing your child to participate and become informed about Singapore Math.

AUCTION QUILT

Kymberly McIntosh is doing an AMAZING job with our class quilt.  She is running into a lot of expense in piecing the quilt together. It would really be wonderful if we, as a class could help her out with the cost of batting, material and the cost of having it quilted by a master quilter from west Salem.  If you are so inclined and would like to help her by contributing a small amount of money, I know that it would be greatly appreciated.  Thank you so much and you may talk to me if you have further questions.  GO FIRST GRADE PIRATES!!


QUILT NAME:  Portraits of Perrydale First Graders
                           Class of 2023

HOMEWORK

The grammar homework will be discussing the capitalization of proper nouns.  We will also continue working on contractions, "Bossy e", and "Sleepy e".

In Math we are grouping things to 10 and adding and subtracting two digit and one digit numbers.  I will also be assessing coin combinations.

SCIENCE FAIRE

I am attaching some ideas that you may wish to use as you begin to think about your science project coming up.  Again, we will be doing one as a class and also I am encouraging each one of the children to do their own.  It's really fun and they will always remember the process they will go through to present his/her project.


Science Process:


Begin with a question
Observe and gain information
Make a prediction
Do an experiment
Tell and write someone what you found out

SPELLING JAN. 23-26

This week our list will contain some review words and some other ones we have used during our writing time.  Please help your child by going to spellingcity.com and playing the games to help solidify the words.  username:  scarey1  password:  mollyd

one, two, three, four, take, taking, of, friend, from, this, by, try, could


Bonus:  twelve, second

SPELLING THIS WEEK! Jan. 17-19

We will have fewer words this week due to the shortened week.  Our test will be on Thursday.

SPELLINGCITY.COM  username: scarey1  password:  mollyd

bake, baking, friend, from, what, could, box, me  BONUS:  number, eleven

LOOKING AHEAD TO MORE DATES TO SAVE

On TUESDAY,  MARCH 20, we will be having a SCIENCE FAIRE at school.  Our class will be doing a project as a class and I would like to encourage any of my students to do a project at home to present at the faire.  Some of you may wish to begin the project now.  Our class will be doing a "Simple Machine" project and all of the projects will need to have the following components:


1.  Begin with a question
2.  Observe and gain information
3.  Make predictions
4.  Do an experiment
5.  Tell and write someone what you found out.


We will have an opportunity to present the projects in class for another REPORT credit.  Please try this and have a blast learning!

SAVE THE DATES!!

We will be having a Math For Families Afternoon on Thursday, February 2 from 3:45 - 5:00 pm.  Please plan on attending in order to become more informed about Singapore Math as well as engage in activities with your child.  We'll have two activity sessions so you can attend multiple classrooms with your children.  3:45 - 4:15 will be an informational session provided by the teachers of the Elementary School and then the breakout activity times are 4:20 - 4:40 and 4:45 - 5:00.  I hope all of you are able to attend and that we can answer any questions you may have.

Three-Day School Week

We will have only three days of school together this week.  Please have your child practice reading his/her take home book every night and reture it on Thursday for a book for the weekend.  Another option is to do the raz-kids.com reading on the computer.  Take a peek and have fun! 

EXCITING NEW WEBSITE

I have purchased a wonderful subscription to a website that helps your child with reading.  It is called
RAZ-KIDS.COM and it reaches all of the kids at ALL reading levels.  The kids are able to listen to a story, then read the story and lastly, take a quiz.  He/She will obtain points every time they accomplish each task.  They will be able to decorate a space ship with the points earned and gain reading comprehension and fluency along the way.  It's a win, win situation for all of us!
To LOGIN, type in the username:  careyj.  
THE KIDS LOVE THIS SITE!  Have fun!

Math Focus

This week we will counting within 20 by making 10 first. 


In our Singapore math curriculum, we spend a lot of time thinking in ways that will make math easier as the kids grow.  One of these methods we are working on is grouping things together in groups of 10 in order to add and subtract numerals.  The language we are using is, "The numeral 13 is one ten and three".  As we add numerals together to make 20 and more, we will group the numbers into groups of 10 and then add together the ones.  This is fabulous mental math exercises and will help them so much in later grades if they learn this thinking strategy as second nature. You may help your child by doing simple addition and subtraction exercises using this technique.


We will continue our reinforcement of position and direction as we have done before. 

Spelling January 9 - 12

Reminders:  Go to spellingcity.com for games and reinforcement of our spelling words.
Username:  scarey1  Password:  mollyd

have, having, come, coming, make, making, like, liking, from, friend, were, was  BONUS:  January

Topic: Language, January 9-12

This week we will be studying three concepts at a deeper level:


1.  Some words are spelled the way they sound and some are not. Have and from are not spelled the way they sound.

2.We have a lot of expressions in our language;  have a ball, have a chip on your shoulder, have the blues, have a close call, have a green thumb, have cold feet, have a sweet tooth, etc.  We will be discussing these and making lists of things in our language that funny expressions we use.

3.  When adding -ing to words that end in e, we drop the e before adding -ing.

READING FLUENCY

Our goal in first grade is to guide and teach your child to read fluently, with expression and to comprehend what is read.  By doing so, your child is more likely to have a successful school experience.  It is vital during this first grade year that your child spends a great deal of time reading not only at school but at home as well.  I will be sending books home with your child on a daily basis as long as they are brought back the following day.  Please send the word cards and take home books in the plastic bags to and from school everyday.  We are on a quest for fluency!!  Just watch your child fly when his/her confidence blossoms through reading!  I'm ready to launch each one of them!!  Happy Reading!


For those of you who already are very dedicated to bringing your book bags back,  thank you, thank you, thank you!!  You're on your way to helping your child achieve great success!


By the way, have I mentioned this year being now 2012 how much I love my job!!

Magazines Anyone???

We are in need of magazines for cutting out words and pictures.  If anyone has any old ones you are willing to part with, we would appreciate them very much.

I am also needing medium sized plastic bottles for some word work activities.  The ideal size is not a litre pop bottle but the larger water bottle size.  I think it is 20-24 oz.  Thank YOU!

Math/Language focus this week

We will spend a lot of time talking and reviewing about adding and subtracting as well as using coins while we add and subtract.  I am having the kids work a lot on place value over the next few weeks as well as proximity and direction words.  Use language at home to help your child at school like:  First, Second - Tenth; Above, Below, Behind, Beside, Next to etc..

We will also be making a large list of words that have double letters in the middle.  Please keep a list of words and have your child bring them to school for us to post on our chart.

Spelling Words!

Please go to the spellingcity.com for games and spelling reinforcement.  The words this week will be review words:  can, dog, the, fast, park, as, run, were, was, with, at, his


The spelling lists will be getting longer as the kids improve in their writing and spelling of words.  I am very happy to see the kid's improvement in spelling.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

I trust that all of you had a relaxing and wonderful holiday with your family.  I missed your child and am so happy to be with them again!

Please send back the homework and books that were sent home to read over the holiday break.  Thank you for those of you who have done this already.

It's great to be back!

We have a new student names Mila.  We are very happy to have her with us in our class family.  Welcome Mila and her family to Perrydale and our class!!