Throughout the short week of October 15th, students continued to work with numbers between 0 and 50. These skills include: counting forward and backward from any given number, skip counting by 5's and 10's (and even 2's), ordering a set of numbers from least to greatest and beginning to understand place value (tens & ones). We used the free app "
Number Pieces" and began to really think about numbers having digits in specific places or "homes" called tens & ones. If you have an iPad at home -- this is a great learning tool to help your child understand place value! Please practice all of these skills at home on a regular basis.
First Grade classrooms were visited this week by small groups of 4th Graders who are involved in a PBL (Project Based Learning) activity. The 4th Graders took surveys from First Graders about favorite flavors of juice and soft drinks. Our class was very impressed to see 4th Graders collecting "data" using "
tally marks". This is a skill we are learning to use as well! Here is another great tip to practice math thinking at home -- have your child gather "data" using tally marks (correctly!!) around the house. Ideas could include: How many pairs of shoes are laying around the living room (haha!). Actually this is a higher level of thinking considering a "pair" is actually 2 shoes. (Early multiplication thinking...) OR have your child make tally marks showing how many toys in their room are not put away, etc. We are surrounded by many opportunities to get your child's brain really thinking about Math! And they can have fun in the process.
In Social Studies we are learning how to use maps and globes and understanding cardinal directions. We had fun locating the "compass rose" on many different maps and testing each other about where North/South/East/West were located on maps.
Our class was "gifted" this week with 20 really WONDERFUL books from a Wells Fargo Program! Thank you to our homeroom Mom, Angela Hall, for helping our students benefit from this fantastic reading initiative
. Your child cannot read enough!! Just remember, if you do anything each evening, please, please, PLEASE read every day to and with your child!!! And p.s. - we LOVE free stuff for our classroom! BOOM!
Next on our hard work agenda from this past week is something we have created for the Global Read Aloud Project. As you know, we are reading the book Marty McGuire along with thousands of kids from around the world. We Twitter & Skype regularly with a First Grade Classroom from Chicago (Mrs. Smith) and Ms. Manion from Oregon. (Map Skills!!) The book is really engaging for our kiddos and they get mad when we can't read another chapter (there is a schedule!) What is really exciting is our students will also be a part of a GLOBAL BOOK about all the learning our kids have had from Marty McGuire. Both Ms. Gelles' class and our class will be contributing in a special way to this Global Book. It is a project that, once completed, I will be sure to share with you in some way! A First Grade Teacher from British Columbia is organizing it all and we cannot wait to see the finished product! In the meantime -- this is the very beginning of our contribution:
Our assignment was for students to pick their favorite part about Chapter 6. Each student drew a "Mental Image" (comprehension strategy) of what was going on in the Chapter. We then compiled our pictures into a graph. Our next job will be to add this picture into another app and analyze the data. We will create audios and verbally analyze the information we learned from our graph. Last, we will send off our contribution to be a part of this GLOBAL BOOK! The world is a very big place and we are excited to see all the contributions to this book from around the world! I will keep you posted!
And last, but not least -- here are a few more student projects about using rocks & soil around Bear Creek. Click on the link to view. There are still a few students who have this project still outstanding and I will add them as they finish up. Have a great week!
