Lots of Learning!

Hi everyone! I can't believe we are nearing the end of November. Phewwww, we have been doing a lot of learning! In Reader's Workshop we have finished up our unit (though lessons will continue to be reinforced all year) on building our fluency. Students have learned many strategies such as paying attention to the punctuation, reading like a story-teller, thinking about the meaning of the sentence or story, chunking text together, and more! They continue to read and build that stamina both independently and with buddies. I am truly impressed and proud of their love of reading.

In Math we have finished up unit 2 and began unit 3. Students continue to count coin combinations (pennies and nickels and soon dimes), create and extend patterns, solve simple number stories using various strategies, learn about patterns on the number grid, and much more.


In Writing Workshop we began our unit, Small Moments. In this unit the students are encouraged to think about small moments/experiences in their lives to write about, adding a lot of interesting details. Students have listened to great stories where I have focused on the "small moment" and have looked/listened for all the details that the author included just in that small moment. Students are learning that big stories are "watermelon stories" and are encouraged to look inside that watermelon and pick a "seed" story. An example of a watermelon story would be "My Birthday Party". An example of a seed story would be "My Birthday Cake".

Students have been given plastic boxes for their WTW sorts. They seem to love these. They hold their sort cards perfectly. These are stored in the Word Work station and when they are in this station they may opt to grab their box and sort. This is optional in the Word Work station as they work with their sorts each day in a separate time.


In Science the students are learning about the different animal groups and what animals need to survive. In Social Studies they are learning about neighborhoods. They also practiced searching in atlases and learned that an atlas is a book of maps.


We are working on nouns and verbs in class. Ask your child to name the different types of nouns!