Week of October 25, 2010

The students worked hard all week, and they had a ton of fun on Friday! What a perfect way to end the week.

We learned the following:

• Math: We learned our "tricky teens," which are the numbers 10-19, on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. We played counting games to help reinforce our counting skills. We also learned about estimation. Lastly, we learned basic addition and subtraction skills by telling number stories. For example, an addition number story would be, "Lisa and Debbie have pink shirts on, and Sara does too. How many friends are wearing pink shirts?" An example of a subtraction number story would be, "I had three chocolate chip cookies at snack. I only ate one. How many cookies do I have left?"
• Writing: We started Writer's Workshop this week. To begin, each day we talked about a question. To answer the question, the students had to use a complete sentence. For example, one question was, "What do you like to do when you get home from school?" On Thursday, we practiced writing a sentence in response to one of the questions that was discussed. The students first drew a picture about their topic. Then, they had to decide upon the sentence they would write. Next, they had to determine the number of words in the sentence and draw one line for every word. The students then had to use their knowledge of letter sounds in an effort to write the words in the sentence. The students also had to use a capital letter at the beginning of the sentence and a period at the end of the sentence.
• Reading: We also started Reader's Workshop this week. Our first mini-lesson addressed how to properly treat the books in our classroom library. In addition, it addressed how to put the books away using the categorizing system. We also learned that we can look for a familiar letter at the beginning of a word to help us figure a word out if we don't know it.
• Phonics and Word Study: We continued practicing writing sentences and looking at the different components of a sentence. We also learned that there are spaces between the words in sentences. To begin putting spaces between words, we will use two fingers. As the year progresses we will narrow that amount of space to one finger.
• Handwriting: We learned the following letters: H and K.
• Science: We finished our unit on the five senses. We continued to play games during our class meeting that require us to use one sense. We also read "Seven Blind Mice" by Ed Young. This story uses colors to describe each mouse.

Library Workstation

Writing Workstation - the students practiced writing sight words by tracing the sight words, then writing them on their own. Once they were done their worksheet, they practiced writing the words on a white board.

Handwriting Workstation - the students continue to practice their first name, last name, and phone number