May News #1

 The arrival of May will bring lots of anticipation for the end of the school year. We will stick to our schedule and routines as much as possible, but will also have some "fun" to celebrate the upcoming end of the year. It gets more difficult each week to keep them motivated and focused, especially when the weather is so nice.

Spelling: This is week 29 and then we have just one more week of spelling. Woo Hoo! I am so proud of their efforts and for the extra practice that they are doing at home.

Math: We have completed Module 6, which focused on “Put Together and Take Apart Word Problems” and this week, we will begin Module 7, which focuses on “Compare Word Problems”. This will be our final module focusing on problem solving. We are working on listening to what the problem is asking and to focus on key words to decide if we need to add or subtract. We also have “Math Slides” almost daily to review and keep on top of equality, problem solving, counting money, telling time, fact fluency, number sequence, and geometry, as well as an independent equality page almost weekly. I also want to mention that I have been impressed with how many students are doing the homework pages that accompany our daily lessons. Thanks for returning those. The extra practice gives them a better understanding of the skill we are working on.

Reading: Last week, our reading goals were to read and spell words with ie, igh, and words that end with y. Our comprehension skill was story structure (identifying characters, setting, problem, and solution), and our grammar skill was adjectives. This week, our reading goals will be to read and spell words with the suffixes of ful, ly, and y, our grammar skill will be to identify adverbs in sentences, and our comprehension skill will be to understand character traits and author's choice of words. The week of May 8th, our goals will be to read and spell words with syllable patterns, as well as the prefixes of re and un, our grammar skill will be adjectives that compare, and our comprehension skill will be to identify the main idea and key details in stories we read. The week of May 8th will be the last week of new reading skills. We will be using our large group reading time to finish the year with writing and review of skills we have covered.The following words have been added or will be added to our word wall: ball, across, second, large, heard, head, should, brothers, loved, people, everyone, most, sorry, field, only, caught, thought, beautiful, took, minute, friendship, listen, and idea. 

Writing: We will continue writing in our journals a few days each week, and complete narrative lessons. We will also revisit "opinion" and "informative" and do review samples for each.

Science: During the month of May, we will finish up our lessons on “Light and Sound”. Our final Mystery Science lesson it titled “How do boats find their way in the fog?” We will also have some investigations about communicating with light and sound. 

Ticket Challenge: We are working on a “class challenge” of earning 10 class tickets for a movie break and popcorn. We have earned 5 thus far and I am hoping we can make it to 10 this upcoming week. I also give out individual tickets to students for making good choices. Their tickets are placed in a bucket and on Fridays I draw 5-7 students to pick a prize.

Upcoming Events:

Thursday, May 11th field trip to Swan Lake in the morning (we will return in time to eat lunch at school)

Thursday, May 25th First Grade Picnic Day at Breda Park. More details to come as date gets closer in regards to whether you want a school made sack lunch or whether you want to send one with your child on that day.