Friday Flyer

Dear Families,

       

Happy Holidays!!!  This time of year is so magical and peaceful.  We love spending our day with your children!

 

This week, during language arts, we began our reading unit on non-fiction.  The kids LOVE to listen to and read non-fiction books.  We will learn about how NF is not a story, notice how a NF book is organized, talk about different text features (table of contents, captions, photographs, diagrams, index, headings, & glossary) and how to determine the main idea and supporting facts in many NF books.  If you don’t have any NF books in your home, consider a quick trip to the library to pick some up.  Reading NF books is of high interest to young readers and improves their reading and comprehension skills a lot.:)  Later this month, we will also learn about Hanukkah by reading a story and making latkes (potato pancakes).  We will also be reading “The Legend of the Poinsettia” and discuss how the flower originated in Mexico.  Over the upcoming holiday break, please be sure to continue reading EVERYDAY with your child.  With the longer break we don’t want our reading skills to slip. J

 

In math, we have been working on solving addition and subtraction story problems, understanding place value and equivalence, and investigating counting sequences.  We are always discovering new strategies to solve our math problems!

 

In social studies we are learning all about maps and compasses in preparation for our walking field trip to Meijer next week Wednesday.

Our classroom holiday party will be on Wednesday, December 21st at 2:15 (2-2:15 is our all school recess and set up time).  Thank you to parents that are donating their time and help for this party!  Because of the difficult economic times, we do not do any type of gift exchange among the children.  We celebrate the season and enjoy each others company at the party! 

 

At this time of year we count our many blessings.  You and your child are among them.  We truly enjoy teaching your children and watching them grow both socially and academically.  Thank you for sharing them with us!

May you and your families have a safe and happy holiday. 

Warmly,

       Jennifer Mason and Kelly Putnam

P.S. Please be sure your child is dressed for the weather next week Wednesday, December 7^th as this is the day of our WALKING field trip to Meijer to support the “Helping Hands” project.  For those volunteering for this trip, please arrive at school by 12:20.

*Dec. 22^nd is a PTC spirit day, send in any donation to wear pajamas today! J  This is also our last day of school before break.

Christmas Break: Dec. 23-Jan. 2, school resumes on Jan. 3^rd. 

Friday Flyer

Dear Parents,

         

This week during writing workshop we continued studying the craft of certain authors and added what we learned to our pieces.  For example, Mo Willems uses speech bubbles, writes in large text to convey sound, and uses ellipses.  Kevin Henkes sometimes writes in short choppy phrases to convey action and or emotion.  We are also working on revising our own writing with partners as well as by ourselves. This month we will also begin our Informational Writing unit.

The reading strategies focused on this week were “jumping” into the first 3 sounds of unknown words while thinking of what word would make sense and reading on, practicing retelling our stories with a lot of details, flipping vowel sounds in unknown words from short to long (as well as the two sounds c and g make, and rereading favorite books many times.  This helps with improving our reading fluency. J

Our comprehension strategy this trimester is learning about how text is organized into characters, setting, problem, and solution. We have started to identify these particular parts of a story and filled out a graphic organizer together. 

Next week, our third vowel will be introduced during Spelling through Phonics.  It is the short (i) when found in the medial position in words.  We will continue to practice writing words daily that contain the short (a, o, and i) along with the consonants taught thus far.  We are becoming great little spellers…even some 5 letter words!

          In math, we started Unit 3.  We will be building on our counting skills, working on place value, and we will investigate the structure of the base-10 number system.  Please look for your child’s Unit 2 math packet (on geometry)  in Friday Folders this week.  We are also learning to “attend to precision” as a mathematician.  This means that we are careful mathematicians, we label our work, use numbers and words to describe our thinking, and we use different strategies to check our work.           

In Science we are continuing on with our weather watchers unit. Your child has been exploring wind direction and speed, precipitation, cloud cover and the different signs of fall. Ask your child to give you a weather report for the day!

For Social Studies we learned about Election Day Veteran’s Day this week.  We are so thankful for the right to vote and for the service of all veterans!  We will also be looking at family traditions surrounding the holidays.  Soon, special ‘projects’ will be coming home to be completed and returned, stay tuned!

          Parents, the cold and flu season is upon us.  Please keep your child at home if they are sick.  This is the only time we don’t want to share!  Also, your child must be fever free for 24 hours, without medication, before returning to school.

         

Thank you for your continued support.  Enjoy your weekend with your family!

                                Jennifer Mason and Kelly Putnam

Reminders:

·        11-11-16: Popcorn Day, Picture Re-takes

·        11-14-16: Firemen visit

·        11-18-16: Spirit Day! Wear Your Teacher’s Favorite Color

·        11-18-16 Coupon Book Sale begins

·        The week of November 21st we have school on Monday and Tuesday.  No school Wed.-Fri., Happy Thanksgiving!

 

Friday Flyer

Dear Families,

       Thank you for attending conferences this week.  We have enjoyed having the opportunity to share with you regarding how your child has acclimated to school, as well as ways you can further support learning and behaviors from home.   

During Readers Workshop, I introduced the strategy “back up and reread” sentences when a lot of the text was difficult and had to be stretched. Children need to reread the sentence to “smooth” it out.  This helps support good comprehension and retellings.   We also continue to work on retelling our stories using the words first, then, next, and last after reading a book.   

       Next week, during Writer’s Workshop we will celebrate the end of our first unit with a “splash” of soda (Sprite) as we “toast” to what great writers we have become.  We will toast to several different concepts that we have learned and are now able to do.  Our next unit is “Authors as Mentors”.  We will continue with narrative writing as we take a close look at different authors and study their craft.  The kids LOVE Writer’s Workshop!!

       During math workshop we have been focusing on word problems (stories that are written with numbers involved that students solve).  Students have learned that the most important part of solving these problems is explaining and showing evidence of their thinking!  We can now write equations (ex. 5+2=7) that show how we solved the word problem, draw pictures to help solve, use math tools (unifix cubes, number grid, etc.), and even write a sentence to explain what we did.  We also started our unit on geometry this week!  Students are enjoying our study of shapes and can build shapes using different shapes.  Our math workshop is helping us to explore and teach each other how mathematicians think and share their ideas with others!

              Don’t forget, our Halloween party is next week Friday, October 28th. We start dressing at 1:45, our parade starts at 2:00, and the party is at 2:15!

Have a great weekend with your family,

              Jennifer Mason and Kelly Putnam

* Reminder:

- No school on Friday (Oct. 21)

"Growth Mindset"

Dear Families,

We are so pleased that your child is a part of our classroom community for the 2016-2017 school year. As we  learn and play together we will also be building critical skills for a lifetime of curiosity and growth. We will be teaching some important ways of thinking about ourselves and the world this year that has grown out of the incredible work of Carol Dweck.

Carol Dweck is a researcher, currently at Stanford University, who has pioneered a great deal of work around the idea of growth mindset. A growth mindset is the belief that we can learn anything with support, hard work, and thoughtful strategic instruction. Children with a growth mindset outperform children who do not think of themselves and their learning this way.

The way we support this work in our classroom is by intentionally teaching ways of thinking about ourselves and our learning. This year, we will be teaching your children the concepts of:

OPTIMISM: The belief that no matter the obstacle, we have the power and possibility to overcome it.

RESILIENCE: The ability to bounce back from setbacks and frustrations and learn from them when they happen.

PERSISTENCE: The habit of trying something more than once, or sticking with something through the hard parts.

FLEXIBILITY: The knowledge that there are multiple ways to solve any problem, and the skills to strategically solve it.

EMPATHY: The ability to understand feelings and other people’s points of view. A fundamental aspect of a healthy child and a healthy community.

As we learn more about these big ideas, we will think about ways to use self-talk, self stories, goal setting, and reflection to reinforce and support these positive habits of mind.

As in all things, you are our greatest partners, and so we invite you on this journey with us! We’ve introduced these concepts slowly over the first 5 weeks of school. Here are some ways you can support and connect with your child over these big ideas:

●        Share your own stories. Talk with your child about times you showed empathy or were flexible.

●        Listen in on your own self talk and refine it. Be mindful of saying things like “I can’t” as in “I can’t put together this IKEA furniture!” instead try, “This feels hard, but I am going to take a break and try it a different way to see if that helps!”

●        Read with your child and talk about the ways characters are acting in regards to these habits of mind.

We look forward to talking with you more as the year unfolds. As always, feel free to contact us with questions, comments, and concerns. It is with great pleasure that we have begun this journey together.

Warmly,

Kelly & Jennifer

 

For More Information:

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2015/09/23/carol-dweck-revisits-the-growth-mindset.html

http://www.upworthy.com/researchers-studied-kindergarteners-behavior-and-followed-up-19-years-later-here-are-the-findings

https://www.yahoo.com/beauty/reading-harry-potter-books-can-make-kids-more-tolerant-93438785457.html

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/01/why-parents-need-to-let-their-children-fail/272603/

http://nymag.com/news/features/27840/

Dear Parents,

We can’t believe it is October already and we are quickly approaching conferences and Halloween. 

Halloween Parties

Our Halloween party will be on Friday, October 28^th. Please send your child’s costume to school in an extra bag marked with their name.  We have an all school recess from 1:30-1:45 (this is when we will set up the classroom for our party).  The students will start dressing at 1:45 and will then parade around the building starting at 2:00 with the party following the parade from 2:15-3:00.  If part of your child’s costume is something like a black turtleneck or sweatpants, they may wear them to school and add the rest of their costume later.  Just a reminder, no toy guns, swords, or knives are allowed.

Morning Snack

Please remember to send your child to school everyday with a healthy snack (even when having hot lunch).  This is important to their learning!  Thank You.

Language Arts

        During Spelling through Phonics we have added more consonants to our learning as spellers. The children are anxiously waiting for their first vowel to be given in this program.   This is because we have discussed that you have to have a vowel in EVERY word in order to spell words correctly.  What could be more exciting!!  Early next week, I will introduce the short a vowel sound when it is found in the medial position.  Then we will finally be able to spell the entire word during Spelling!  J

  During Readers Workshop, our comprehension strategy for the next month or so will be learning how to identify the beginning, middle, and ending stories. This organization of text is important to understand because it supports our comprehension.  The reading strategies that your children have been taught are, when we get stuck on a word…1. look at the picture and think of what word would make sense and 2. Back up and reread the sentence while getting our mouth ready for the first sound in the unknown word and 3. Stretching and blending the sounds we hear in the unknown words.   Next week, we will work on backing up and rereading, knowing sight words in a snap, and bringing up our schema about the information in the book before we start reading. 

During writer’s workshop, we continued to work on stretching our words to hear more sounds, using spaces between our words and adding details about a personal experience. Next week, I will introduce quotation marks and suggest they try to add dialogue to their writing pieces. I am so impressed with how much writing the children are producing!  Many are stretching their stories across 4-5 pages. We are also working hard on making our sentences a 5 star sentence.  (Start with a capital letter, spaces, neat, make sense and punctuation)

                 Math

        We wrapped up our initial introduction to addition with lots of story problem practice and addition math games.  I’ve heard that many of you are enjoying playing “Double Compare” at home!  Our focus during math workshop now is on subtraction.  We are sharing many strategies with one another on how to solve subtraction story problems and are applying these skills to math practice games as well, I am very happy with the progress being made!

       

Science

In science, we have been taking full advantage of the beautiful weather we’ve been experiencing!  We will be studying weather and the seasons all year long and last week we wrapped up our summer portion of the unit as it is officially fall now!  We went outside to observe the weather using our senses and we made wind and temperature observations- ask your first grader for more details!

Social Studies

We are continuing our study of National Symbols.  In a couple of weeks we will play National Symbols Jeopardy at the completion of our learning about the American Flag, The White House, Mount Rushmore, The Liberty Bell, and The Statue of Liberty.

Computer Lab

During our computer lab time each week we have learned the names of the parts of the computer, we’ve learned about computer lab expectations, and we are even able to use two word processing programs (Microsoft Word and Power Point)!  Your child now knows how to capitalize letters, change the font and size, and insert a picture into their document.

***Thank you so much for your at home help and support.  First grade is fast paced; your child would not be having a successful experience without the team effort of home and school.  Please don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any questions, we look forward to meeting with you soon at conferences!

       

Have a great weekend!                             

       

Sincerely,

Jennifer Mason and Kelly Putnam

Upcoming Dates:

-        Friday, Oct. 7^th-

Howard Christensen Nature Center

Field Trip- DRESS FOR OUTDOOR WEATHER and remember you SACK LUNCH J

-        Wednesday, Oct. 12^th- Walk/Ride your bike to school day

-        Friday, Oct. 14^th- ½ day, 11:25 dismissal, also Walk-a-

thon, 9:30-10:15

-        Week of Oct. 17-21: Book Fair

-         

-        Oct. 17 & 20^th: Conferences

-         

-        Oct. 20^th: spirit Day- Hat Day (also, last day for mileage

club)

-        Friday, Oct. 21^st: NO SCHOOL

-        Tuesday, Oct. 25^th: PTC Meeting, 7pm

-        Friday, Oct. 28^th: Halloween Parties (see above)

 

First Grade

Flyer

September 16, 2016

We are off to a fabulous start this year!  What a nice group of first graders, they are excited to learn!  Some classroom expectations we are working on are: being active listeners (with their whole body), following directions (even if you don’t want too) and keeping up with our busy and fast paced routines.   Please support these same topics at home by giving your child daily responsibilities and chores.  Some ideas are: Jobs such as hanging up coats and backpacks, putting their lunchbox by your sink, setting or clearing the table, wiping down counters, empting dishwashers, folding or sorting laundry, or taking out the trash.  Consistent expectations and reinforcement are important for 6 and 7 year olds to learn.  They can do these jobs as a way to practice following directions and to help out their family.

          This week we have also dedicated time to talking/reading about being a “school family.”  Members of a family help one another, practice always being respectful, responsible, ready and safe.  We also discussed how to react if someone does or says mean things to you… (Stop!  Take a breath, and then react with words. Don’t continue the negative action.)  Our focus word this week was “empathy.”  We are learning to put ourselves “in someone else’s shoes” and how to show kindness and compassion as well.

          Starting next week, we will continue our morning with Reader’s Workshop. This is when I model what good readers do and teach a reading strategy through a mini-lesson. After the mini-lesson the children are given a basket of books to independently practice what they have just learned.  The strategies that will be taught next week  are Good Readers … practice everyday, predict during the story as to what they think will happen next, and look at the pictures to get our brains thinking about what words we might see on that page and how to pick out a “Just Right book” for themselves.  We will also be starting our “Writer’s Workshop”.  Everyday your child will produce a piece of writing.  At this point in the year, we review what authors and illustrators do, model how to think of a topic (out loud), choose a topic, sketch a quick drawing of your idea, count how many words are in their sentence when spoken out loud, and stretch each sound in the word to write it.  We also remind them about “5 Star Sentences”:

1. We start our sentences with a capital letter.

2. Leave spaces between our words

3. Use punctuation at the end

4. Our sentences need to make sense

5. Our sentences need to be neat

 When writing at home (a thank you note, message to a parent or Grandparent,, grocery list…) with your child, please be consistent in following this same routine.   

          In a couple of weeks, your child will be bringing home a leveled book from my classroom.  These are in a special bag and labeled with your child’s name.  You will find a note inside the bag, for parents, explaining how to help your child when reading at home.  

Please assist your child in remembering to return it daily for a new book J        

In math, our math workshop time is in full swing!  We learned many math routines and procedures and we began using lots of different “math tools” that will help us become great “mathematicians!”  Our focus in Unit 1 is on building numbers and solving story problems.  Great start mathematicians!

We will soon begin our investigation of U.S. National Symbols for Social Studies.  We will learn important facts about the American Flag, Bald Eagle, Liberty Bell, Statue of Liberty, White House, and Mount Rushmore.  We will look at some literature and will be viewing short video clips and making posters to teach others about these unique symbols.

Every Friday, your child will be bringing home a red Wildcat folder (unfortunately, these folders have not come in yet, loose papers will be in your child’s backpack this week).  This folder will contain important information from the office and our classroom.  Please return these folders to school every Monday after removing all papers.

          At this point for homework, please encourage your child to read daily before bed, finding sight words and pointing to the words as you or they read. 

We had a super first 2 weeks with your child.  We hope they have enjoyed their first grade experience so far! 

Thank you for all of the generous classroom donations; we greatly appreciate it!

Have a wonderful weekend!

Ms. Mason and Mrs. Putnam

Reminders:

*Send a healthy, peanut free snack for your child every

 day.

*Be prepared for the day’s specials classes (see special schedule included in paperwork in backpacks today)

* Send all lunch money in an envelope or baggie with your child’s name on the front.

Important Dates:

ü      Sept.21 PTC Boxtop collection kick off

ü      Sept. 22 PTC Chuck E Cheese Night

ü      Sept. 23 Picture Day

ü      Sept. 23 Blackout Football Game

ü      Sept. 27 Family Watch Dog Night 6-7pm/PTC meeting 7-8pm

ü      Sept. 30 Field trip money due ($12) and PTC Hat day

Jennifer Mason, 1^st grade teacher

jmason@nvps.net

Kelly Putnam, 1^st grade teacher

kputnam@nvps.net

Dear 1^st Grade Families,

            LIGHTS, CAMERA, ACTION!  Welcome to 1^st grade at North Oakview Elementary School!  We hope you had a great summer and are ready for a 1^st grade year filled with SHINING moments!  We are VERY excited to see your MOVIE STAR SMILE on the first day of school on Tuesday, September 6.

           

We thought you might like to know some things about your first grade teachers.

 

Mrs. Putnam graduated from Hope College and has her Master’s degree from GVSU.  She taught 3^rd grade for one year in Grand Ledge, 2^nd grade for nine years in Northview, and this will be her sixth year job sharing with Mrs. Mason in 1^st grade (which is so much fun!)  Mrs. Putnam is originally from DeWitt, Michigan and she likes to read and do lots of outside activities such as bike riding, riding her scooter, and playing outdoors with her children.  Her husband teaches in East Grand Rapids and their daughter, Gracie, is 9, son Gibson is 7, and son Graham is 4.  She feels very fortunate to have the opportunity to help you learn which means she’s SUPER excited to start the school year!

Ms. Mason grew up in Rockford Michigan.  She graduated from Western Michigan University and has her masters from GVSU.  She taught preschool for one year, Kindergarten for two years and has currently been in first grade for 19 years.  SHE LOVES FIRST GRADE!!!  In her spare time, Ms. Mason loves to be with her two sons Jackson (8) and Cohen (6).  They both are North Oakview students.  We love to go camping all summer long, fishing, ride bikes, swim, ski, read children’s books, watch movies, or just play in our yard at home.  Ms. Mason and her boys also have a new puppy named Bentley and an older dog named Mia…she’s 14 years old!  I’m sure that there will be a lot of Bentley adventures to share.  J

 

            Students, we do have one thing we’d like to ask your parents to do.  We would like to know more about you and your family.  Please write us a short email about you and send it by the end of the first week of school.  Some ideas to include may be your hobbies, likes and dislikes, fears, previous school experiences, academic strengths/areas of need, your parents’ hopes and wishes for you, and what they expect from this year.  You may also include any medical concerns/allergy information, and the names/ages of any siblings.  This is one way for us to get to know you even better.  Thank you!

            If you or your parents would like to know more about us, about our plans for the school year, or just have questions, feel free to contact us!  You may call school at 361-3450 (before/after school) or email anytime.  Please be sure to have your after school plans in place prior to coming to school each day as late afternoon phone calls make the end of the day more hectic.  We have many exciting things planned, and we are ready to help you accomplish great things!  We are so excited to start our school year together, so come prepared with your ideas, skills, and a smile. J

Your “Directors,”

Ms. Jennifer Mason

Mrs. Kelly Putnam

First Grade Teachers 

Dear First Grader,

Hello! Can you believe you will soon be a first grader?  Guess what?  You are going to have two teachers, Mrs. Mason and Mrs. Putnam.   Mrs. Mason will be with you in the mornings to teach you reading, writing, spelling and phonics.  Mrs. Putnam will be teaching you math, science, social studies and computer lab in the afternoons. We are excited to begin the new school year with you!  To help you get ready for your first day of first grade, we thought you might like a checklist of the supplies you can begin to gather and bring to school on Tuesday, September 6th.

1.) 1½ inch hard cover 3-ring binder
2.) notebooks (1 spiral, 1 composition)
3.) 1 pencil box 5”x8” (not a pouch)
4.) 1 box of 24 crayons (only 24 please)
5.) A large backpack (without wheels)
6.) A healthy snack and lunch (daily)
*Most of these items can be found at the dollar store. J

If your family is able to provide any of these additional classroom supply needs, it would be greatly appreciated!
Classroom Needs: (not required by all students)
Kleenex
3”x 3” sticky notes
Yellow #2 pencils **

**Please, no fancy pencils or personal pencil sharpeners.  All pencils will be shared with the class.

We are looking forward to meeting all of you at our Open house on Tuesday, August 30 from 6:00-7:00pm. 

Remember, school begins on Tuesday, September 6th and it will be a full day.  Come prepared with your ideas and smiles!
   Sincerely,  Mrs. Mason and Mrs. Putnam

                                                           6-8-16

Dear Families,

        We wanted to express how much we have enjoyed this school year.  Working with your children has been a highlight in our teaching careers.  This particular group of children holds many great qualities.  They are very kind, generous, and eager to learn.  What more could a teacher ask for?

        When the year started most could not read or write a sentence, count to one hundred, or tell time.  We are very proud of their hard work and determination.  It was really those two attributes that allowed them to succeed.  Working with them on a daily basis was a joy!  It always amazes us how much they learn to do in first grade!

        Thank you for all of the wonderful parent support you gave to your child and to us.  It is truly appreciated and does not go unnoticed.  We could not have done it on our own and been as successful!

        We encouraged the children to continue their learning over the summer.  Please consider the following ideas:

1.)   READ! READ! READ!  The public library, Schuler Books, and Barnes and Noble all offer summer reading programs that are both fun and motivating.  Also, check out a book title generator based on a book your child loved.  Go to http://yasiv.com, type in your favorite book title, and it will generate a web of book suggestions with a synopsis of each.

2.) Your child should WRITE!  This can take any form—thank you notes, journal writing back and forth with you, lists, stories, pen pal letters—whatever is motivating for your child!

3.) Your child should keep up their MATH skills!  Work through the summer math packet that was sent home to review the skills taught this year.  Studying basic facts is important as well.  There are many apps available for ipods, ipads, and iphones.  Here are some online sites and apps that are great tools for practice:

-        abcya.com

-        www.mathplayground.com

-        www.ixl.com (accounts are active through June 30)

-        Apps: monster math, sushi math

We hope these ideas are useful to you.  Thank you for sharing your sweet children with us this year, we have truly enjoyed learning and growing together.

Warmly,

Jennifer & Kelly

Friday Flyer

 

Dear Families,

         

We are closing in on our final month as the 2015-2016 First Grade Family.  The children have made tremendous academic and social growth this year; their second grade teachers are going to love them! 

Our final unit during writing workshop is “Realistic Fiction”.  This is always an enjoyable unit to teach…children’s minds are FULL of stories and they tend to be natural storytellers.  We have studied the experts, as well as learn how to create a story map containing characters, setting, problem, and solution in order to write our story. The children have written several stories each and enjoy sharing t hem with their peers.

During Readers workshop, we are reviewing the strategies that were taught this year and “fine tuning” them with the more difficult text we are reading.

In science this week we continued to focus on the painted lady butterfly’s life cycle, we are studying these creatures up close and personal in our classroom!  We started with painted lady caterpillars (larva stage) eating and growing over the past 2 weeks and we then watched as they formed chrysalises (which is the pupa stage of the life cycle).  We actually had several caterpillars emerge from the pupa stage right during class and we observed them becoming adult butterflies right before our eyes- WOW!!  Students also constructed the life cycle while doing an art project, using different types of noodles.  These creations will come home soon!

In math, we focused on money and 2-digit addition and subtraction over the past few weeks.  Your child should be able to identify the penny, nickel, dime, and quarter and should know what each coin is worth.  We learned fun facts about these coins and read many math books about this topic as well.  Check in with your first grade mathematicians to see what fun information they can tell you about coins (who’s on the heads/tails side, etc.)

In social studies we will soon begin our unit on families.  Next week Friday, an at-home project on family trees and interviewing a family member will come home.  More details to come!  

Upcoming Dates:

All Library books are due- 5/27/16

No School: Memorial Day- 5/30/16

Field Day- 6/3/16 (in the afternoon)

Field Day Rain Date- 6/6/16

½ day of school- 6/8/15 (dismissal 11:25)

½ day of school- 6/9/15 (dismissal 11:25)

½ day and last day of school- 6/10/15 (dismissal 11:25)

Sincerely,  Jennifer Mason & Kelly Putnam

Friday Flyer

Dear Families,

 Happy spring!  We all had a wonderful time today at the Dairy Discovery Farm and Meijer Gardens.  The amount of learning that was absorbed today far surpasses a regular day at schoolJ! We hope you hear all about it from your first grader.  Thank you SO much to the parent volunteers that took time away from their busy schedules to help with our kids.  You are all very much appreciated!

         During writer’s workshop, we just completed our unit on opinion and persuasive writing.  This week we started our final writing unit of the year titled “Realistic Fiction”.  This showcases great imaginations!

        When reading with your child at home, be sure to give them the cues such as, “that has a vowel team” (ex. “ea” like in (seat) the e says its own name and the “a” is silent) or “that is a silent e word” (like in bike) when they are stuck. 

        In math we just finished learning about fractions, we worked on using patterns and rules to subtract multiples of 10 from a 2-digit number, and this week we are working on odd/even.  We are also using lots of math strategies to solve more difficult word problems and we will be reviewing and extending our math learning for the rest of the year.

In science we wrapped up our unit of study on weather.  We discussed spring and reviewed what to do in case of severe weather.  We also started our last science unit of the year, “An Animal’s Life!”  We are currently studying painted lady butterflies and their life cycle.  Studying these animals up close at Meijer Gardens has been a highlight already!

In social studies we are completing our Junior Achievement program.  A volunteer from the community comes in each week for 5 weeks to teach us how things work in a community.  The students are loving learning from “Mr. L!”

It is hard to believe that we only have 7 weeks of school left.  Our students are really starting to look like second graders!

Have a great week!

Jennifer Mason and Kelly Putnam