Finishing First Grade...

We have had such a wonderful Spring in first grade.  Our days were filled with great themes such a life cycles of animals, egg exploration, beginning chapter books, directed drawings, story publishing, poetry and the THA Spring Musical.  We had a galloping good time at the FIRST EVER...THA Stick Horse Derby!!  We had to design, build and name our stick horse and we had to design our jockey jersey.  The creativity was spectacular and the races were so much fun.  We finished the derby with a fantastic tailgate party provided by our wonderful parents.  We are now planning for our end of the year pool party and field day.  We have had a great year in first grade!  Second grade be ready because we are all moving up!!!

Please note these summer expectations for our students transitioning into second grade.
1.  Read at least 10 minutes a day.
2.  Try to visit the library once a week.
3.  Review math flash cards weekly.  All cards should be mastered.
4.  Journal as much as possible!
5.  Finish your comprehension book.
6.  Enjoy time with family and friends!!!!

FEBRUARY NEWS

The first graders at THA are really heating up these cold winter days.  We started reading chapter books last week and we LOVE the interesting characters and the stories that we are able to read  about "all by ourselves"!  I am very proud of how well they are reading and at how interested they are in reading now...just in time for our annual BOOK FAIR!!!!

Tomorrow is Grandparents day and our music department has planned a spectacular show for our dear grandparents.  After the program the students will be allowed to take their grandparent on a tour of the school, visit the THA Cafe and make an ice cream sundae and of course take a trip to the book fair.  Tomorrow will be a great day for all.

In math we are beginning to add double digits (without regrouping) and we have started learning the doubles + 1 math facts.  We are working on telling time "all around the clock" and we are counting mixed change.

In spelling we are using blends in the beginning and the end of words and we can spell 21 high frequency words along with all CVC and CVCe patterned words.  We are dividing our 2 syllable words and beginning to spell "chunks".

We will be writting stories this month using the FIRST, NEXT, THEN, LAST story frame.  We will let our creativity soar as we write fantasy stories.

We are in our 6th theme in reading and our fluency and comprehension are building each week.  The skills of focus this month are ABC order, story elements (setting, character, events/problems, solutions), endings of a story, summarizing, noting details and nouns.

We are finishing polar animals and are studying hibernating animals and shadows.  Mr. Groundhog sure will help us with this unit.

In computer class we are learning to code.  We will have 12 little robots that we will make paths for through coding.  We are so excited to see our robots go!

On Monday we will celebrate our 100th day of school!!! Hip-Hip-Hooray!!!  First Grade Rocks!!!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR

In first grade we started 2019 off with a "pop" and a "bubble".  We popped out bad habits by popping pop corn, and we bubbled in resolutions with sparkling grape juice.  We even added some party blowers to enhance the fun!!!

Second semester will be filled with lots of learning, community service and fun.  We elected Lilly Heape and Ben Hutto as our Valentine Queen and King today.  We will help them raise "$-votes" for our class.  Good luck and thank you to Lilly and Ben.  We will help our school's fundraiser by selling World's Finest Chocolates during the month of January.  On Friday, January 18 we will pay $1.00 to wear jeans and the money raised will help a THA family in need.

We are so excited to be hosting our annual Grandparent's Day on Friday, February 1st.  We will have a musical program in the gym followed by an ice cream sundae bar and a chance to take our special grandparents on a tour of our classroom and the school.  This is always a fun and busy day at THA.  

On Saturday afternoon, February 2 you may see some of our first grade girls in glitz and glamour for the Little Miss THA pageant and that night the Jr. Class will sponsor a Daddy~Daughter Sweetheart dance for the girls in K/3~4th grade.  

On Monday, February 4 we will celebrate our 100th day of school.  We will do many activities in our classroom which center around the number 100.  The lower school will be collection items to donate to JARM (Jasper Animal Rescue Mission) so that we can help our local fur babies.

In our classroom you will catch us studying about polar animals and their habitats.  We are all readers now and our sentences are getting more and more detailed each week.  We might just turn into 2nd graders very soon!!!  Stay tuned for the many fun things to come in first grade!

ICE Plans ( In Case of Evacuation)

Due to the hurricane evacuation I sent home a homework plan with your child.  Please try to keep them busy so that we don't lose the skills we have been working with. 

Reading- Study the theme 2 /week 2 words.  Read daily and fill in the reading log.  Look for CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words when you read.  Tell or write sentences with the words you find.  Retell the story to a parent or sibling.  Draw pictures of the characters and write a sentence to go with it.

Math -  Write to 100.  Practice counting by 2's and 5's.  Sort small items into groups of 10 and count them by 10's.  Eat an apple, how many bites did it take?  How many seeds did it have?  How many sit ups can you do?  How many jumping jacks can you do?

Spelling - Practice writing CVC words using short a, e and i.  Practice writing sentences with these words.  Your child should be able to spell: a, I, the, will, to, you, and, are, of.  Please help your child memorize these spellings.

Writing - Practice writing upper and lowercase letters using the correct form and size.  Practice writing your first and last name using the correct letter formation and size.

Journal - Write about what you and your family did during the storm.  Did you stay home?  Did you evacuate?  Draw a picture to go with your story.

Setting Goals in September

The first graders came back from Labor Day and are charged up and ready to go.  They have learned the rules, routines and procedures and are doing very well.  We will be working on the following skills:

Reading
Compare and Contrast
Noting Details
Opposites
Short vowels
Beginning and Ending Sounds

Math
Sorting by Attributes
Graphing
Color words
Number words
Directional words
Ordinal numbers

Writing
Letter formation
Letter size
Choosing a topic
Writing on a topic
Making writing fun to Read

Spelling
Spell-Out Words: a I the will to you and are of
Vowel sounds: short a, e and o in CVC words

Our S.T.E.M. project last week was a project involving balance using small cups.  The children were very creative building pyramids, animals, houses, towers and much more. 

Whewww~hewww...Week 2

FIRST GRADE IS IN FULL SWING

We are off to a great start in first grade.  Our daily routine is getting better each day.  We are focusing on independence and responsibility.  Please help your child develop routines for things at home and help them to work on independence. We are using the assignment books, please sign the bottom of the page after your child has completed all homework and you have checked over it.

Reading:

In reading we are working on short a words, beginning middle and ending sounds, sequencing, cause and effect and comprehension strategies.

Spelling:

Short vowel a, o and i used in VC and CVC words.  The spell-out words that we are reviewing are:

a, I, the, will, to, you & and.  

Phonics:

Beginning, middle and ending consonant sounds, blending sounds to make words.

Math:

Writing the digits correctly, graphing, color words, number words and directional words.

Please have at least one parent attend the parent meeting on Thursday, August 23.

Session one~6:00

Session two~7:00

This is a very important meeting.

Thank you for partnering with me to help your child get off to a great start.

Welcome to First Grade

It was so nice to welcome 18 bright happy first graders to my classroom.  We are going to have a  spectacular year.  I am excited that Mrs. Amy Wade will be our part time assistant this year.  I'm looking forward to digging into our curriculum and watching these firsties grow and succeed!  August will be filled with learning about our new friends and about how to be a great friend.  We will also focus on responsibility and independence.  Pete the Cat will be watching us and he may even give us a few tips on how first grade works.

I can't wait to get to know each child and their families.  Please fill out the information sheets in the green weekly folder and return those to me ASAP.  Feel free to contact me with any concerns. 

HeRe  wE gOOOOO.

March comes in like a LION and goes out like a LAMB!!!

We are working like lions, roaring through out new beginning "chapter books", writing creative stories, using adjectives to describe, designing and building leprechaun traps, spelling two syllable words, counting mixed change, adding two digit numbers, telling time, solving word problems...and reading fluently!!!  We are a fierce group who has worked  very hard thus far in first grade.  We are excited about the adventures that spring has to offer.

Field trip to Build a Bear
Field trip to Oatland Island
Field trip to Blue Heron Nature Center
Spring Musical

We will be studying about animals in April and May.  We are looking forward to learning about life cycles, habitats, living habits,  and special features of the animals who share out planet. 

Assignments for January 31-February 2

Math
Study all flash cards
Parents-Make a 10x10 grid
Students-write to 100 on teh 10 x 10 grid
Count 100 small items in groups of 10 (cereal, chocolate chips, noodles)

Reading
Review all words in theme 5
Begin studying week one of theme 6
Log daily

Spelling
Review all spell out words
Study the CvCe pattern using long -u : tube, cube, cute, rule, tune, June, use, mule, rude, tune
Study the CvC pattern of short u words: tub, cut, us, sub, us, run, bus, rug

Language
Write a sentence and a question in your zebra book each day.

**With parental guidance the children could research groundhogs:
Youtube: Fun Facts About Groundhogs
Youtube: How to draw a groundhog

Predict if the groundhog will see his shadow or now.  Go outside and make shadows using different things.

Write 3 facts you learned about groundhogs.

The * items are ideas for extra fun.

***We have been learning about cold weather.  We were going to watch The Magic School Bus in the Arctic.  This is a good video about how arctic animal keep warm.  We will be doing an experiment next week about blubber.

****We have been studying adjectives.  We are going to make a poster for each child in the class using adjectives to describe 1. Physical appearance and 2. Character traits
Your child can write 2 adjectives about each class member and we will compile our information on Monday.  We did Ashley's on Monday so we have hers.  We need
Hunter
Keaton
Eric
Keira
Jill
Collins
Nolan

I hope you all stay well!!

Brrrrrr.... It's Cold in First Grade.

January has been filled will topics related to cold weather.  Many of the students experienced snow for the first time.  Each student wrote a story about building a snow man in which they used the sequencing frame FIRST, NEXT, THEN, LAST as a guide to help with sequence and recall.  We made "snow paint" using glue and shaving cream and we used it to paint snowmen, the pictures dried into   puffy 3-D snowmen.   We made "snow" from cornstarch and lotion and enjoyed making snowballs with our classroom snow.  We put water and food coloring in an ice tray and left it in the fairy garden over night.  When we left it it was a liquid, but when we found it the next morning it had frozen into solid cubes.  We used these colored cubes to do ice drawings (we had to work quickly because the cubes were cold!!)  This week we will be studying about Arctic animals and how they survive in the cold.  We built a "den" in the math room to protect us from the cold...(the AC unit blowing full force!), we saw how a shelter is helpful in keeping us warm.  We will do an experiment using blubber to find out how important this fat layer is for our cold weather friends. 

In math we have been working on addition and subtraction facts with 2, addition facts that we call "doubles +1, graphing, tallying, counting by 2's, 5's and 10's forward and backwards, number words, double digit addition with out regrouping and word problems.  We will begin regrouping soon!!

We have completed Theme 5 in our reading series and we started the Accelerated Reader program.  Our reading skills are really getting stronger.  Stop by first grade and you may just find us curled up with a good book!

Dashing Through December...December 12, 2017

Hi Parents,
I've listed some helpful tips as you head into the "Twelve Days of Christmas"...
-put time limits on technology
-set aside time for journaling/journal with them as well
-play board games
-teach waiting...waiting in a store, waiting at a restaurant, waiting for their time to talk
-teach monotonous tasks...Santa loves a hard worker.
...folding laundry
...hanging laundry
...unpacking groceries
...setting the table
...clearing the table
...making breakfast/lunch
...making their bed
Social Things to work on-
-taking turns
-sharing
-winning and losing nicely
-compromising
-complimenting others
-using please and thank you

Christmas vacation is a great time for snuggling in front of a fire and sharing a great book or telling a story.  Spend quality time with your child this season...next year they will be a year older and much bigger so cherish each moment and enjoy your family time!! 
Merry Christmas

November 19, 2017

November was filled with many activities related to Native Americans, the Pilgrims and our first Thanksgiving.  The students discovered the different land forms that were homes to the Native Americans and how they used the land to survive.  They studied about the homes and survival skills of  the Ojibway, the Iroquois, the Cherokee, the Lakota, the Hopi and the Haida tribes.  We drew different  types of homes (tepee, long house and pueblo) , made pottery from play dough, wrote summaries of each tribe and played a few Native American games.  We learned a rain dance and are waiting on the rain to come!!!
All of the children have made exciting progress with their reading skills and look forward to their time for independent reading each day.
We are studying odd and even numbers, adding 2 to a number, ordinal numbers, symmetry, telling time, counting money, capacity of containers, estimation, and using standard and nonstandard measurement.  The children are copying and creating beautiful patterns using pattern blocks and they enjoy using calculators to solve and check higher level math problems.
There is never a dull moment in our classroom...first grade is fantastic.

We will be boarding the Polar Express and going around the world to learn about Christmas in other countries during December. 

October 19, 2017

October has been a busy month in first grade.  The students have researched and learned so many interesting facts about bats, spiders and pumpkins.  If you see a first grader walking around, ask them to share their knowledge on these topics.  The 1st and 2nd graders "got to know" a pumpkin this week.  Each student brought a pumpkin to school.   They wrote adjectives that described their special pumpkin, they read to their pumpkin, they weighed the pumpkin and measured the circumference of their pumpkin. We mixed all of the pumpkins into a big pile and they had to find the pumpkin that matched their description.  Each pumpkin made it to its rightful owner.  Today we "gutted" each pumpkin and boy oh boy did we have pumpkin faces, hands, knees, elbows and arms as we worked on this project.  Tomorrow we will have the help of some 8th and 9th graders and each student will carve a face into their pumpkin.  I'm excited to meet the jack-o-lanterns that will be created.

The first graders are rocking in their math shoes!!!!!  Every student scored 100% on their math test yesterday!  I am seeing improvements each day.

We have completed theme 2 in our reading series and are now in theme 3.  The students are always saying..."WE ARE READERS,,,WE ARE READERS!!!"  They are so excited to read to anyone who will listen, just ask our pumpkins, lol.  In theme 3 we will focus on sequencing, main idea and details, topic sentences, summarizing, words with double consonant endings, consonant blends, long vowel words, plurals with -s, and verb endings -s, -ed, and -ing. 

There is never a dull moment in first grade!!!

October 3, 2017

HaPpY  OcToBeR....Things here in first grade are getting a little "batty"!!!  Yes we are studying bats this week and we have some large vocabulary words to prove it. Bats are nocturnal mammals.  Some bats hibernate.  All bats use echolocation to navigate.  Microbats eat millions of mosquitoes and insects, we like that!  Megabats eat fruits and help spread seeds.  We will make bats, read about bats, research bats, compare bats and play games using "echolocation".

Next week we will have our theme 2 reading test, the information for that test will be in the weekly folder this week.  I am so proud of the progress the children are making.  We are reading CVC words and are learning to read CVCe words.  We have mastered all of our first high frequency word list and are working on list 2.   We will work with "s" blend words this week. We are dividing words into syllables to decode and we have learned the "i" and "e" sound that -y makes at the end of a word.

Fun in math.
The children learned a rap song to help them memorize their doubles facts.  They are writing number  sentences and solving word problems.  They are creating amazing patterns with pattern blocks.  We are using ordinal numbers, color words, directional words and number words every day.  Math time is a busy time in first grade

Stay tuned for SpIdErS, pUmPkInS and other HaLlOwEen things...

Welcome Fall!!

We welcomed fall by painting leaves and learning a poem about fall.  We are watching for signs of fall outside.  We are sooooo ready for the temperatures to "fall".
The children are becoming such good readers.  We have worked on one and two syllable words and have learned how to segment a word by syllables.  We know our short vowel sounds and are working on the long vowel patterns.  We will be working on comparing reality and fantasy as well as sequencing events in a story.  Please use the key words, first, next, then and last when discussing a story with your child.  Have your child make a sandwich or help you prepare a meal.  Discuss what you did first, next, then and last.  We are writing complex sentences by using "and" and "because" to link more information in the sentence.  We are working on writing on a topic and adding details in the sentences to "paint pictures in your head".
In math we are working on the doubles facts through 9+9.  Please study the flash cards each night.  We are working  word problems and writing number sentences to match the problem, ordinal numbers through sixth, counting by 2's, 5's and 10's, color words, number words and shape words.
Thank you for all that you do to help your child learn!  I am seeing progress daily.

Monday, September 18, 2017

We were so happy to be back together after the hurricane and excited that our families didn't experience major damages.
 The children did very well on the Theme 1 reading test!!!!  I'm sure you are beginning to notice that their reading vocabulary is expanding and that their excitement for reading is growing.  Please praise your child, and allow them to share with you the phonics rules that we are studying.  We have covered all short vowel sounds and are able to read and write CVC words!!!  Last week we studied the CVCe pattern and have started sounding out long vowel words.  Today I introduced the rule, "when 2 vowels go walking, the first one does the talking and says its name" to the class.  With the expansion of their decoding abilities, fluency and comprehension will follow.  You can help you child with comprehension by asking who the main character was in the story and important details about the character.
Please continue to review the correct formation of the lowercase letters by referencing the direction sheet that was sent home.  We are working on forming complete sentences with a capital letter at the beginning and an ending mark at the end.  We will be using the words "and" and "because" in our sentences in order to give more detail and meaning.  Having your child orally answer questions in complete sentences is a great way to help them as they are learning to write complete sentences.
We will start learning the "doubles facts" in math this week.  Your child will be bringing home a box with flash cards. Please flash these each day.
The fund raiser will end on Thursday, please send all orders and payments in on Thursday.  Thank you for your participation!!

Thursday, September 7, 2017

With hurricane Irma spinning off of our coast I am praying for the safety of all of you.  Please keep up with the THA web posts as information will be given as soon as it is available.  In order to keep your first grader practicing on the skills we have covered I'll list some things that you may want to do with them while we are out of school.

1. Continue reading and signing the reading log daily.
2. Practice reading the word lists in the HW note book as well as in the Phonics Dictionary.
3. Practice spelling cvc words.
4. We've started using the cvce rule to decode long vowel sounds, practicing that pattern with all vowels will be helpful.
5  Practice counting and writing to 100 by 1's, 2', 5,s and 10.  Talk about those patterns.
6. Math  words to know: most, least, greatest, fewest, color, circle, draw, triangle, square, number, first, second, last, between.  Color words and number words (zero - ten).
7 Write a sentence or 2 every day.
8. Draw a picture with lots of details, tell about the picture, tell the topic of the picture.

Our number one priority is safety.  We will all be back together very soon, stay safe.

Monday, August 28, 2017

Please review the high frequency and vocabulary words in the homework notebook.  These words should be easily read by sight.  We have several math vocabulary words that we are using, you may want to make flash cards for these words:
write
draw
color
most
least
square
circle
number
first
second
third
last
between
middle
All primary color words.

I am seeing much improvement in handwriting...keep up the good work!!

Monday, August 28, 2017

We had a wonderful Monday.  Don't forget to sell cookie dough.  Please don't forget that class pictures will be taken on Wednesday,information was sent home in your child's folder.