So the pictures of our classroom firefighters finally made it on the blog after numerous attempts, and many errors, but 1 hour and 28 minutes later - HERE THEY ARE!!! There has to be an easier way....
So, it's June and we are entering our last full week of school. This week we will do our last entry into our Weekend Writing Journals. Over the past couple of weeks, the writing in our classroom has been unbelievable!! We are talking multiple pages unbelievable - like 10-12 pages. We have so many talented writers in our room! We couldn't be prouder. We will also be writing about our Summer Bucket List. What do you want to do over the summer!! There are so many fun things to do, but what is at the top of your list?? We will also be learning about and discussing the Summer Olympics. We will talk about when the Olympics began, what events are in the Summer Olympics and what the Olympic flag stands for. We will be making our own Olympic torches, olive leaf crowns and gold medals. It will be very interesting and a lot of fun!
This Friday is our field trip to the Franklin Park Zoo. Please pack your child a peanut free snack and lunch in a brown paper bag and don't forget a water bottle. Please make sure your child wears shoes that will be comfortable enough to handle a lot of walking. Sneakers are preferred. Also, since we will be outside for a couple of hours, you may want to apply sunscreen before your child comes to school. If you will be meeting us at the zoo, I will be sending home a notice telling you what time to meet us there. I am thinking 10:30, but I will send a note home just to be sure.
Have a wonderful week!!!
Mrs. M
Mrs. Cataldo
Mrs. Fiore
Fire Safety Fun!!
Sunday, June 3, 2012
Sunday, May 20, 2012
16 Days To Go....
I hope you all had a chance to spend some time outside over the weekend. What fantastic weather! I had to break out the sunscreen and my vegetable garden is up and running. Great weekend all around!!
Last week, we were lucky enough to have Mr. Lopresti come into our room to discuss fire safety with our class. The kids loved it! They all got a chance to try on all of Mr. Lopresti's fire fighter equipment and uniform. We also had a few volunteers to demonstrate some first aid techniques. I have a lot of pictures that I will be posting on the blog. Keep watch!! Thank you Mr. Lopresti!!!
This week is going to be very exciting!! We have Spirit Day on Tuesday. Please have your child wear red and white clothes and we will enjoy all of the festivities Ms. Brown and the parents will have set up for them. And, of course we will be having our big kickball game - 5th graders vs. teachers. If you would like, your child can bring a beach towel to sit on when they watch the game. GO TEACHERS!!!!! :) I'm just hoping I don't hurt myself......
A sneak peak at the week ahead -
ELA -
This week our phonics focus is the vowel dipthong ou and ow. Our story in our anthology is "Ebb and Flo and the Baby Seal". Our comprehension focus will once again be story elements and we will be monitoring our comprehension by making inferences. Our grammar focus will be using am, is and are. During writer's workshop we will be writing about "If I Were a Butterfly.....". Where would you go?
Math -
We will be reviewing subtraction, fractions and time to the half hour.
Science -
Our caterpillars are in their chrysalises. We are a little over a week away from having butterflies. We will be watching another video about the life cycle of a butterfly and making observations.
Have a wonderful week!
Mrs. M
Mrs. Cataldo
Last week, we were lucky enough to have Mr. Lopresti come into our room to discuss fire safety with our class. The kids loved it! They all got a chance to try on all of Mr. Lopresti's fire fighter equipment and uniform. We also had a few volunteers to demonstrate some first aid techniques. I have a lot of pictures that I will be posting on the blog. Keep watch!! Thank you Mr. Lopresti!!!
This week is going to be very exciting!! We have Spirit Day on Tuesday. Please have your child wear red and white clothes and we will enjoy all of the festivities Ms. Brown and the parents will have set up for them. And, of course we will be having our big kickball game - 5th graders vs. teachers. If you would like, your child can bring a beach towel to sit on when they watch the game. GO TEACHERS!!!!! :) I'm just hoping I don't hurt myself......
A sneak peak at the week ahead -
ELA -
This week our phonics focus is the vowel dipthong ou and ow. Our story in our anthology is "Ebb and Flo and the Baby Seal". Our comprehension focus will once again be story elements and we will be monitoring our comprehension by making inferences. Our grammar focus will be using am, is and are. During writer's workshop we will be writing about "If I Were a Butterfly.....". Where would you go?
Math -
We will be reviewing subtraction, fractions and time to the half hour.
Science -
Our caterpillars are in their chrysalises. We are a little over a week away from having butterflies. We will be watching another video about the life cycle of a butterfly and making observations.
Have a wonderful week!
Mrs. M
Mrs. Cataldo
Sunday, May 13, 2012
Happy Mother's Day!!
I hope all of you had a wonderful Mother's Day! The weather was gorgeous and I didn't have to cook. Just wish there was someone else to do the food shopping and laundry.....
A sneak peak at the week ahead:
In ELA - This week our phonics focus will be long vowel i - concentrating mostly on igh. We will also discuss the contractions 'd, 've and 're. The story we will be reading in our anthology will be "Blast Off" and we will be discussing the story elements - characters, setting and beginning, middle and end. We will also continue our discussion on verbs in the present tense or as Storytown puts it...verbs that tell about now. A little confusing...
In Math, we will begin our week with a review of concepts taught throughout the year with our end of year assessment on Tuesday. Over the next couple of weeks we will be reviewing chapters we felt needed a second glance at such as fractions, time to the half hour and double digit addition. We will also focus some time on word problems.
In Science, we will continue discussing the life cycle of a butterfly. We were very excited (and surprised) to see that three of our mealworms had turned into Darkling Beetles this past week. I know some of you had a chance to see one of them at the open house. The students were very excited. We are anticipating our caterpillars to build their chrysalises this week and we will be waiting patiently for our butterflies!! This week we will be making our own model of the life cycle of a butterfly. Thank you to the Sousa and Constantino families for sending in some model magic clay for this, but we still need a little more. If you have any green or white model magic floating around, we could use some for our science projects. Thank you!!!!!
We are in the midst of year end assessments with our writing assessments done last week - boy did they all do a FABULOUS JOB! Mrs. Cataldo and I have been saying all year how we have a classroom of great writers. Math assessments will be done this week and we keep plugging away at DRA's. We are very proud of the progress each and every one of our students has made. They work very hard and it shows in their work. Kudos to you and your children!!!!
Don't forget:
Class pictures are tomorrow, May 14th.
Enjoy the last few hours of this wonderful Sunday!!!!
Mrs. M
Mrs. Cataldo
A sneak peak at the week ahead:
In ELA - This week our phonics focus will be long vowel i - concentrating mostly on igh. We will also discuss the contractions 'd, 've and 're. The story we will be reading in our anthology will be "Blast Off" and we will be discussing the story elements - characters, setting and beginning, middle and end. We will also continue our discussion on verbs in the present tense or as Storytown puts it...verbs that tell about now. A little confusing...
In Math, we will begin our week with a review of concepts taught throughout the year with our end of year assessment on Tuesday. Over the next couple of weeks we will be reviewing chapters we felt needed a second glance at such as fractions, time to the half hour and double digit addition. We will also focus some time on word problems.
In Science, we will continue discussing the life cycle of a butterfly. We were very excited (and surprised) to see that three of our mealworms had turned into Darkling Beetles this past week. I know some of you had a chance to see one of them at the open house. The students were very excited. We are anticipating our caterpillars to build their chrysalises this week and we will be waiting patiently for our butterflies!! This week we will be making our own model of the life cycle of a butterfly. Thank you to the Sousa and Constantino families for sending in some model magic clay for this, but we still need a little more. If you have any green or white model magic floating around, we could use some for our science projects. Thank you!!!!!
We are in the midst of year end assessments with our writing assessments done last week - boy did they all do a FABULOUS JOB! Mrs. Cataldo and I have been saying all year how we have a classroom of great writers. Math assessments will be done this week and we keep plugging away at DRA's. We are very proud of the progress each and every one of our students has made. They work very hard and it shows in their work. Kudos to you and your children!!!!
Don't forget:
Class pictures are tomorrow, May 14th.
Enjoy the last few hours of this wonderful Sunday!!!!
Mrs. M
Mrs. Cataldo
Sunday, April 29, 2012
I'm glad I didn't put my winter coat away....
My son had two baseball games this weekend and I FROZE!! Here it is the end of April and I was wrapped in my winter coat and wishing I had brought a pair of gloves. Crazy, crazy weather. But I do love watching him play - GO RED SOX!!!
We are on the home stretch of First Grade!!! Can you believe it?? We are entering assessment time again - writing assessments, DRA's, math assessments, DIBELS....whew! Lots of work to do. We also will be getting ready for our open house on May 10th. This week we will begin writing our autobiographies. We've been talking about this project this week and the students seem really excited to share all of their information about themselves. You will be able to see the finished project at open house.
This week in ELA: Our phonics focus for the week is long vowel u (u-e as in fluke). We are on our last book in our anthology series and the story we will be reading this week is "Amazing Animals". Our comprehension focus for the week is alphabetizing and using graphic organizers. We have used a couple of graphic organizers in the past but this week we will be using a graphic organizer that lists the animals in our story, their special feature and how it helps. Seeing information in a graphic organizer makes it easier to remember and understand. Our grammar focus for the week is verbs.
This week in Math: We just finished up our unit on money and I was so proud at how well everyone did on their test on Friday (they will be coming home on Monday) Money is difficult to learn, especially coins, when most people are using debit cards to pay for things. It was really important for us to incorporate real coins into our math centers for the students to hold them, see them and notice the differences between a penny, nickel, dime and quarter. This week we will begin our unit on measurement using non-standard units of length. This unit is going to be a lot of fun. We will be using paper clip chains and yarn to measure things in the classroom. We will be using our feet as a unit of measure as well. This unit gets the kids up and moving and being creative with what items they will choose to measure. Which item was biggest? Which one was shortest?
This week in Science: I'm sure you've heard by now the bugs are in!!! We have our mealworms and thanks to Dr. Sidell we have a really cool handheld digital microscope to use via the SmartBoard to see them up close and personal. We were able to count how many segments they have and we were able to see their legs moving. We began discussing what makes a bug an insect. We also started talking about the life cycle of a mealworm. What does the mealworm turn into when it comes out of its pupa? This week we will be taking the mealworms out of their containers to watch them move across a paper plate and we will use what we are learning in math to see if our mealworms are longer or shorter than a paper clip.
Have a wonderful week everyone!
Mrs. M
Mrs. Cataldo
Mrs. Fiore
Sunday, April 8, 2012
April Showers Bring May Flowers...
Only one more week until school vacation but who's counting?? Even though March was a long month, I feel like the time is flying by. Before you know it, we'll be wrapping up our year!!
A look at the week ahead:
In ELA - Our phonics focus this week is long vowel o or o-e words such as smoke. The story we will be reading in our anthology is a non-fiction story called On Saturday. We will learn different ways people spend their Saturdays. What do you do on Saturdays? Our comprehension skill of the week is drawing conclusions and answering questions. Our grammar focus is using describing words that end is -er and -est. During writer's workshop this week we will write about what we like to do on Saturdays.
In Math - we will begin our unit on Money. We will be discussing pennies, nickles, and quarters and how many different ways you can come up with a specified amount using different coins. We have been talking about coins since the beginning of the school year during our Morning Math Calendar so I have a feeling the students are going to do really well.
In Science, we will be talking about wind. We will be looking at bubbles and kites and how the wind effects their movement. We also are expecting our shipment of mealworms this week - after April School Vacation we will beginning our unit on Insects!! Dr. Sidell bought each classroom a handheld digital microscope that we will be able to hook up to our Smart board. It will be perfect to look at the mealworms as they go through their life-cycle!!
Dates to remember:
Popcorn day - April 12th. If you would like your child to have popcorn on Thursday, please send in $1. Thank you!
Have a wonderful week and a fabulous vacation!!
Mrs. M
Mrs. Cataldo
Mrs. Fiore
A look at the week ahead:
In ELA - Our phonics focus this week is long vowel o or o-e words such as smoke. The story we will be reading in our anthology is a non-fiction story called On Saturday. We will learn different ways people spend their Saturdays. What do you do on Saturdays? Our comprehension skill of the week is drawing conclusions and answering questions. Our grammar focus is using describing words that end is -er and -est. During writer's workshop this week we will write about what we like to do on Saturdays.
In Math - we will begin our unit on Money. We will be discussing pennies, nickles, and quarters and how many different ways you can come up with a specified amount using different coins. We have been talking about coins since the beginning of the school year during our Morning Math Calendar so I have a feeling the students are going to do really well.
In Science, we will be talking about wind. We will be looking at bubbles and kites and how the wind effects their movement. We also are expecting our shipment of mealworms this week - after April School Vacation we will beginning our unit on Insects!! Dr. Sidell bought each classroom a handheld digital microscope that we will be able to hook up to our Smart board. It will be perfect to look at the mealworms as they go through their life-cycle!!
Dates to remember:
Popcorn day - April 12th. If you would like your child to have popcorn on Thursday, please send in $1. Thank you!
Have a wonderful week and a fabulous vacation!!
Mrs. M
Mrs. Cataldo
Mrs. Fiore
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Well, it is only March....
Boy were we spoiled by the weather the past couple of weeks! 70's and 80's in March? The kids have been acting like its the last couple of weeks of school - they've been so excited. Now the heat is back on in my house and we will have to suffer through "seasonal" weather this week. UGH!
A look at the week ahead:
In ELA - Our phonics focus this week will be long vowel a and a-e words. We will review the job of King Ed (silent e) as we work on -ake and -ate words. The story we will be reading in our anthology is "Flake, the Missing Hamster". This story is a play and we will talk about the characteristics as well as the different parts. We will be focusing on fluency and expression in our reading groups this week as well as problem/solution and summarizing. Our grammar focus will be using describing words to tell how many.
In Math - we will begin our unit on graphs. We will look at bar graphs, picture graphs and how to interpret data from a graph.
In Science - we will begin our unit on Wind.
Report cards go home tomorrow. Please review, sign the back and return to school after going over how wonderfully your children are doing in first grade!! Kudos to all!!!
Have a wonderful week....
Mrs. M
Mrs. Cataldo
Mrs. Fiore
A look at the week ahead:
In ELA - Our phonics focus this week will be long vowel a and a-e words. We will review the job of King Ed (silent e) as we work on -ake and -ate words. The story we will be reading in our anthology is "Flake, the Missing Hamster". This story is a play and we will talk about the characteristics as well as the different parts. We will be focusing on fluency and expression in our reading groups this week as well as problem/solution and summarizing. Our grammar focus will be using describing words to tell how many.
In Math - we will begin our unit on graphs. We will look at bar graphs, picture graphs and how to interpret data from a graph.
In Science - we will begin our unit on Wind.
Report cards go home tomorrow. Please review, sign the back and return to school after going over how wonderfully your children are doing in first grade!! Kudos to all!!!
Have a wonderful week....
Mrs. M
Mrs. Cataldo
Mrs. Fiore
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)