What We’re Learning: Week of December 10th

Reading:  We will be reading a fiction story called “Ruby in her Own Time”.   We will focus on using words to describe how the main character changed throughout the book.  We will also review characters, setting, and a major event.  Your child will continue to come home with a guided reading book to read in their “book in a bag.”  Please remember to practice reading your child’s book-in-a-bag with them.  Ask them comprehension questions, such as, “Who are the characters?” and “Tell me what happened in the beginning, middle, and end of this story.”  **Starting next week, I will be doing several individual assessments for the end of the quarter.  As a result, I may not be able to follow my normal guided reading schedule every day.  Therefore, your child may not receive as many guided reading books in the next couple weeks.  Please continue to practice reading the book in bag with your child when they do bring it home.  If they do not bring a new book home that day, they can read a choice book or work on Raz-Kids.  

Writing: We will continue our opinion writing unit.  They have learned to review a collection and make choices about which item in that collection is the best, writing defenses for those judgments.  The students have also learned to write a review about anything, such as toys, restaurants, video games, movies, and book reviews.  They have summarized, evaluated, judged, and defended their judgments. This week we will begin to pick a piece to edit and publish for the end of our writing unit.  I will continue to conference with students and reinforce the application of what we are learning.

Word Study/Spelling:

-Letter Name- Consonants Blends: pr, dr, br, tr  (prep, drop, brush, trip)

-Read and Write Fry Words: Teacher choice of 5 words from 2^nd column---please continue to practice all 25 words.

-Grammar: Use verbs to convey a sense of past, present, and future

Math: Our math lessons each day will include computational fluency, fact fluency, and core math instruction focused on the first grade common core math standards. Computational fluency will help the students to use the most effective and efficient strategies.  Fact Fluency is working with both addition and subtraction facts within 10.  Our end-of-the-year goal is to have students complete 15 addition facts in one minute and 15 subtraction facts in one minute.  Our core lessons will include hands-on math activities and games that support the common core.   We will continue to work on surveys and collecting data, as well as representing the data in a picture graph.  We also will work on answering questions about the data. 

2nd grading period Science and Social Studies:
Science: Habitats/ Wants and Needs
Social Studies: Economics – we will learn about needs and wants.

Homework: Continue working on homework log for the month. Thank you for your continued home support!

Extras:

-Please make sure you are sending your child with a peanut-free snack!

- Holiday Shop—Our class shops on Monday, December 10.

-Winter/Holiday Celebration- December 20th

- End of 2^nd grading period- December 20^th

- Last student day before winter break- December 20^th

- Winter break for students: Dec. 21^st - Jan. 6^th (back on the 7th)