Week 26

Finally, a full week of instruction!  Although the weather held out (despite one early release and one delayed day), we had an unfortunate stomach bug roaming through our classroom, so attendance was low.  The students were troopers however, and seemed to enjoy getting back on a regular schedule. 

In unit study we learned about Chief Powhatan, Pocahontas and George Washington. The students loved hearing the stories about these past Americans.

In language arts, it was Read Across America week.  We read lots of Dr. Seuss books throughout the week.  On Monday (Green Eggs and Ham), we wore green.  On Tuesday (Fox in Socks), we wore silly socks and graphed who had on silly socks.  On Wednesday (Oh The Places You'll Go), we dressed as our future selves.  On Thursday (If I Ran the Zoo), we brought an animal to school.  Finally, Friday was book character day.  We were allowed to dress as a favorite book character.  Here are some of us:

 

Buzz Lightyear from Toy Story

 

Ninja Turtle from Green vs. Mean

 

Fancy Nancy from Fancy Nancy Budding Ballerina

 Elsa from Frozen

 

Farmer Brown from Dooby Dooby Moo

In math this week, we began to learn about clocks and time.  We learned the difference between an analog and digital clock.  We learned about the parts of each type of clock.  We also began to practice telling time to the hour.

One of our favorite daily math activities happens when we come back from lunch: LAPS.  Students walk around the room dancing to math songs and grabbing one cube from the basket after each "lap." When the music stops, the students go to their table and make groups of ten with their table mates.  This requires cooperation and an understanding of 10.  It is also teaching the relationship of two numbers to make ten.  Here are some students combining their groups with a partner to make ten:

Once the tens are made, I go to each table and they must tell me how many cubes they have.  Example: "We have two groups of ten and 3 extras, so we have twenty-three." Finally, we combine all the tables cubes to see how many we have all together.  We record our number on our math board and compare it to how many we had the other day or yesterday.  This is a great, fun, active way to learn about numbers. 

Looking forward to next week....

In unit study we will finish our Famous Americans unit by learning about Betsy Ross, Abe Lincoln and Martin Luther King Jr.

In language arts, we will focus on the letter Ww.  We will learn the sight words: where, with, down.  We will continue to discuss parts of a story, this week focusing on problem/solution. 

In math, we will finish our unit on clocks and time.  Our goal is that every student will be able to tell time to the hour on both analog and digital clocks.

Have a great week!