April 25, 2016

This week, we have been doing some fun Reader's Theater scripts. The kids work in pairs and act out the plays. They are doing great and having so much fun!

 

In math, we are continuing to work on addition. Before we learn about a plus sign and equals sign we learned to compose numbers using the words and/make. For example 2 and 3 makes 5. This helps them make sense that they are combining numbers. We have been working on reading story problems to find the important information and solve the problem. The kids worked to come up with their own story problems for their partner to solve.

In science, we have been learning about pants. We have learned about the needs of a plant, parts of a plant and how a plant grows. We started an experiment about what would happen if seeds did not get everything needed. The kids have made some great predictions and are excited to see what happens. 

We started some work about Earth Day on Friday. We learned about various ways to protect the Earth. We loved celebrating with our Earth Day headbands. 

April 18, 2016

The kids were invited to sing on the announcements on Friday. They did a great job.

April 11, 2016

In math, we have been focusing on combinations up to ten, but more specifically, combinations to make 10. The more fluent a child is with making ten, the easier it will be when composing and decomposing larger numbers. We have three games we have played this week. For the first game, students were given cards with combinations of ten and they needed to build the combination with two different color snap cubes. For example, if their card said 8 and 2, they could build with ten red ad 2 blue. When all cars were complete, they would visually be able to see all the combinations of ten. The second game required a set of number cards and is one you could play at home. We used number cards 0-10 with multiples of each number. We turned the cards face down and took turns trying to make a combination of ten. If a combination was made, the student was able to keep the cards. The more fluent the kids were with the combination, the easier the game was and the quicker they were at making combinations.  

The third game had the kids looking for combinations of ten on a grid, They took turns with a partner making as many combinations as they could. 

In science, we have been learning about living and non-living. We learned the characteristics of living and non-living things and after sorting pictures as a class, the students were able to sort their own pictures. 

After learning characteristics of living and  nonliving things, students were able to observe an earth worm. Some were more excited than others, but all quickly able to tell it was a living thing. After observing the earth worm. we observed gummy worms. It was quickly determined they were non-living and yummy!

In writing, we are working on our animal research. Students selected a favorite animal and need to use text and online sources to find out the habitat and diet of their animal, A predator of their animal and what their animal does in winter, if it lives in a cold climate. They also may find out other fun facts. Once research has been completed the students will use what they have learned to write their own non-fiction text about their animal.