Happy Tuesday!

We have a lot of kiddos starting to share some real sentences that they are writing! Amazing! That morning sentence does come in handy. So, what should your child be starting to do? 

*Print concepts: Can your child find the first word in a sentence and track print from left to right?

*Can your child tell the difference between a letter, word and sentence? 

*Can your child write his or her name with just the first letter being capital? 

Most of the sentences are 'I see,' 'I can,' and 'I like' sentences. This is how we start every year! 

Will's sentence: I see Yellowstone.

Reagan's sentence: I see water. 

Playing button match-up! Looking for buttons that have 1 or more matching attributes. 

Ask your child what attributes he or she can sort by! 

We learned the word 'and.' We were all connected with the word and now the word is at our tables! Reagan went immediately to writing workshop and wrote an 'I see' sentence with the word 'and!' 

Bryanna was writing about her mom and I showed them how I always draw a little heart next to the word 'love.' (Just like Bryanna!)

Some writers are starting to make books now. They put one idea or part of the story on a page (and add words). These books are stapled! 

Jenna's story: I see pool and hot tub. 

So....Jenna has a new writing goal! 

So does Dawson! 

CONGRATULATIONS to Clara and family for their new baby girl! 

I hope we get to meet her! 

Ooohh.....'and' in the morning sentence! 

So much learning!

We've been practicing the important skills of speaking and listening with our assigned elbow partners! 

Today we shared what we did last night! Sometimes we lean and tell...other times we turn and talk. 

We have our FIRST chunk expert! Nora was filling in a blank in the news book. The word was ___ower (shower) and Nora knew the 'sh' chunk! WOW! 

We actually got to watch a movie with Eric Carle in it! He gave us a lot of good advice such as 'wind up your thinking machine!' 

Whenever we are learning about something and we come across a fancy word...I give a student a chance to come and sit in the fancy chair!!! Today Clara was telling us what it means to 'describe' something. 

Here is Jaxon filling out our 'value' chart during a math warm-up! We started a good counting strategies poster (look below). 

Math problem solving!!! Today's problem was : Sort the bears by color. How many green bears do you have? How can you show your answer? 

Will's strategy is to 'touch each object' as you count! 

Nora's strategy is to 'move each object' as you count!

Brody's strategy is that sometimes you might know a number of objects in a 'flash!' 

Bryanna is added to the HOW DID YOU DO IT wall! Remember that a huge part of math is being able to explain your thinking! 

Welcome back!

We are working on our math binders! This will end up being one of our choices during math small group time. 

Today our math problem was: Make a picture with pattern blocks. Draw it in your notebook. How many pattern blocks did you use? 

This is one of our first multi-step problems! I'd say about half of the kids finished! :) :) It was interesting to see who traced shapes, who colored the shapes like they look in real life, etc. 

Today we practiced what reading workshop will look like in our classroom. We looked at our We are Ready to Learn chart and glued it in our reader's notebooks. Then we drew pictures about how what we think reading workshop will look like! Will thought he'd be 'reading the pictures!' He's right too!!! 

Noah thought he might sit in a just right 'carpet' spot! He's right too! 

Reagan thought she might be able to sit on the futon and work with her booktub! She's right TOO! 

Happy FRIDAY!!!

Will shared with us that he knows what we are doing next in our day by reading the schedule! He's got everyone doing that now :) 

Some friends enjoying the globe during choicetime! 

Brody noticed that Miss Dunker LOVES to have many copies of books she loves! 

We read an awesome wordless book called, Chalk! Then we went outside and wrote our names three times with chalk! We are trying to write our names with the first letter being capitalized.

We spent a lot of time today looking at the number line. It will be a great tool for us to use! We made our own number line on the floor and had some great discussion! 

Here we are practicing one of our new 'done' choices! (Writing numerals!) 

Happy Thursday!

Here is Brody reading our morning sentence! Way to go Brody! You might have heard about morning sentence...right from day 1 we've been learning that readers use picture clues to figure out hard words. We also practice snap words and initial sounds with survey! 

Exploring with buttons! Look below to see what some kiddos tried! 

Dawson arranged his in order by size! 

Alora sorted out all of the stars :) 

Reagan found an 'A' button! 

Layla found buttons without holes! 

Nora's idea was to sort by color! Boy--did this catch on!!! Great job Nora! 

Nora's table friends (Alivia and Gabe) were helping her...

I challenged Bryanna to make a pattern...red, gold, red, gold, red....wow! 

Today our math problem was: Write your name. How many letters are in your name? 

Here is Dawson taking a look at Bryanna's work. Bryanna made it onto our 'how did you do it' wall! Her strategy was to keep track of the letters in her name by writing the numerals underneath each letter. 

She also tried drawing circles-like Nora-but Dawson noticed the value of the circles didn't quite match.

Have to share this! Nora was turning in her math notebook for the birthday cake problem. She came up to me and said, "I just wanted to explain that the five candles and 5 are for how old I am now. The 6 and the little candle off to the side are because I'm going to be six soon!" 

WOW!!! 

Here is a page from today's BIG K02 math notebook! 

We are learning how to share and discuss things with our elbow partners! 

Here is our math wall! I just love this wall! Soon it will be full! Nora is our first friend on the wall.

3 Ways to Read a Book! Just so you know...your child CAN read!