ANNOUNCEMENTS AND SHENANIGANS

What a fun week it was celebrating Red Ribbon Week!  So many of the students dressed up in red, tie-dye/peace signs, mismatched, sporty and superhero attire!  The focus of this week was to emphasize taking care of our bodies and being healthy!

We continued to talk about spiders and created some fun spider weavings that will be displayed around a class letter we wrote.

In science, we wrapped up our energy unit by making solar ovens out of pizza boxes to make smores using the sun’s heat! It was a yummy Friday treat!

It was fun to learn more about our friend Luke this past week while he was our superstar.

Raiya’s dad came to read to us as our Friday parent reader. This is always a time our class looks forward to each week.

CLASSROOM HAPPENINGS:

REPORT CARDS: On Tuesday the report cards for the first quarter will go home.  I want to compliment the first graders on working so hard this first nine weeks! In your child’s report card envelope you will find a sticker chart that allows you to see your child’s amount of completed work from week-to-week.  You will also see a “Performance Level Three Indicators” page that lists expectations for the end of the year. Please put this in a safe place as you will only be receiving one copy.  There is a place for your signature on the outside of the envelope – we thank you in advance for signing and returning the envelope in a timely manner. The contents are yours to keep at home.

As you look over your child’s report card, please remember that a “Level 1” can have two meanings.  It can mean that your child has had adequate exposure to the skill and is struggling to independently show mastery.  Or, a “Level 1” can mean that the skill is multi-faceted and grows across the school year. These skills are much broader and will need time to build the depth and
complexity needed for a strong, balanced foundation.  If I did not mention concerns at our conference and have not contacted you through email, written note, or a phone call, please do not worry about the “Level 1s” that you see on the report card for this first grading period.  It is exactly where the children are at this point in the school year for MANY of the areas.

If you see a Level 1 in any area of “Student Responsibilities,” please know that this is an area of continued focus.  Your child and I work on a daily basis to become more independent with these skills. To help your child build more
independence in the areas of “Student Responsibilities” look at the “Performance Level 3 Indicators” on the form that is coming home with your First Grader’s report card.  In your daily home life, try to build some of the same expectations into your routines. For example, if you child struggles to find things during the school day and I noted “organization” as a concern on the report card, provide ways for your child to be more organized at home (i.e., a desk space to manage, responsibility of his/her backpack, daily opportunities to straighten up his/her room).   

ROOM MOMS:

Last week you found a donation letter in the Tuesday folder from our fantastic Room Moms, Ricki Ahearn and Shweta Arora!  Thanks for your attention to this information and returning the envelopes to school in a timely manner. They have already started planning many events for our class and we appreciate all they will do to make this a memorable year for the kids!

HALLOWEEN:
Finally, the students are definitely looking forward to the annual festivities of
Halloween!  Please remind your first graders to save their costumes for after
school. We will not be dressing up during school hours. Yes, I have had some
questions about this.  Be safe and have fun!

 

SPECIAL STAR is Swara this week!  We are looking forward to learning more about our special classmate!

 

UPCOMING FIELD TRIP:

On Thursday, November 1st we are headed to the Georgetown Palace Theater!  This is a new destination for us, and we look forward to sharing this experience with your children.  If you haven’t already returned your child’s permission slip and $6 entrance fee, please do so on Monday, October 29th.  We are needing to buy tickets and settle up prior to our trip so thank you for your help with this. Due to limited seating, we are only able to bring 2 parent chaperones per class on this trip. Congratulations to Molly Sylestine and Shweta Arora for being chosen to accompany up on this field trip.  We are excited about this opportunity and are keeping our fingers crossed for a beautiful day!

 

PICTURE RETAKES:
For those who ordered a school picture package, if you are not satisfied with your child’s pictures, return the entire packet to school and we will hold onto them until re-takes on November 29th.

 

CCE SIBLING SPOOKY STORIES:

Canyon Creek Siblings 5 and under, join us on Tuesday, October 30^th from 10:30-11am at CCE for Spooky Story Time with our Librarian! Non-Scary Costumes are welcome but not necessary.  Parents must stay with their children.  Contact Family Support Specialist Lisette Castaneda at Lisette_castaneda@roundrockisd.org to RSVP.

 

DATES TO REMEMBER:

October 30: Report cards go home
November 1: 1st Grade field trip to Georgetown Palace Theater
November 2: Parent Reader (Natalie S.’s Family)
November 6: TAG Information Night at 6:00 in the library
November 12-15: Scholastic Book Fair
November 19-23: Thanksgiving Break

 

THIS WEEK AT A GLANCE …

READING & WRITING:

– Continue discussing consonant blends and looking for examples in our reading and writing
– Use nouns and proper nouns in our writing

– Discuss verbs and how they bring sentences to life

– Factual writing about spiders

MATH:

– Explore number relationships through properties of addition and subtraction

SCIENCE:

– Predict and describe how a magnet can be used to push or pull an object
– Identify how magnets work
– Demonstrate the ways that objects move, such as straight, zigzag, up & down, back & forth, round & round, fast & slow

HANDWRITING:

-review letters learned

-review correct pencil grip

-review correct posture

-revisit correct placement of the letters on the lined paper

-practice starting letters “at the top”

-On the website you will find a section titled “Handwriting Helpers.”  You can use that section to help your child with handwriting at home.

TECHNOLOGY

-learn how to log onto the computer

-learn keyboarding skills

-showing our learning through Seesaw

HOMEWORK FOR THE WEEK:

1. Read 10-15 minutes every day. Record a book response Monday-Thursday inside the planner.

2. Return field trip permission slip and student $6 fee if you haven’t already.

Have a fantastic week!

Announcements and Shenanigans!

Welcome to the last full week of October and the first week of our second quarter of instruction!  The children are settling into our routines, and it makes me smile to think about their progress since the first day of school in August.  Thank you for all you are doing at home to support your children!

Rain, rain, and more rain!!  To help the students release their need to wiggle this rainy week, we spent recess time moving to GoNoodle (an online movement website) and playing games.  This cute group of students enjoyed making Lego creations, working on puzzles, playing Connect 4 and writing around the room.

In reading, we have been exploring non-fiction books focusing on spiders. We discussed our schema on spiders and then have been reading to find new learning. We also discussed text features in non-fiction books.

We have continued to explore energy and focused on sound energy. The rain put a damper on our heat energy experiment so we are hoping to make solar ovens out of pizza boxes this week to make smores. We played a sound bingo game which was a lot of fun.

In math, we have been working on measurement. This week, we used 4 different tools to measure the same objects and then we recorded our findings. We are looking forward to comparing our findings this week.

Asha’s mom came to read to us on Friday. She read a few books about the character Miss Nelson. The kids loved hearing those stories.

This week, we also became a SHINE class! Mrs. Hougham and some of our 5th grade students came to cheer for us and deliver our poster. Being a SHINE class shows that we are showing kindness around CCE!

RED RIBBON WEEK:

This week is our annual Red Ribbon Week!  Here is our schedule for the week:

Monday: Rally in RED to live a healthy life! (wear as much red as you can)

Tuesday: Say PEACE to living unhealthy! (wear peace signs or tie-dye)

Wednesday: DON’T MATCH UP to an unhealthy life! (wear mismatched clothing)

Thursday: RUN AWAY from unhealthy things! (wear warm-ups, a track suit, or sports clothing)

Friday: Be a CCE SUPERHERO, pledging to live a healthy life! (wear a superhero t-shirt or cape)

Please refer back to your copy of our schedule which was printed on red paper; it came home in the Tuesday folders on Oct. 16!  Hang it on the refrigerator to help your child remember what to do each day.  Thank you for your help!

SPECIAL STAR

Our superstar this week is Luke this week!  We are looking forward to learning more about our classmate!

ROOM PARENTS:

Recently, the first grade teachers met with our room parents to go over our year!  You will be hearing from them very soon.  Thanks for supporting them and all of our first graders as they work hard to help make this year very memorable.  Thank you, Ricki and Shweta!

UPCOMING FIELD TRIP:

In last week’s Tuesday folder, a permission slip was sent your way for our upcoming field trip to the Georgetown Palace Theater!  This is a new destination for us, and we look forward to sharing this experience with your children.  The permission slip and $6 entrance fee for your child is due by October 26.  Due to limited seating, we are only able to bring 2 parent chaperones per class on this trip.  If you are interested in joining us, please email me.  I will have a teammate draw the two lucky helpers on October 26!

DATES TO REMEMBER:

October 22-26: Red Ribbon Week
October 26: Spooky Fun Run at 5:30

October 26: Parent Reader (Raiya’s Family)
October 30: Report cards go home
November 1: 1st Grade field trip to Georgetown Palace Theater

 

THIS WEEK AT A GLANCE …

READING & WRITING:

– Continue discussing consonant blends and look for examples in our reading and writing

– Discuss verbs and how they bring sentences to life

– Read informational text about spiders and determine the main idea

– Plan facts to share about spiders

– Discuss the parts of a friendly letter

MATH:

– Measure objects using different nonstandard tools

– Compare results by ordering shortest to longest

– Review and assess time to the hour and measuring length
SCIENCE:
– Continue discussing historical figures, their inventions, and their use in our everyday life

– Predict and describe how a magnet can be used to push or pull an object

HANDWRITING:

-review letters learned

-review correct pencil grip

-review correct posture

-revisit correct placement of the letters on the lined paper

-practice starting letters “at the top”

-On the website you will find a section titled “Handwriting Helpers.”  You can use that section to help your child with handwriting at home.

 TECHNOLOGY

-learn how to log onto the computer

-learn keyboarding skills

-showing our learning through Seesaw

HOMEWORK FOR THE WEEK:

1. Read 10-15 minutes every day. Record a book response Monday-Thursday inside the planner.

2. Return field trip permission slip and student $6 fee.

Have a fantastic week!

ANNOUNCEMENTS AND SHENANIGANS

Thank you so much to each and everyone of you. It has been great to sit down with each of you and discuss your child’s strengths and goals as we look ahead into our 1st grade year. Thank you for taking the time to come and sit and chat with me about your kiddos!  

Our pineapple buddy is taking another week off and we will have a new Superstar the week of October 22nd!

For a short school week, it was filled with a lot of fun and learning. We continued talking about time to the hour as well as discussed light energy. We even played a fun game called Lights On to help us identify light energy. We also wrote some small moment stories (we call them  pepperoni stories). We read about the fall season and did some acorn writing about fall. These cute acorns will be up in our hallways soon!

Vihaan’s mom came and read to our class today! The kids always love seeing our fabulous parents in the classroom!

SPECIAL DATES TO REMEMBER

October 19: Parent Reader (Asha’s Family)

October 22-26: Red Ribbon Week

October 26: Spooky Fun Run at 5:30

October 30: Report cards go home

November 1: 1st Grade field trip to Georgetown Palace Theater (more info to come)

 

ACADEMIC NEWS:

 Math

– measuring length with various tools

– comparing lengths

 Reading & Writing

– blend sounds (bl, br, cr, cl)

– using verbs to show action

– introduce the importance of informational texts

– using text features from informational texts (titles, captions, labels, photographs, etc.)

– asking questions while reading informational texts and comprehension strategies

 Science:

– Identify sources of sound energy

– Identify sources of heat energy

– Understand the importance of sound and heat energy in our everyday life

– Identify historical figures and their inventions and their uses in everyday life

 Handwriting: 

-review letters learned

-review correct pencil grip

-review correct posture

-revisit correct placement of the letters on the lined paper

-practice starting letters “at the top”

-On the website you will find a section titled “Handwriting Helpers.”  You can use that section to help your child with handwriting at home.

 TECHNOLOGY

-learn how to log onto the computer

-learn keyboarding skills

-showing our learning through Seesaw

 

Have a wonderful week!

ANNOUNCEMENTS AND SHENANIGANS

I hope you are having a wonderful 4-day weekend!

 

Due to the short week, we will resume our Star of the Week celebrations the week of October 22nd.  We look forward to learning more about one of our special classmates!

This past week was filled with a ton of fun!!! We started learning how to tell time to the hour this week! We used our addition skills to roll two dice and then add them together and then drew the time once we added.

We read a book called The Jelly Donut Difference and brainstormed ways of showing kindness. We then wrote about how we can show kindness and did a donut craft. These will be in our hallways this week so make sure you check them out.

We continued our discussion and exploration on how heat changes objects. They were given a challenge to see who could melt their baggie of ice the fastest. The group that ran their’s under water melted it fastest.

Friday was a special day. We got to hang out and get to know our 4th grade reading buddies. Most kiddos have the same buddies from last year and it is fun to see those friendships continue.

Our buddy, Alonso, was our superstar this week! It was fun to learn more about  him and his family.

We also had some visitors this week in our classroom. Mrs. Hougham, our counselor, came and did her weekly lesson. We learned about the word encouraging. Swara’s mom also came and read to us as our Parent reader on Friday. We love having special visitors.

For this week’s Reading Log homework in the planner, please have your child

record 2 entries. They will bring the planners home with a new log on Wednesday, October 10th and they will need to be returned to school on Friday, October 12th.

FALL CONFERENCES:

I am really looking forward to meeting with you on Monday at our scheduled Fall Conference!  At this meeting, we will discuss your child’s strengths and areas for continued growth.  Our conferences are limited to 20 minutes each, so please make every attempt to be on time.  My meetings are back-to-back for most of the day, so I will try hard to stick to our schedule as a courtesy to all of you.  Your child has had the opportunity to provide his/her own feedback; therefore, they do not need to attend. I look forward to chatting soon!

 

SPECIAL DATES TO REMEMBER

October 8: Student Holiday; Parent / Teacher Conferences

October 9: Student Holiday

October 22-26: Red Ribbon Week

October 26: Spooky Fun Run at 5:30

October 30: Report cards go home

ACADEMIC NEWS:

Math

– Review parts of a clock and describe its role in telling time

– Tell time to the hour (on an analog clocks & a digital clock)

 

Reading

– Review how time passes on a calendar and timeline

– ABC order and using a dictionary

– Introduce Media Literacy

 

Writing

– Create personal narratives using “small moments” from our lives

– Reread our stories with “new eyes” to make sure that it makes sense and revise
as needed

 

Science:

– Identify sources of light energy

– Understand the importance of light energy in our everyday life

 

Handwriting: 

-continue learning Frog Jump Capitals F, E, D, P, B, R, M, N

-learn correct pencil grip

-learn correct posture

-revisit correct placement of the letters on the lined paper

-practice starting letters “at the top”

-On the website you will find a section titled “Handwriting Helpers.”  You can use that section to help your child with handwriting at home.

 

TECHNOLOGY

-learn how to log onto the computer

-learn keyboarding skills

Have a wonderful week!