Words from Whitson

August in Mrs. Whitson's Class

                                         

 

                 HELLO EVERYONE!

         As promised, I'm back again with all the information about what we'll be doing in August. I usually arrange the blog by subject area, then put the important dates or other information at the end.

MATH    

For the first week we'll be reviewing skills learned in kindergarten. This will include coins; calendar; number words; writing numbers and counting to ten; basic shapes; more, fewer and same as; ordinal numbers; following directions. Then we'll start adding to ten vertically and horizontally.

Two of our School Improvement Plan (SIP) goals are in math. The two math goals for the entire school are Computation and Problem-solving. The goals for first grade are as follows:

          Computation: By the end of the year, students will be able to compute 50 addition problems, up to a sum of18, in 5 minutes.

          Problem-solving: From an individual baseline score on a word problem involving the use of problem-solving strategies, students will progress one level in their ability to solve this type of problem by the end of the year.

READING

Until we begin Guided Reading groups after Labor Day, reading activities will include teacher-read books with student activities related to the book. These activities can include writing activities, comprehension and sequencing of events, and character and plot identification. The children will have time every day to read silently at their seats or with partners. The first week or so of school, Mrs. Snook and I will combine our classes to read Junie B. Jones, First Grader (at last!) and do some literacy activities to go with it.

Starting August 20^th, we will be having Book Buddies with Mr. McGill’s 5^th grade class every other Wednesday from 1:15-1:45. Each child will have a buddy or two, and they will read together and sometimes do projects together.

PHONICS

We will review all letter sounds, rhyming word, and blending 3-letter words with median vowels, such as bat, cup, sit, etc.

HANDWRITING

The children will begin to learn how to write the lowercase letters in D’Nealian font. The letters will be presented so they go with spelling and phonics practice, and will not be taught in alphabetical order. Once the students have learned to make a letter, they will be responsible for making it correctly in their writing. At Open House you will receive a copy of the D’Nealian font and how each letter is made.

WRITING 

We’ll begin the writing process. We will begin with class stories and books, and simple sentences from teacher prompts and student brainstorming.

Garrison Mill’s third SIP goal is Writing Conventions, which includes capitals, periods, capitals, commas, etc. We’ll take a baseline writing sample for every student the first few weeks of school, and the goal is to have them advance one level from the baseline by the end of the year. The rubric we use for this is from the program, 6+1 Writing Traits. I will provide you with a copy of the conventions section at Open House.

SCIENCE

Our first science units are Weather and Water. 

SOCIAL STUDIES

Our first unit concentrates on cardinal directions, and finding our city, county, state, country, and continent on a map and globe.

OTHER INFORMATION

Tuesday, August 19 is Open House for K-2 parents. There will be a PTA meeting at 6:30 followed by Open House. Please try hard to attend. You miss it and you miss a lot!!

Thursday, August 14 is Room Parent training

Friday, August 15 is Sally Foster fundraiser kickoff, and kids can wear their vacation t-shirts.

Friday, August 28, families new to Garrison Mill (and Kdgt. families) are invited to an ice-cream social.

*** Our student teacher, Pame (pronounced Pam) Timbs, will be slowly taking over teaching responsibilities starting next week. By September 8, with my guidance and input, she will be teaching most subjects. She will be sending you a short, separate blog telling you about herself soon. Her tenure with us will be over in mid-November. Think of it as having two teachers in the classroom instead of one.

Thank you for reading all the way through this long first blog! Please get in touch with me if you have any questions or concerns. I do not check my phone messages regularly, you need to email me or send me a note attached to your child’s behavior calendar if you want me to get your message!!

Diana

 

WELCOME TO FIRST GRADE!

                                                       Hi Everyone,

It was great to meet all of you at Meet and Greet! Thank you for bringing your supplies, it makes the first day of school so much easier! A reminder that, if you have not signed up for the blog, you may do so by going to the first grade section of the Garrison Mill webpage, clicking on my name, and then subscribing to the blog on the left-hand side of the page.

   Welcome! We are going to have a wonderful year as partners in your child's education. First grade is such an important year. This is where your child makes big strides in reading, spelling, and writing. It's where he learns basic rules that govern the mathmatical processes. It will be fun and challenging. I am looking forward to working with you to make this a productive year for your child.

Remember that Open House will be on August 19. The PTA meeting starts at 6:30, with Open House afterwards. Please make every effort to be there. A lot of ground will be covered.  The following will be gone over:  our daily schedule; our behavior plan; the homework policy; daily folders; the new report card; the teaching materials we'll be using. You'll take home a lot of information. You will also get to get to know our student teacher, Pame Timbs, who will be with us until around Thanksgiving. There will be a Q. and A. period at the end, so bring any questions you may have.

I will be updating this blog monthly. In it, I'll let you know what skills we'll be working on, any dates you will need to remember (the dates will also be on the monthly calendar that I send home in the daily folder), and anything else in which I think you might be interested. If I need to get information to you that needs to go home immediately, I'll either email you or send you a note in the daily folder.

I will be writing another post shortly to tell you what we'll be covering the first month of school, so be looking!!

I'm looking forward to getting to know you! Please feel free to contact me at any time via email or note if you have concerns or questions. I have an open door policy.

By the way, even though when I post the blog it looks really good  :-), the program tends to change the font and color at random. It isn't me!!!

Diana Whitson