Happy New Year!

The children had a smooth transition back to school after a two week break.  I was very excited to introduce the children to our two new mini iPads that were donated to us from the Yarmouth Education Foundation!  Last week, the children used the iPad with a buddy to learn about this tool.  Going forward, children will use these iPads independently during work station time.  The children and I are thrilled to have this new learning tool in our classroom.

Last week during Reading we spent our mini-lessons discussing how to think as we read, both to ourselves and with a buddy.  We learned:

• to get our minds ready to read by looking at the pictures, thinking about what is happening, and making predictions about what will happen.
• to ask questions before and while we are reading.  I introduced the children to Questioning Owl, a character to help us remember to ask ourselves questions and make predictions as we read.
• to give our buddies a picture walk of our book before we read to them.  Buddies can make predictions before they start reading, just like we do when we read-to-self.
• to play thinking games with our buddies, such as "What do you think my book will be mostly about?" and "What do you think will happen next in my book?"

Last week during Writing we started a new unit, Small Moment Stories.  The children learned to:

• think of something that has happened in their lives and write that story across the pages of a book.
•  write about one small moment instead of a whole day or week.  For example, we wrote a small moment story together about playing tag in the gym.  Instead of writing about our whole day at school, we wrote about a twenty minute block of time.
• leave spaces between their words. 

Last week during Math we:

• played the Dice Throw Game.  During this game, children rolled two dice and found the sum of the dots on both dice.  They recorded the sum on a bar graph.  Children continued playing until the bar above one number reached the top.  This game helped children practice adding and learn that some sums are more likely to be rolled than others.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• played Guess the Covered Number.  I covered a number on our number grid, and the children had to use the numbers that came before and after the covered number to figure out the covered number.
• used our bodies and ribbon to make shapes.  Through these activities, the children learned more about the characteristics of each shape (number of sides, corners, and length of sides).
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

Enjoy this sunny day!
Katie