Nonfiction, How-To, and Measuring

This week during Reading we:

• learned that readers think about the big idea in a nonfiction book before, during, and after reading.
• learned that the pictures in nonfiction books help us better understand what the words are teaching us.  Readers study and talk about the pictures.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• learned that when we read nonfiction books, we may come across words we have never heard of.  Readers can look at the pictures to search for clues about what a word might mean.
• added "be" to the word wall.
• learned to pay attention to the labels in pictures and what they are referring to.
• learned that Dr. Seuss's birthday is Sunday.  We read Cat in the Hat and created hats for Monday's community meeting.

This week during Writing we continued our How-To unit.  We:

• learned that writers can add a warning to a step if there is something their reader needs to be careful of.
• learned that, just like recipes have a list of ingredients, we can add a "What You Will Need" list to our How-To books.
  
  
  
  
  

•  reviewed that writers need to leave spaces between their words.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

• learned about periods and practiced adding them to our books.
• shared some of our how-to books with our first grade reading buddies.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

During Math, we spent the week learning about measuring.  We learned that before tools like rulers were created, people could have their bodies as a tool for measuring.  We then used paper cutouts of our feet to measure different objects around the classroom.

Another day, I read a book called How Big is a Foot?.  This book teaches readers that when different people use their feet to measure, they might get different measurements based on the length of their feet.  Because of this, standard units of measurement are necessary.  I introduced the class to the standard foot, and we used this unit to measure objects in our classroom.  We learned that, when we all use the same size measuring tool, we should all get the same measurements.

Next week, we will spend time reading Dr. Seuss books.

Have a nice weekend!
Katie