Lunch Bunch

I was so excited to have my first "lunch bunch" last Friday. Each week students worked together to earn table stars. The table with the most stars gets to eat lunch in the classroom with me. Who will it be next week? We'll have to wait and see!

Extending Patterns

We've been working hard on mastering the art of making patterns. This week, students played a game called "Extend the Pattern." They worked together in pairs. One student made a pattern and then the other student rolled a dice with numbers 1 and 2 on it. If the dice showed a 1, the student needed to add one more color tile to the pattern. If the dice showed a 2, the student needed to add two more color tiles to the pattern. Students did a great job working with their partners, taking turns, and making challenging patterns!

Extending the pattern from Haley Alvarado on Vimeo.

Learning with Letters and Sounds

Students have a great time drawing pictures and sounding words during our daily Skills Block and Writer's Workshop! They had a blast trying to think of words and pictures that go along with each letter in their name. Students were encouraged to use pictures from the class alphabet strip and also from their name tag (which has a picture for each letter in the alphabet). Not only was this a fun and creative activity, it also taught the students to use resources from around the classroom to help them with their work!

Open House

I hope you had a great time at Open House. I think the students REALLY enjoyed showing you "their" classroom and routines. Aren't they adorable???

What's Your Job?

Last week we started class jobs. Each student has a classroom responsibility. This helps students feel a sense of belonging as well as ownership. We have a few "unique" jobs such as "mystery job," which could be any special task throughout the day. We also have an "energy supervisor," who is responsible for turning off lights and saving energy. Ask your child what job he/she has each week.

Perfect Patterns

We just began our new math unit on Patterns and students are already taking it to a new level! Students got to practice acting out patterns, for example (clap, clap, jump, clap, clap, jump). We also used students to make different types of patterns, for example (boy, girl, boy, girl or blue shirt, red shirt, pink shirt, blue shirt, red shirt, pink shirt). Students should be able to make and recognize AB, ABB, AAB, and ABC patterns. Don't forget to practice making patterns at home using items from around your house!!

Reader's Workshop

We spend time every day in Reader's Workshop. Students have been learning all about characters and settings of books. We practice reading our "Star Books," nursery rhymes, and other familiar books. We begin Reader's Workshop each day with our reading song. Take a peek at our super readers!

Jack and Jill

We have been studying Nursery Rhymes as part of our daily Skills Block. We use these nursery rhymes to learn about letters, sounds, rhyming words, and vocabulary. Students have the opportunity to sing, read, and act out each nursery rhyme. They also get a copy of each to put in their special "Nursery Rhyme" book to practice reading during Reader's Workshop. Because these nursery rhymes are already familiar to most kids and fairly short, they are great for students to begin pointing to the words. As you will see below, students are having a great time acting these rhymes out. And if it wasn't their turn today, they know that they will get a turn as we continue to study each rhyme. Check out the great acting and singing below...I don't think we have one shy student in the group! (press play and give the video one minute to begin)

Jack and Jill from dayle timmons on Vimeo.

Star Book Retelling

We have been studying "Star Books" in our class. Star Books are familiar or classic children's stories. We read these books over and over again for students to become very familiar with them. Students have been practicing "reading" these stories by retelling them during Reader's Workshop. They also have many opportunities to act the story out, use puppets to retell, and use flannel cut out pieces of the characters. Students are having so much fun retelling these Star Books as you will see just a little bit of the FUN captured in the video below. Enjoy!!

Three Billys Goats Gruff from dayle timmons on Vimeo.