We also were able to have a philanthropic opportunity with the help of the Girl Scouts! On Friday students at #MannSchool were encouraged to dress as their favorite book character! The optional donation of $1 went towards the families affected by the 3 alarm fire on September 3rd here in Oak Park. Ms. Cairns of course dressed as her FAVORITE book character of all time...Anne of Green Gables!
This week we worked with more math story problems, using math vocabulary. We work in ability groups for the first part of math so we can work on our appropriate skill level, but then reconvene as a group to work on the language of math and the writing piece to math. As this is first grade, we have more discussion/explanation of how we arrive at answers and will transition more to writing out our thought process as this is the emphasis with the Common Core Math Standards. I am SO impressed with how insightful the students are! WOW!
In reading workshop we worked with a practice round of the making words activity! One of my personal favorites! We take all the letter from the mystery word and create as many words as we can. It's a wonderful activity for exploring phonics and sounds in addition to a spelling lesson. It lends itself naturally to differentiation as those students who are ready for more make extended words and sentences, verbalizing what needs to be added! We get into discussion of base and root words, word origins Latin...I could go on and on how wonderful this activity is for ALL learners...including me a self-proclaimed word geek! I choose the mystery word based on our spelling phonics patterns for the week so that the children have extra practice with that skill. So for example if the mystery word was "princess." You can make multiple long i and silent e words with the letters in princess so it's bonus practice for the word work phonics pattern which helps with reading, writing, and spelling. Even 'rithmatic too as the CCSS for math have much more written pieces to it!
We also have GREAT news! We spelled the compliment word GREAT! If we get a compliment from other teachers in Mann School, we earn a letter. We earned the letters g r e a t which spell GREAT!
We took a class vote, and decided to have a stuffed animal or toy day on Tuesday, September 30th. The stuffed animal must be able to fit in our book bag. If it is a toy it CAN NOT be electronic. If the toy or stuffed animal distracts us, it will have to spend the rest of the day in our book bag in our lockers.
Thank you for helping us to be so GREAT!
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