Week of 11/24

Welcome back from our long holiday weekend!

Us teachers have been adjusting our morning schedule a bit, and we seem to have found a good stride for the morning time: the first chunk of our morning block will include centers that stretch beyond literacy, into math, science, social studies, and beyond. As we start our next topic of “Rocks and Bones,” our learning centers revolved around rocks. All week, the centers stayed the same, so students had the opportunity to really dive into each of the centers, while also taking time for small-group work with Christie or Andrea.

At one center, students wrote stories from the point of view of a rock. Another center included a pile of books and the task of finding different information about rocks. A rock “guessing game” was another center, with students trying to figure out rock-and-mineral-related riddles, and then, of course, create their own. And a fourth learning center took place in the block area, as students built structures, then drew what they had created, then repeated the process backwards.

Our reading word work introduced sight words “why,” “when,” “where,” and “said.” These are very common words in print and speech, and constant practice will help kids become fluent in these sometimes-tricky words. We also looked at words ending in “ill,” as well as other words with the “wh” consonant blend. Soon, we’re hoping to create a consonant blend (or “digraph”) chart for the classroom.

During math time, the first graders are beginning to look more closely at the concept of place value. This is a hugely important topic, and one that will be a focus for months to come. Having a printed-out 100s chart at home is a great way to support the work we’ve done this week, looking at patterns in the numbers and exploring questions like “if 12 and 21 have the same numbers in them, how are they not the same number?” and “what is a digit?”

Our afternoon family group time was spent finished up our farm topic from the previous weeks, as well as looking ahead to our new topic. We reflected upon our work, our groups, and what we liked or did not like about our previous project time. And, we brainstormed some ideas of future themes we might want to explore. Hopefully, even more ideas will come up over the next few weeks. Our Burke Box (a classroom resource from the Burke Museum in Seattle) arrived, full of rocks and minerals for us to look at, so we began to explore its contents, while also thinking about what we already know about rocks.

Several questions have already come up, and some experiments, too! While we spent a chunk of time exploring the rocks, several kids wanted to know what happens if you put certain rocks in water – will they just get wet? Disintegrate? Melt? A great deal of scientific conversation followed. Other students have expressed interest in sparkly rocks and crystals, and geodes seem to be a fascinating favorite, which will be great to look more closely at.

Also, another field trip is upon us! We will be going rock collecting at Saltwater State Park on Monday afternoon. There, we will hold an Explorers outing, as well as have exploration time. One specific activity will be to find and collect some extra special rocks for our “pet rock” project for next week.

Our trip to see Wizard of Oz is next Wednesday, and we also have a parent meeting this coming Tuesday night. See you all soon!