Weekly Updates March 21-31

Hello,

I can’t believe it’s the last week of March. The year is truly flying by. I’m looking forward to meeting with families tonight or Thursday to share the progress of first graders so far this year. Keep practicing those KAT questions. And don’t forget to turn in your permission slip for our PAC field trip if you haven’t already.

Here is the sign up link for Knowledge-a-thon​:

http://signup.com/go/TNwaqh

Timber Rattlers Reading Program: Remember, if your child is participating in Fang’s Reading Club and completes the 2 week reading assignment, fill out the the corresponding Fang and bring him back to school. If your child completes all the the assignments, he/she will earn a complimentary ticket to the Timber Rattlers game on June 11th at 1:05 PM.

Upcoming Events:

3/28 & 3/30: Portfolio Conferences 4:00-7:00
3/29: Wacky Hair Day
4/3-7: Dress Up Days- See Below

4/7: KAT in the AM, PAC field trip in the PM
4/11: Egg Crack Off- Look for a note to be coming home soon!

KAT Week Dress up days April 3-7th

Monday Brewer/Sports Day

Tuesday Dress as a question or answer to KAT question

Wednesday Pajama Day

Thursday Superhero Day

Friday Dress Fancy

Reading: We will be finishing up our character unit this week. Students have been working hard on making 3 star predictions. Three star predictions include a prediction before we start reading, another prediction when we start to notice the trouble, and another prediction about when the trouble starts to get fixed. We also give evidence for our predictions, and check in to see if we were correct, kind of correct or if the author surprised us!

Writing: Students are doing an amazing job writing realistic fiction stories. They are giving their characters troubles and then fixing the troubles. We are using what we know about adding action, feeling and dialogue to make our stories come alive!

Word Work: The new words this week are: say, well, give, again, please. Please have your child practice these words on a regular basis. As they become fluent with them, it’s helps them with their reading and writing.

Math:  We’re going to be spending a couple more days on comparison problems and using comparison bars as this concept was a little tricky for first graders. At the end of the week we will be moving on to two digit addition!

Content: We are continuing our study of US symbols. Students have begun to research a symbol of their own by themselves or in small groups using nonfiction books and pebblego. You can access Pebblego from home if you’d like. The username and password are both electa. Students have dug right into their research and are very excited about what they are learning!

Weekly Updates March 20-24

Hello,

Thank you for continuing to practice your KAT questions at home. We have been practicing the questions at school as well, and students are doing an awesome job. I look forward to meeting with you next week during our Portfolio Conferences to share the growth your child has made so far this year in first grade.

Here are some areas we are looking for volunteers:

Book Fair

http://signup.com/go/zkKGHy

Conference Meals

http://signup.com/go/bEgipo

http://signup.com/go/TNwaqh

Here is the sign up link for Knowledge-a-thon​

Timber Rattlers Reading Program: Remember, if your child is participating in Fang’s Reading Club and completes the 2 week reading assignment, fill out the the corresponding Fang and bring him back to school. If your child completes all the the assignments, he/she will earn a complimentary ticket to the Timber Rattlers game on June 11th at 1:05 PM.

Classroom Need:  We are in need of more pens for writing.  We use the Paper Mate: Flair Pens in black.  If you are out and about and could pick up a pack we would appreciate it!   Thank you for all the donations so far!

Upcoming Events:

3/28 & 3/30: Portfolio Conferences 4:00-7:00
3/29: Wacky Hair Day
4/3: Sports Day
4/11: Egg Crack Off

Reading: We are doing an amazing job of making our stories come alive! This week we’ll be spending some time acting out what we think might come after the end of the story by thinking about what we know about the characters. We’ll also share different ideas about how a book might be performed. We’ll end our week by thinking about the lessons stories are trying to teach us and keep that life lesson in mind as we read new stories to see how they fit together.

Writing: We’ll be starting our realistic fiction writing unit this week, From Scenes to Series. In the first part of this unit writers will invent characters and small moment adventures for their characters. They will plan and act out their stories to help add details. In the second part of the unit, writers will put their characters in more than one book and more than one adventure. We’ll spend some time studying mentor authors to help us add details. We’ll end our unit by publishing our books, making sure to edit and revise in meaningful ways, and create a “meet the author” page.

Word Work: The new words this week are: saw, eat, ran, after, must. Please have your child practice these words on a regular basis. As they become fluent with them, it’s helps them with their reading and writing.

Math:  We are continuing to solve comparison story problems. We are also learning about how we can use comparison bars to help us solve these situations. We’ll be having our unit assessment on Friday.

Content: We are continuing our study of US symbols. We’ll learn about a couple more symbols and then we’ll choose a symbol we want to learn more about and do our own research using books and Pebblego. We’ll end our study by presenting our learning to the rest of the class.

An Irish Visitor

Mr. Brien visited us today and shared some Irish heritage and an leprechaun story!

Weekly Updates March 13-20

Hello,

There are many exciting opportunities happening at New Directions this time of year! Portfolio conferences are the the last week of March. Please let me know if you haven’t received your scheduled time. The KAT is also coming up April 7. Packets with information came home on Friday. Please spend some time going through the questions with your child. They are all things we’ve learned in first grade, but sometimes a little extra practice is helpful! We’ll be practicing the questions at school too. This is an amazing fundraiser for our school, and the PSC is so supportive of all of our school initiatives.

Here are some areas we are looking for volunteers:

Book Fair

http://signup.com/go/zkKGHy

Conference Meals

http://signup.com/go/bEgipo

http://signup.com/go/TNwaqh

Here is the sign up link for Knowledge-a-thon​

There are so many exciting offerings for summer school this year. Have you seen them? If not, here is the course description packet. Registration opens on Sunday, March 19th at 2:00 pm. There are a few New Directions Teachers teaching summer school this year. Check out this list to see what classes are being taught by New Directions teachers. I am sure you will agree that there are many great options for enrichment this year!

Timber Rattlers Reading Program: Remember, if your child is participating in Fang’s Reading Club and completes the 2 week reading assignment, fill out the the corresponding Fang and bring him back to school. If your child completes all the the assignments, he/she will earn a complimentary ticket to the Timber Rattlers game on June 11th at 1:05 PM.

Classroom Need:  We are in need of more pens for writing.  We use the Paper Mate: Flair Pens in black.  If you are out and about and could pick up a pack we would appreciate it!   Thank you!

Upcoming Events:

3/15: No School for Students

3/17: Wear Green
3/28 & 3/30: Portfolio Conferences 4:00-7:00
3/29: Wacky Hair Day
4/3: Sports Day
4/11: Egg Crack Off

Reading: This week we are continuing to act like we are our characters. We’ll be working with our partners to act out the scenes together. Partners will take turns being the character and narrator. We’ll also notice parts our characters aren’t talking and think about what the character might be saying and add that in. Then we’ll be joining up with another partnership and forming clubs to act out our books. We’ll be looking closely at the words, pictures and pay close attention to what the character does and says.

Writing: We are finishing up our Writing Like Scientists unit. We’ve been working hard to add introductions and conclusions to our writing. We’ll also be spending some time editing for punctuation, capitals and spelling. At the end of the week we’ll be conducting one last whole class experiment and writing a lab report for our portfolios. Next week we’ll be starting to write realistic fiction.

Word Work: The new words this week are: so, ate, over, where, or, into. Please have your child practice these words on a regular basis. As they become fluent with them, it’s helps them with their reading and writing.

Math:  We are continuing our  Comparisons and Data unit and moving on to solving comparison problems. We are working hard to make a movie in our mind to help us come up with a strategy to solve these problems. See tonight’s math homework for examples of the types of problems’ we’ve been solving. We’ve also been working hard on becoming with fluent with our addition and subtraction facts to 10. We spend time each day practicing these facts using our yellow, red and orange fact cards.

Content: We are continuing our study of US symbols. We’ve been taking notes on the different symbols we’ve been learning about. Some of the symbols we’ll be studying are The Flag, The White House, The Bald Eagle, The Liberty Bell, along with other symbols students are interested in.

Author's Breakfast

Friday, March 10, 2017

Friday News

It's a busy time of the school year and there are many exciting things happening in our school.  Thank  you to everyone who came to Author's Breakfast.  We were very excited to share our writing in this unit.  I will send a blog post on Tuesday with classroom updates. Have a great weekend!  

• There are so many exciting offerings for summer school this year. Have you seen them? If not, here is the course description packet.Registration opens on Sunday, March 19th at 2:00 pm. There are a few New Directions Teachers teaching summer school this year. Check out this list to see what classes are being taught by New Directions teachers. I am sure you will agree that there are many great options for enrichment this year!

•  A message from Student Council: 
  HOORAY! Our 3D printer was fully funded! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!
  As you begin your spring cleaning, please look for magnets, old electronics, toy cars, Knex, and legos. We will also take household items like measuring cups, paper products and utensils. Basic office supplies would also be helpful when building our makerspace. As always, you can send monetary donations with your child to contribute toward makerspace supplies. 

• Culver's Night is Monday, March 13th.  It is from 5-8 p.m.  I will be there during the last hour slot from 7-8 p.m.  

• NDLC Running Club
  New Directions is starting an after school running club!  Please watch your child's folder for information on the Running Club.  

• If you can help at any of the following, here are the sign-ups:

Book Fair
http://signup.com/go/zkKGHy
Conference Meals
http://signup.com/go/bEgipo
Knowledge-A-Thon
http://signup.com/go/TNwaqh

• If your child is participating in the FANG Reading program. Please have them turn in their slips weekly. They will receive prizes as they go. If you child starts now, and meets the requirements, you can send them all in at once! :) 

• KAT packets are coming home today.  Make sure to check for it and start practicing the questions! 

• Birthday Box Reminder

We will be collecting Birthday box donations at conferences on March 28 &30. Please drop off donations at the designated tables.  Our highest need items are decorative birthday plates, napkins and tablecloths.  We will continue to collect all other items including decorations, candles, cake mixes (please check expiration dates), cans of frosting, cake decorations, and sprinkles.  Our goal is to collect enough items for 50 Birthday boxes.  

We are also in need of volunteers to help collect supplies on March 28 & 30th and to assembly boxes on April 22nd. Please click the link below if you are interested in signing up to help!

http://signup.com/go/fa4ZnY

Please contact Kristin McEneany at  kristin.mceneany@gmail.com  with any questions.

• Check out this months newsletter to learn more about other important happenings in our school!

March 6-10

Hello,

Well, it seems like March has come in like a lion, with some lamb in there as well. Hopefully by the month’s end we’ll have some consistently nice days! Conference notes with your scheduled time came home yesterday. Please let me know if you didn’t receive yours. This is a busy time of year in first grade. See below to find out what’s happening!

http://signup.com/go/TNwaqh

Here is the sign up link for Knowledge-a-thon​

Student Council sent out a letter introducing their next project: a Makerspace. You can see that letter here.

In addition to supplies, they are hoping to add a 3D printer to the Makerspace. Please go here to donate. If you donate before March 10th, Donors Choose will match your donation if you use the code LIFTOFF.

Timber Rattlers Reading Program: Remember, if your child is participating in Fang’s Reading Club and completes the 2 week reading assignment, fill out the the corresponding Fang and bring him back to school. If your child completes all the the assignments, he/she will earn a complimentary ticket to the Timber Rattlers game on June 11th at 1:05 PM.

Classroom Need:  We are in need of more pens for writing.  We use the Paper Mate: Flair Pens in black.  If you are out and about and could pick up a pack we would appreciate it!   Thank you!

Upcoming Events:

3/10: Author's Breakfast 7:15-7:45

3/15: No School for Students
3/28 & 3/30: Portfolio Conferences 4:00-7:00
3/29: Wacky Hair Day
4/3: Sports Day
4/11: Egg Crack Off

Reading: This week as we learn more about characters we’ll be putting ourselves in the character’s shoes and actually becoming the character. We’ll try to act, talk and think like we think our character would. We’ll match our voices to how our characters are feeling, and change our voices to match the feelings. We’ll also use clues such as dialogue tags and narration to help us know how to act and talk like our character. We’ll be working on making our voices sound smooth to really sound like our characters. We’ll spend time rereading to make our voices sound just right.

Writing: We are continuing to Write Like Scientists. Partners have planned and conducted a couple of experiments and completed lab reports. We are working on adding in detailed steps to make sure our how-tos are clear and concise and studying other lab reports to add more to our results and conclusions. We are excited to share our lab reports at our author’s breakfast this Friday.

Word Work: The new words this week are: help, going, by, away, down. Please have your child practice these words on a regular basis. As they become fluent with them, it’s helps them with their reading and writing.

Math:  We are continuing our  Comparisons and Data unit. This week we are comparing 3 sets of data and then will be conducting our own surveys and comparing the results.

Content: We started our study of US symbols today. Some of the symbols we’ll be studying are The Flag, The White House, The Bald Eagle, The Liberty Bell, along with other symbols students are interested in. We’ll spend some time learning about the symbol and what it stands for.

Happy Birthday Dr. Suess!

Mystery Reader