Announcements

A few announcements being sent home today to look for:

Book orders due Friday!  

Reading party on Thursday!!  

A note about some upcoming Guidance discussions.  

Thank you!!

Chinese New Year!

Happy New Year!  

Today marks the Year of the Rat!

 May we all find good fortune!

Friday marked our 1st day of Snow Motion at Cochran's!  It was a beautiful winter day and so wonderful to see so many parents out supporting all of the first grade skiers and borders! Thank you!!

(I am sorry if you don't see your child in this!  There were many kids over on the T-bar - where I was not able to take photos!)

This week we started a few new units!  One unit was in Writing, where we are now writing about Nonfiction!  The students get to be the teachers now and share all they know about different topics!  They will love this because they are all so knowledgable about so many things!!

We also started a new Math unit on Measuring, Comparing, Fractions & Time! On Wednesday we went out to the woods to play "What Time is it Mr. Fox?" to reinforce our lesson on Time that morning! This outdoor lesson was so much more fun!  Then we calmed down with some Sit Spot time.  It was beautiful seeing everyone pause and jot down some observations, poems, and wonderings.  Check out the video below!

Inspiration!

                                          

After reading some books about Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. this week we reminded ourselves of all of the inspirational books that we have read in the past month or two:  Jane Goodall, Jacques Cousteau, Kid President, MLK, Rosa Parks, and Abraham Lincoln (a student's choice) are the ones that the students chose to write about! It was so nice to see the collaboration that needed to happen to make this a successful project!

I hope you all have a great extra day off! Happy B-day MLK!!

Camo Woodsy Wednesday

This week outside we began with a pass and share circle sharing what we knew about camouflage.  Then we headed out on a scavenger hunt for camouflaged "toy" animals hidden among the dead grass.  We then shared our thoughts on which animals were easier to find because of their brighter colors. We discussed how the camouflage trait is helpful for the safety of the animal and a strategy for hunting.  We then ended with a (slightly comical) puppet show about traits! 
Lots of great learning and engaged kiddos - yay!!

This week...

      We have settled in nicely after vacation and have begun to dig in with lots of learning!  This week we started a new theme on Organisms.  We will discuss traits, similarities, and then conclude with lessons on designing a solution to a human problem by mimicking how plants and or animals use their external parts to help them survive, grow and meet their needs!

     This week we had an art walk in our very own classroom museum.  We explored some famous art pieces and then decided which one we liked the best (or we liked the least).  This was a fun way to start an opinion writing prompt!  In math, we have started counting and writing larger numbers! 
We also read a couple of really inspiring stories! One about Jane Goodall and another about a young girl named Julia Butterfly Hill who spent 738 days up in a Redwood named Luna.  She saved this 1,000-year-old tree from being cut down. A fabulous story my son gave me from the Redwood Forest National Park.