This afternoon you should have received a text message from TAISM regarding Eid Al Adha holiday. It is going to be from November 5 to November 8. Classes will resume on Wednesday, November 9.
November Specials Calendar_Jenny
Sunday, October 30, 2011
la la la ... you will hear someone singing in the shower!
Today in your child's folder you will find a couple song sheets from Mrs. Wilson, our music teacher. The children have been learning and practicing these songs and Mrs. Wilson thought it'd be nice for them to sing to their parents and siblings at home. It will be so fun to see them track the words as they sing (putting some extra reading time there)! Don't worry about bringing the song sheets back to school - they are for yours to keep. Have fun!
Grade One Songs, 2011
Grade One Songs, 2011
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
More info on Parent-Teacher Conference and Star of the Week
Our parent-teacher conference is next Tuesday and Wednesday. Tuesday, November 1st will be a half day for students and they will be dismissed at noon. Wednesday, November 2nd is a full-day conference so there will be no school for the kids.
Our first Star of the Week is going to be...... ADESSA! She will be ready to do some "show and tell" this upcoming week. We are excited to see what she's going to show us and tell us.
This past week, Ms. Zulfa and I were Star of the Week. We made a poster with photos of family and friends, pictures of our favorite holidays and food, and things we like to do. Please take a look at our poster to get some ideas for your child's Star of the Week. If you have any questions, please feel free to write to me.
Our first Star of the Week is going to be...... ADESSA! She will be ready to do some "show and tell" this upcoming week. We are excited to see what she's going to show us and tell us.
This past week, Ms. Zulfa and I were Star of the Week. We made a poster with photos of family and friends, pictures of our favorite holidays and food, and things we like to do. Please take a look at our poster to get some ideas for your child's Star of the Week. If you have any questions, please feel free to write to me.
This week in Reader's Workshop
Our readers have been doing such a great job tackling harder texts in their guided reading groups and independent reading time. This week, we focused on "partner reading". We learned that "readers never travel alone" because they have friends and partners they share their stories with. They talk to each other about their books and sometimes they even help each other out when they get stuck with a tricky word or a tricky part. We learned that readers also ask questions and give comments about the story. Reading with someone is like taking a hike up the mountain; it gets more fun and enjoyable knowing there's always someone to talk with and support you when you fall. This weekend, be your child's reading partner and share some of your favorite parts.
Lucky readers! Our readers had another special reader's treat this week. Our student-teacher from SQU (Sultan Qaboos University), Ms. Sheikha comes into our class every Monday morning to learn about teaching. This week she shared a story with our students, Edwina the dinosaur who didn't know she was extinct by Mo Willems. After Ms. Sheikha read the story to the class, our readers put on character masks and acted out the story. The readers were very excited about the acting and were expressive in their lines and actions. Good job readers and Ms. Sheikha!
What a busy week!
The 1st Grade Super Kids have had a really busy week. In Social Studies, we finished interviewing our TAISM community members. We learned about the jobs of our school security guard, Mr. Qayser; our cafeteria manager, Mr. Binu and his team; our school's swimming and P.E. assistant, Ms. Grace; and our admissions coordinator, Ms. Nimmi. We extended this activity by typing up some of the quotes in a speech bubble format in I.T. computer lab. The final product will be put up on the walls in the ES foyer later next week.
Who has a sweet tooth? 1st Grade Super Kids do! This week, our "Super Kids" earned a little "Cinnamon Roll" party for their hard work and spelled out "Super Kids". Every time they work well together, they earn a letter. Thank you Ms. Zulfa for baking us some delicious cinnamon rolls! Also, a big thank you to Sara Jansson (Pelle's mom) who brought in some yummy homemade "Fall Festival" spider cookies. The kids enjoyed them at snacks today.
Sunday, October 23, 2011
TAISM's Got Talent!
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Reminders...
Next week in math we will be sorting buttons! Yes, we could always use more buttons! If you have a pile of buttons that you don't need at home and you are willing to donate, please send them to school with your child starting Saturday. Thank you!
It's time to say, "Cheese!" Photo day for yearbook is fast approaching. It is Monday, October 24th, day 3. We have P.E but since the children have swimming and they are going to change into their swimwear anyway, children can just wear their regular school uniform to school. Regular TAISM uniform consists of a white, red, or navy blue polo shirt with colored pants, shorts or skirt.
Please remember that the 1st graders have already begun their swimming unit. Our P.E./swimming days are every day 1, 3, and 6. Please send your child with a 'swim bag' that includes a swimming suit, goggles, towel, and underwear if your child is wearing his/her swimming suit underneath the uniform in the morning. Wearing crocs or flip flops/sandals on swimming days might be helpful when they change and get in and out of the pool.
Finally if you haven't subscribe to our class blog, please do so by entering and submitting your active email address in the "follow by email" box located on the left side bar of the blog. Once you subscribed, you will be receiving email notifications when new postings are updated and hence it saves you time from visiting our blog regularly to see if there are any updates or not.
It's time to say, "Cheese!" Photo day for yearbook is fast approaching. It is Monday, October 24th, day 3. We have P.E but since the children have swimming and they are going to change into their swimwear anyway, children can just wear their regular school uniform to school. Regular TAISM uniform consists of a white, red, or navy blue polo shirt with colored pants, shorts or skirt.
Please remember that the 1st graders have already begun their swimming unit. Our P.E./swimming days are every day 1, 3, and 6. Please send your child with a 'swim bag' that includes a swimming suit, goggles, towel, and underwear if your child is wearing his/her swimming suit underneath the uniform in the morning. Wearing crocs or flip flops/sandals on swimming days might be helpful when they change and get in and out of the pool.
Finally if you haven't subscribe to our class blog, please do so by entering and submitting your active email address in the "follow by email" box located on the left side bar of the blog. Once you subscribed, you will be receiving email notifications when new postings are updated and hence it saves you time from visiting our blog regularly to see if there are any updates or not.
2... 4.... 6.... 8.... 10....
In math this week, our mathematicians learned to skip count by 2's and 5's. We made a skip counting booklet and we practiced counting and shading in hundreds chart in I.T. class on the computers. This weekend, have your child practice skip counting by 2's or 5's... count some crayons, buttons, markers, candy and see how far he/she could go up to.
Go to http://www.abcya.com/interactive_100_number_chart.htm to make your own skip counting hundreds chart.
Go to http://www.abcya.com/interactive_100_number_chart.htm to make your own skip counting hundreds chart.
Our TAISM Community
A community is...
"A place where people work together."
"Sometimes people work in a different place."
"When people help each other."
"There are rules and expectations in a community that help keep us safe and healthy."
"People in the community share."
"People take care of their community."
These are some ideas and understandings that our 1st graders had when they hear the word, "community". This week we started to talk a lot about the TAISM community. We brainstormed many groups of community members at TAISM, such as nurses, teachers, principals, counselors, cafeteria workers, guards, administrators, and many more! We learned that in order to have a healthy and organized community, we need different teams of people to do a certain job. This week, we had a chance to meet and interview our aquatics coordinator, Mrs. Lisa File, our admissions office associate, Mrs. Urmila Seymour, and one of our school guards, Mr. Qaiser to learn more about their jobs and how they work as part of their team. We are going to continue our community interviews next week with different community members. At the end of the interview project, a mural of our community will be displayed in the ES foyer. Stay tuned!
"A place where people work together."
"Sometimes people work in a different place."
"When people help each other."
"There are rules and expectations in a community that help keep us safe and healthy."
"People in the community share."
"People take care of their community."
These are some ideas and understandings that our 1st graders had when they hear the word, "community". This week we started to talk a lot about the TAISM community. We brainstormed many groups of community members at TAISM, such as nurses, teachers, principals, counselors, cafeteria workers, guards, administrators, and many more! We learned that in order to have a healthy and organized community, we need different teams of people to do a certain job. This week, we had a chance to meet and interview our aquatics coordinator, Mrs. Lisa File, our admissions office associate, Mrs. Urmila Seymour, and one of our school guards, Mr. Qaiser to learn more about their jobs and how they work as part of their team. We are going to continue our community interviews next week with different community members. At the end of the interview project, a mural of our community will be displayed in the ES foyer. Stay tuned!
Writer's Workshop and Word Work
Our writers and word workers have been extremely busy! In writer's workshop, our writers have been writing so many personal narrative stories and their writing folders are just stuffed with page and pages of these fantastic stories! This week we learned that writers don't always start a new story, and instead, they work on an "old story" by adding more details. A lot of them continued working on their old stories this week by telling more about "what I did", "what I saw", "what I said", and "how I felt". Now these writers are writing their stories across pages with matching illustration, labels, and even speech bubbles. We are at the stage of "revise and edit" now, and soon we will be ready to publish our very first personal narrative story of the year! Stay tuned for our publishing party!
In word work, we have been working hard in our small groups. Each day, these small groups rotate to a different word work activity. This week I introduced a new activity called "read, make and write". After introducing the word sort to them, students draw the picture/word card and they have to read what it says, then make the word using magnetic letters 3 times, then they write it. This is a great activity to reinforce the word sort feature that they are working on that week. Some of the word sort features that our children learned this week are: beginning consonants B, M, R, S, P, T, M; word family "-at"; beginning digraphs /th/ and /wh/; and short vowels /a/ and /o/.
Ask your child to put on their word detective hat and "word hunt" some of these features in their books this weekend. = )
In word work, we have been working hard in our small groups. Each day, these small groups rotate to a different word work activity. This week I introduced a new activity called "read, make and write". After introducing the word sort to them, students draw the picture/word card and they have to read what it says, then make the word using magnetic letters 3 times, then they write it. This is a great activity to reinforce the word sort feature that they are working on that week. Some of the word sort features that our children learned this week are: beginning consonants B, M, R, S, P, T, M; word family "-at"; beginning digraphs /th/ and /wh/; and short vowels /a/ and /o/.
Ask your child to put on their word detective hat and "word hunt" some of these features in their books this weekend. = )
Guided Reading
We have just started our guided reading program this week as part of our Reader's Workshop. Guided Reading is a time when teacher gathers and reads with a small group of students who share similar reading behaviors and reading similar leveled texts. Each day I meet with 1 to 2 groups of readers, gather them on the rug and preview the text with them, introduce the story pattern (if applicable) or give a brief synopsis of the text and characters, and introduce some tricky words they might encounter. Then, the readers read the text on their own while I pull one kid at a time to read to me until I get to everyone. Finally, we reconvene again to discuss the text to check for understanding and deepen our thinking about the story.
This week, we learned that good readers get their minds ready to read by doing a 'picture walk'. This is a helpful strategy to practice with your child before the actual reading because it helps build schema for the text that supports reading fluency and comprehension. In other words, when looking at the pictures before reading, readers have the opportunity activate their prior knowledge by making self-to-text connections, text-to-text connections, or text-to-world connections. You might hear your child say, "Oh this part reminds me the time when I..." or "this part reminds me of another book ..." or "I know about this because I've seen it in a magazine or heard it on the news..." Picture walk is really a good way to get readers to 'warm up'!
Starting this week, you will see that you child is bringing home 2 books everyday - 1 guided reading book, and 1 'just right' book or a 'look book'. Please continue to support your child at home by having them read to you or a sibling everyday.
This week, we learned that good readers get their minds ready to read by doing a 'picture walk'. This is a helpful strategy to practice with your child before the actual reading because it helps build schema for the text that supports reading fluency and comprehension. In other words, when looking at the pictures before reading, readers have the opportunity activate their prior knowledge by making self-to-text connections, text-to-text connections, or text-to-world connections. You might hear your child say, "Oh this part reminds me the time when I..." or "this part reminds me of another book ..." or "I know about this because I've seen it in a magazine or heard it on the news..." Picture walk is really a good way to get readers to 'warm up'!
Starting this week, you will see that you child is bringing home 2 books everyday - 1 guided reading book, and 1 'just right' book or a 'look book'. Please continue to support your child at home by having them read to you or a sibling everyday.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Another busy week has flown by!
Wow, what a great week we've had!! Our 1st graders have had a really busy week - learning new "just right book" and "look book" book-shopping routine in reader's workshop, writing many personal narratives in writer's workshop, skip counting by 5's and 10's in math, and setting personal goals and learning more about the members of our classroom community in social studies. Not to mention we had a great time meeting our visiting authors, Steve Skidmore and Steve Barlow on Sunday. Finally, last but not least, we also met our 4th grade reading buddies from Mr. Bernhardt's class yesterday and did a fun pirate activity with them!
This week in Literacy, our children focused a lot on Word Work (or sometimes people call it Word Study). Word work is one of the components of Balanced Literacy. Word work plays an integral part of children's literate-rich lives because it helps develop their accuracy in recognizing and writing sight words, understanding the meanings in texts, and most importantly, it allows them to enjoy and appreciate language when they are able to use different word-solving skills such as the understanding of phonics, spelling patterns, suffixes and prefixes and many more to read and write (Bear, Invernizzi, & Templeton, 2008)
So this week, our "word workers" have been working hard on the beginning consonants (/b/ and /d/) and beginning and ending digraphs (/sh/ and /ch/). Together with their partners, they sorted the picture cards that have these sounds (i.e. cheese, ship, chair) under the proper heading. Later, we also did another activity called "Word Hunting" where we became word detectives and carried our imaginary magnifying glasses around the classroom, "hunting" for words that had these sounds and recorded them on dry-erase boards.
The digraphs we have been working on this week is: /th/, /ch/ and /sh/.
The blends we have been working on this week is: "st", "fr" and "sw".
Ask your child what words they know that have those sounds in either the beginning, middle or end of the word. Or they can try to do a word hunt around the house!
This week in Literacy, our children focused a lot on Word Work (or sometimes people call it Word Study). Word work is one of the components of Balanced Literacy. Word work plays an integral part of children's literate-rich lives because it helps develop their accuracy in recognizing and writing sight words, understanding the meanings in texts, and most importantly, it allows them to enjoy and appreciate language when they are able to use different word-solving skills such as the understanding of phonics, spelling patterns, suffixes and prefixes and many more to read and write (Bear, Invernizzi, & Templeton, 2008)
So this week, our "word workers" have been working hard on the beginning consonants (/b/ and /d/) and beginning and ending digraphs (/sh/ and /ch/). Together with their partners, they sorted the picture cards that have these sounds (i.e. cheese, ship, chair) under the proper heading. Later, we also did another activity called "Word Hunting" where we became word detectives and carried our imaginary magnifying glasses around the classroom, "hunting" for words that had these sounds and recorded them on dry-erase boards.
The digraphs we have been working on this week is: /th/, /ch/ and /sh/.
The blends we have been working on this week is: "st", "fr" and "sw".
Ask your child what words they know that have those sounds in either the beginning, middle or end of the word. Or they can try to do a word hunt around the house!
Reference:
Bear, D.R., Harris, R.C., & Pearson Education, Inc. (2008). Words their way DVD tutorial: Planning for word study in K-8 classrooms. Upper Saddle River, N.J: Pearson Education.
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
P.E. - Swimming Unit
Starting next Wednesday, October 19th (Day 6), your child will be swimming during P.E. time until November 16th.Your child will need to bring a "swim bag" of swimming gears.
- one-piece swimsuit for girls; mid-thigh suit for boys
- a towel
- waterproof sandals for walking on the deck and in locker room
- goggles are recommended
- something to tie up long hair
Please refer to the October Specials Calendar for P.E. days. There's no P.E. on Sunday, October 16th due to noon dismissal for all staff inservice.
The November Specials Calendar will be out at the end of October.
If you have any questions or concerns, please contact our P.E. teacher, Mr. Luther Rauk at raukl@taism.com.
- one-piece swimsuit for girls; mid-thigh suit for boys
- a towel
- waterproof sandals for walking on the deck and in locker room
- goggles are recommended
- something to tie up long hair
Please refer to the October Specials Calendar for P.E. days. There's no P.E. on Sunday, October 16th due to noon dismissal for all staff inservice.
The November Specials Calendar will be out at the end of October.
If you have any questions or concerns, please contact our P.E. teacher, Mr. Luther Rauk at raukl@taism.com.
Sunday, October 9, 2011
The 2 Steves Visit
Today your child will probably come home saying "Thingamabob" and "whatchamacallit?" and you will be like "huh?". Well, today our visiting authors, Steve Skidmore and Steve Barlow (aka the 2 Steves) were here at TAISM and your child got to meet them both! These are made-up words that keep appearing in the play called, The Thingamabob that Skidmore and Barlow co-authored.
Together with the 2 Steves, children participated in an interactive play written by Skidmore and Barlow called, The Thingamabob. The story is about this monster called "Thingamabob" appearing in town causing major distractions and delays and making a lot of kids late for school. All the kindergarteners and 1st graders were extremely engaged in the interactive play. They learned lines and silly, made-up words like "thingamabob" and "watchamacallit" from the story, as well as actions that go with the different expressions of the characters.
Go to http://www.the2steves.net/default.aspx to learn about these authors and their books.
Together with the 2 Steves, children participated in an interactive play written by Skidmore and Barlow called, The Thingamabob. The story is about this monster called "Thingamabob" appearing in town causing major distractions and delays and making a lot of kids late for school. All the kindergarteners and 1st graders were extremely engaged in the interactive play. They learned lines and silly, made-up words like "thingamabob" and "watchamacallit" from the story, as well as actions that go with the different expressions of the characters.
Go to http://www.the2steves.net/default.aspx to learn about these authors and their books.
This Week in Math
Our mathematicians have been doing a lot of counting these past weeks! They are counting the days of the week. They are counting the days we have in September and October. They are even counting the days we have been in school! Last week, we learned all about sequencing and arranging days of the week, months of the year, and events in a story in order with their math partners. I am sure you've probably seen a paper-clipped set of days of the week, months of the year, and the story "Wiggle the Caterpillar" in your child's green folder. Please feel free to continue practicing sequencing and reading the words with your child at home. The sets are for you to keep.
In addition to sequencing, children have also been learning and playing different math games that focus on counting forward and backward and adding and subtracting numbers between 1-20. In our "Jump Jump" game, kids learn to use a number line, moving the counter forward and backward to help build their number sense in solving simple addition and subtraction problems. In our "Build the City" game, kids roll 2 dice and add the dots together, then they count the unifix cubes and build a "building". Through games, our mathematicians are also practicing their turn-taking skill.
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
This Week in Reader's Workshop
This year in 1st Grade, we are going to a great journey of reading. These little "reading adventurers" have learned that like any other journey and trip, we must get ready and pack our backpack full of things we need. For the past two weeks, these smart readers have been building stamina in reading and make their reading muscles grow strong and big. On the first day of Reader's Workshop, we set the timer to read for 10 minutes, then each day forward, we keep adding more and more minutes to build up our stamina. As of today, our readers are able to sustain 20 minutes of reading time on their own.
So now that the readers have their reading stamina in their "reader's backpack", we are going to keep adding things and strategies we know and need so we can travel far.
Today, your child was introduced to two types of texts: "just-right books” and "look books". Basically "just-right" books are texts that match the child's reading level. With these "just-right" books, readers are able to apply various strategies to help them decode (solving tricky words), comprehend (reading for meaning and understanding), envision (making a movie in their minds), predict and infer ("What might happen next? What is the author really talking about?") and many more. Readers achieve their best when they are able to apply reading strategies to books that aren't too difficult or too easy for them. Therefore encourage your child to reread and apply a different strategy each time. This will help build their independence and confidence in reading.
On the other hand, "look books" are books that readers pick based on the topic of interest. It could be a genre-based text (space, animals, insects, transportation) or author/series-based (Dr. Suess, Mo Willems, Arthur, Clifford etc.). These books aren't necessary "just-right" for them, in fact, when given a choice to pick a look book, kids often pick texts that are nonfiction, or harder texts or a series that they really love and were read to them by a teacher or parent but they aren't able to read yet. Readers "look" at these texts and try to use pictures to help decode. They also look at pictures and read short captions to learn about the topic. Some children also choose these books as a "goal-setter" to help them get their minds ready and get a feel of what reading harder texts is like.
So now that the readers have their reading stamina in their "reader's backpack", we are going to keep adding things and strategies we know and need so we can travel far.
Today, your child was introduced to two types of texts: "just-right books” and "look books". Basically "just-right" books are texts that match the child's reading level. With these "just-right" books, readers are able to apply various strategies to help them decode (solving tricky words), comprehend (reading for meaning and understanding), envision (making a movie in their minds), predict and infer ("What might happen next? What is the author really talking about?") and many more. Readers achieve their best when they are able to apply reading strategies to books that aren't too difficult or too easy for them. Therefore encourage your child to reread and apply a different strategy each time. This will help build their independence and confidence in reading.
On the other hand, "look books" are books that readers pick based on the topic of interest. It could be a genre-based text (space, animals, insects, transportation) or author/series-based (Dr. Suess, Mo Willems, Arthur, Clifford etc.). These books aren't necessary "just-right" for them, in fact, when given a choice to pick a look book, kids often pick texts that are nonfiction, or harder texts or a series that they really love and were read to them by a teacher or parent but they aren't able to read yet. Readers "look" at these texts and try to use pictures to help decode. They also look at pictures and read short captions to learn about the topic. Some children also choose these books as a "goal-setter" to help them get their minds ready and get a feel of what reading harder texts is like.
Right now in your child's book box at school, they have a combination of "just-right" books and "look books". They will be changing their books weekly. If you see your child bringing home the same book more than once, it is probably they are rereading to try out new reading strategies or to practice fluency and prosody. Ask them what strategy they are trying out tonight! = ) Happy reading!
Saturday, October 1, 2011
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