First Grade News

February 3, 2014

Curriculum Highlights Writing non-fiction research, collecting dash facts Math number stories and problem solving Word Study learning from love - no word in English ends with v - write ve instead, avoid writing uv - write ov instead, prefixes, bases, suffixes Science Living Things Observations habitat, behaviour, appearance Reminders Authors Day! Friday, February 7th at 1:45pm. Please come celebrate your childs first published book. Save the dates February 28, 8:30am Grade one performance - March 13 & 14 Parent Teacher Conferences
Word Study

love loved

loving lovelier

lovely unloved

loveliest lover

unloving loves

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Parents you are wonderful! Thank you for playing such an active role in the commencement of our nonfiction study. Your involvement means children are able to choose a topic that interests them personally rather than rely only on what can be done at school. Please read carefully my emails about NOT taking notes at home. Please engage in conversation, observations and reading/ watching together. Kindly leave the note taking for school. And please dont be overwhelmed by the project I want each child to complete the project at their own level of development. If your child is able to record a dog has 4 legs, a tail and 2 ears that is just fine, if theyre ready to talk about migration patterns let them go for it. !
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At home you can talk about the material they are reading/ viewing and ask what they learned from it. In school we have been learning a method of taking notes called dash facts. The idea is that you divide your page into two columns. On one side you write a dash and a fact you have found, on the other side, you write an example or explain the fact. EG. Topic Dogs Dash Fact - 4 paws - 1 tail Section What Do Dogs Look Like? Example/ Explanation/ Detail - soft padding underneath - wag when happy - some cut tail for hygiene when young

Also note this week that the base word for spelling is love. So the word sum for loving is actually: love + ing. When you write out the word loving you would say, l-o-v-no ei-n-g. When you add a vowel suffix to a base word with a silent e, you drop the e and add the suffix. In partnership, Ms. Tindall
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Monday Reading: Become an expert on your chosen topic. Be creative in the sources you use: books, Internet, magazines, interview an expert, watch a documentary, careful observation etc. Please note we are not expecting children to take notes at home. Wed like children to come to school saying things such as, Heres what I know about what lions eat. They are carnivores. That means they eat meat. Some of the animals they catch are. They catch these animals by Math: Practice time to the quarter hour. Most children are still finding this very tricky. Be sure to differentiate the long and short hands.

Tuesday

Reading: Become an expert on your chosen topic. Read, watch, observe for a few minutes and then tell someone a fact you learned. *** Children do not need to take research notes at home. They will be doing that part at school. Conversations, interaction, reading together and talking about new learning with an adult are vital pieces. Stop every few minutes and share what has been learned. How does this add to what you already know? What does that mean? Can you draw any connections to another topic? What information is new to you? Have any of your ideas changed since reading this text/ making this observation/ interviewing this expert/ viewing this video? Is this like anything else you know? What information does this diagram, map, chart, table give you? How has the author organized the information? What is fact and what is opinion? Can you summarize what you have learned today? What are some key points you want to remember to record during writing time tomorrow?
Math: Grab piles of coins (and notes if extending). Practice organizing and counting amounts. Write the amounts you grab in cent notation (dollar and cent notation for extension). Wednesday Reading: Become an expert on your chosen topic. Math: Play games to practice addition facts such as Addition Top-It or any other games you might have at home that enhance speed and accuracy in this skill.

Thursday Reading: Become an expert on your chosen topic. Word Study: Tell someone the rule about no word in English ending in v and what you have to write instead. Find some other examples besides love. (EG have, give) Math: Play games to practice addition facts goal: increase speed and accuracy with single digit addition. Friday Reading Poem collection: Recite poems and sing songs from your poem collection. Return it to school on Monday.