Imagine you are a letter going into the mail. Where would you want to go?
Who might be getting you? What message might be inside?
(Check the comments for ideas from the BUGS!)
Wednesday, January 28, 2015
Monday, January 26, 2015
Dear Parents:
Today I am sending home our first “minute read”. I will be sending these home every Monday for
the remainder of the school year to help increase fluency, sight word
recognition and decoding skills. Please help your student to complete their
minute read activities every day (it only takes a minute! J )
Monday: Have
your student start at the top of the story and read as far as they are able in
one minute. As your child reads, mark
any words your student read incorrectly on the recording page. At the end of one minute, draw a line where
your student stopped (you might want to put a small “M” above the line so you
know that was for Monday). At the bottom of the page, note how many words your
child read correctly in that one minute for Monday.
Tuesday -
Friday: Repeat the process
exactly as you did for Monday. You
should see your student getting a little further each day and getting more
words correctly.
Repeated readings really helps to solidify sight words and
newly decoded words into our brains for future readings.
At the
end of the week, celebrate the progress with your student!! Note any words s/he is still struggling with
for continued practice.
EXTRA
ACTIVITIES:
1. If there are new words in the story that your child does
not know, look them up, learn what they mean and then record them on a “word
list” or index card and build up a vocabulary bank of new words learned!
2. Ask questions about what your child read each day! Talk about any words they read incorrectly
(did it change the meaning of the sentence?) and discuss the facts in the
story.
Return
the recording page on Monday to Mrs. Koehn
(keep the story page for future reading practice!)
(keep the story page for future reading practice!)
Reading - Stop and ask questions. As you read with your child (which is hopefully every day!) stop every now and then and ask questions. You don't have to wait until the end of the book to ask comprehension questions and your questions can be of the "I wonder why..." variety to promote critical thinking. For instance, if you are reading a fiction text (Charlotte's Web for example), stop every now and then to wonder about something that has happened or that a character has said. If you are reading a nonfiction text with your child (a book about sharks, for example), stop and say, "I wonder what that shark eats? Or maybe, "I wonder what the biggest shark in the world is!" Get your child to wonder and ask questions as they read. Then see if your questions are answered by the author. Sometimes the answer is not explicitly stated, it is only implied. Figuring out that the answer exists but is not directly stated is an advanced reading skill that really boosts comprehension!!
Math - Looking ahead in math, it won't be long at all and we will be working on telling time and counting money. One skill that makes these two concepts so much easier for students is if they can already skip count by fives and tens. While skip counting is taught and practiced in first grade, there are still many children who come into second grade having difficulty with this task. If your child is unable to skip count quickly (forward and backwards, starting from any number), please spend the time in the car, waiting in line or at the dinner table practicing counting by fives and tens. It will really help your child!
Math - Looking ahead in math, it won't be long at all and we will be working on telling time and counting money. One skill that makes these two concepts so much easier for students is if they can already skip count by fives and tens. While skip counting is taught and practiced in first grade, there are still many children who come into second grade having difficulty with this task. If your child is unable to skip count quickly (forward and backwards, starting from any number), please spend the time in the car, waiting in line or at the dinner table practicing counting by fives and tens. It will really help your child!
Friday, January 23, 2015
Once upon a time, there was a kingdom of BUGS who wanted to celebrate all their learning about fairy tales. They sent out an invitation to all the land to come to a royal party. There was dancing, theater performers, singing and cake!
.jpg)
Many of us dressed up in fairy tale costumes.
We made crowns for the royal occasion!
The Brementown Rappers were awesome with their great character voices!
Slurping Beauty found her perfect Prince Alarming afterall!
Little Late Riding Hood might be tardy, but she's very kind to her grandmother!
Cheetah and the Sloth taught us that "slow and steady wins the race!"
Ms. Miller taught us a song about a sleeping princess.
Ms. Jane taught us how to do the waltz!
We even got some moms to join in on the dancing!
.jpg)
Of course, to live happily ever after, there MUST be cake!!
Thank you to all our guests who came to support our learning! We have had so much fun learning about literacy through fairy tales! We have become better readers and authors and we have really expanded our learning about the elements of a story!
Wednesday, January 21, 2015
Friday, January 16, 2015
.jpg)
Wednesday, January 14, 2015
Tuesday, January 13, 2015
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)