Weekly Update

Hi Everyone; Happy Friday!

I hope you're excited for the weekend!  Jonah and I have our Puppy Bowl snacks ready to go, and we are excited to watch all the action.  Just a quick update for you this week...

First Grade Music Program:
Please click HERE for a note from our music teachers about the First Grade Music Program. Planning has begun for this fun program, which will be held in May.  Thank you! 

100th Day of School:
The 100th day of school is coming!  Weather permitting, we will mark this special day on Wednesday, February 12th.  (If we have more snow days between now and February 12th, we will adjust the date so it aligns with our 100th day.). The 1st grade teachers and I have been busy planning for this fun day!  As part of our fun, the students are invited to dress like a 100-year old boy or girl, or make and decorate a t-shirt with 100 items for our 100th day celebration.  There's more information to come about our 100th day, but I'm passing this along so you and your child can start thinking about these optional, at-home projects, and whether you'd like to complete them.  

Valentine's Day Party:

Mark your calendar...our classroom Valentine's Day party will be Friday, February 14th from 11:45-1:15 in our classroom.  All families are welcome to attend. The kids will exchange Valentine cards at the party, and I sent home a class roster last week for those of you wanting to get a start on those. The card exchange is completely voluntary, although historically, the majority of the class participates.  If your child brings Valentine cards, please be sure he/she has one for every student in the class. If your child wants to attach a little "something" to his/her Valentine cards, please don't attach candy or food... little items like pencils, erasers, tattoos, stickers are fine. Please watch for more details regarding the party soon!

Focus Areas for the Coming Week:

• Reading:  We will continue our non fiction unit.  We will practice becoming super smart about nonfiction topics by chatting about pages, reading across words, and noticing text features.
• Writing:  We will continue our All About Books unit, in which we teach our readers about a selected topic.  We are including nonfiction text features, such as sections with headings, diagrams, different kinds pages, captions, glossaries, and tables of contents.
• Math:  We will continue our addition unit.  We will learn strategies for solving addition facts, and we will learn that addition is a process of 2 parts coming together to make a whole, so:   Part + Part = Whole
• Science:  We will begin our Force and Motion unit.  We will talk about pushes and pulls, paths of motion (forward, backward, and sideways), and sound and vibration.

Please let me know if you have any questions about anything I've written here. Have a fun weekend!  Enjoy the game!