Short but Productive Week

Although we only had three days of school last week, we sure were busy and got a lot done!  Some highlights of this week included:

• Going to the computer lab to learn how to log in to RAZ kids.  The students enjoyed reading their books on the computer and earning star points.

• Learning a new word game called "Word Race".  The children reviewed word wall words during this game where they rolled dice and wrote the words in a graph.  It was a race to see which word made it to the top first!

• Hearing Poppleton stories during our classroom read aloud.  The kids have enjoyed the various Poppleton stories each day.  Some of them may even bring a Poppleton book home to read with you next week from the library. 

• Finishing up Unit 2 in Math.  We tested our 2nd unit in Math and that test came home with your child last week.  If there were any corrections to be made on the test, please have your child make those corrections at home.  

• We enjoy singing our math songs each day during our calendar routine at the smartboard.  We sing songs that help us practice skip counting by 2's, 5's, and 10's.  We also sing songs about adding doubles, making sums of 10, and counting money.  Ask your child to share these songs with you.  They sure have fun singing them in school, especially when I bring out our microphone!  

I really enjoyed meeting with all of you during parent/teacher conferences last week.  I truly enjoy sharing all of the wonderful things your child is doing and how well they are progressing in school.  Thank you for being such an intregal part of their learning.  I appreciate your support at home.

Mrs. Halon

Off And Running!

We’re off and running in first grade!  Now this blog is off and running as well!  I’m excited to begin sharing all the awesome things we are doing in first grade and show you how we are “growing!”  We spent a good portion of the beginning of the year learning our routines and rules of the classroom.  The students are now settled in to those daily routines and working hard. 

Our guided reading groups have been up and running for several weeks now.  I meet with small groups of readers and read with them at their instructional level, and work on many different elements to guide them in their reading instruction.  While I’m reading with those groups, the other children in the classroom are very busy working on meaningful activities such as:

-reading take home books and working on the phonics skill of the week with an instructional aide. 

-participating with Mrs. Markestad (ELL teacher) on an extension activity from a story they have already read during guided reading that week.

-working independently on a “words” activity to practice their word wall words or word family words of the week.

- reading to self with “just right” books they can read independently. 

I’m so proud of how well the kids work during this literacy time each day!   

Read to Self is a time when the children really enjoy sprawling out any place in the room to enjoy reading their "just right" books.





Students have been working on "tracking" the print with their fingers as they read.  This helps our little readers keep their eyes on the print, tracking it left to right and word for word.

During one center activity, students are "word detectives" and they search for vocabulary in their paper take-home books.  They enjoy this activity.  I encourage you to try this at home with an old magazine or newspaper.  See how many familiar words your child can find!


I'm looking forward to meeting with all of you and talking about your child and their progress during conferences this week.  

Mrs. Halon