Starfish Gazette- October 22, 2014

Hello Starfish Families,

We have been super busy in the starfish classroom.  Each day is filled to the brim with new learning, collaboration, and sharing.  Each day the children are developing stronger skills as readers, writers, mathematicians, and learning the importance of kindness in our classroom.


I wanted to take this time to share some of the exciting learning that is happening in the classroom.

• We have been working hard each day on sorting- We tried a writing sort in our word study journals and are hoping to try writing our words on white boards tomorrow 
• We have been learning about word strategies that readers can use when he or she comes to a word that is tricky. 
• We have been learning to add more details in our narrative stories.  
• We are learning to add on to certain parts of our stories.

• Finding different ways to 'unfreeze' our characters in our stories.  

1. Adding motion marks in our illustrations
2. Add speech bubbles in our illustrations of our characters
3. Adding dialogue in our writing to show readers when the character is speaking

• We are learning how to have a 'discussion'.  We have set discussion norms to set some ground rules when we come together to have discussions. Here are the norms:

1. We will not raise our hands during a discussion
2. We will be active listeners with our bodies and brains
3. We will allow one person to talk at a time
4. We will be generous listeners (if two people talk at once, you can let the other go first)
5. we will honor everyone's opinions and ideas

** I am part of a literacy and science committee with other teachers at SMS this year.   One of our focuses on the committee is creating discussions during literacy, math, and science to build student conversations with one another.  This has been one of my highlights of teaching this year.  It is amazing to watch these children have a discussion like young adults.  The kids are using sentence starters like I agree with __________. I disagree with ______________________. I hope to video one of our discussions so that I can share their collaborative work.  

• Finished our chapter book, My Father's Dragon.  With this chapter book, the children received reading in-response journals.  I have been explicitly teaching how to write in response to a story.  The kids are loving it! We just started the next chapter book in the series today.
•  Learned how to play new math games such as Ten Frame Top-It, Scoot, and High Roller
• Learning how to solve addition word problems step by step
• Learning the importance of labeling math problems.
• We drew maps of our classrooms to tie in with our field trip to the corn maze
• We made scarecrow art projects with water colors
• We have been working on becoming fluent 1st grade readers with reading lyrics of songs

Here are some pictures of our learning together:

Fluency Songs

 Playing Scoot

 Sharing our personal narrative stories with partners.  We are working on giving compliments and adding suggestions

 We made FLUBBER!  We had discussions about our thinking before we started, what we observed, and tomorrow we will write about what we are still left wondering!

 What is kindness? Why is it important?  We have been talking a lot about the importance of kindness at school and at home.  We have started a class kindness chain.  In order to gain a kindness chain, a starfish has to spy another starfish being kind.  Some examples include getting someone's lunchbox for them, helping a friend clean up materials without being asked, inviting a friend to play with them at recess, sharing materials, and so much more!  We are going to hang our kindness chain around the perimeter of our classroom.  Our goal is to make it all the way around by June! :)

Upcoming Parent Volunteers in the Starfish Classroom: 

Mrs. Battle- Mystery Reader on October 24th at 2:30

 Mrs. Lombardi- Reading Volunteer on October 27th at 10:30 

Mrs. Cooper- Afternoon Center Volunteer on October 28th at 1:30 

Mrs. Murphy- Reading Volunteer on October 30th at 10:30

The first grade has a fall festival on October 31st.  Our class will be rotating centers in the lobster, seal, and starfish classrooms.  I am looking for 2 parents who would like to come in to help in the morning on October 31.  Please email me if you are interested!

Thank you to Mr. Cooper for coming to be our first parent mystery reader.  We had so much fun with you! 

I am looking forward to meeting with all the starfish parents the week of October 27th and November 3rd.  Thank you to everyone who completed the parent survey for conferences.  Your feedback is very important to me and helps me plan our time accordingly.

Here are some questions to promote home-school conversations:

1. Can you tell me about My Father's Dragon.  What were some of the animals that you met in the story?

2. What is your story that are writing during writer's workshop?

3. Can you tell me about Lips the Fish or Stretchy the Snake?  How do they help you with your reading?

4. Can you tell me how you made flubber with your class?

5. What art project are you working on in art class?

6. What does circle spots mean?  Who do you sit next to in your circle spot?

7. How do you play who's the boss?

8. Can you explain what a label is?  How do you use labels in math?

9. What was your favorite part of the field trip?

10. What is your class job this week?

Have a great week! If you have any questions or concerns, please remember you can email me at mrochford@sau16.org anytime.  I am looking forward to meeting with you to discuss the progress of your child in the next few weeks! 

Megan Rochford