Two Hour Delay

We had a very busy day, because we had a two hour delay in the morning. We were excited to FINALLY have a little snow. Our word of the day today was "day". It was a rule follower, and we read the word family on the "hay of -ay". This word is a noun. In language arts today, we read the story, Wake Up Groundhog. It was about a girl groundhog named Phyllis. After the story, we met with a partner and brainstormed character traits to describe the groundhog. A character trait is how a character looks, acts, and feels. We wrote down three character traits for each category to describe Phyllis. Mrs. Myers checked our papers and found out that we were really confusing "looks" with "feels" and "acts". Later in the day, we tried this activity again. Check the back of my paper to see the difference. We can explain it to you now! We had centertime, where we visited our second groundhog center. We also had math. We read the story, Go To Sleep, Groundhog. It was about a groundhog that had trouble sleeping. We watched how time changes in the story. (by months). We also brainstormed a list of other ways time changes. (seconds, minutes, hours, days, months, years, centuries, seasons). At the end of the story, we put the months in order and did a math worksheet about months and seasons. After recess, we had a guidance lesson about telling and tattling. Ask me all about it! At the end of the day, we worked on our groundhog newspaper articles. What a day! We hope school is open tomorrow! Check my mail tonight for the 100th Day of School news!

Groundhog Week

Our theme this week is groundhogs. Today we were trying out a new daily schedule. Our day began the same. Our word of the day today as "did". It was a rule follower, because it was a CVC word. The word family today was -id. It was popular! We can use the word in the contraction "didn't". After recess, we had reading workshop and guided reading. Also during his time in our schedule, we will have game time with our group. Today after reading workshop, we played dice word game. We rolled a die and had to find a word in the room with that many letters. We recorded on our game sheet. We will keep playing until we get a winner. After lunch and recess, we had language arts. We read the story, Substitute Groundhog. Then, we worked on retelling the story using pictures. We worked in groups with Mrs. Lauber's students. Each group had a picture from the story. We wrote about that story event on a sentence strip. Then, we put ourselves in order from the beginning of the story to the end. Last, we read our sentences strips in order to retell the story as a group. Then it was centertime. We had four new groundhog centers. In the games center, we are sorting word wall words into "rule breaker" and "rule follower". In the sentence strips center, we are sorting words with consonant blends into the group they belong (blends with "s", blends with "t", etc..) In the writing center, we wrote a letter to a groundhog of choice. We also learned to address an envelop. The last center was the poetry center. We practiced reading a groundhog poem. We each had a turn to be the leader. Then, we found nouns and verbs in the poem and listed them on our sheet. At writing workshop time, we read the story, Geoffrey Groundhog Predicts the Weather. We learned how to write a newspaper article using the "W" questions - when, who, where, what, why, how. Tomorrow, we will finish our stories and add an illustration. At math today, we worked on subtraction groundhog story problems. At the end of the day, we had art!

Fact Day

Our word of the day today was "long". It was mostly a rule follower, but it depends on how you say it. We learned that we need to remember the "ong" chunk for many words. It was a popular word family, but for some strange words. In math today, we practiced fact families again. We used our fact family "house" mats. Mrs. Myers gave us three numbers and we independently made a fact family on our mat. We are doing really well and tomorrow with work with a partner and play some fact family games. After lunch and recess, we used our Martin Luther King fact posters from yesterday to make a timeline on the front carpet. We ordered our facts using the date at the top of our fact. Then, Mrs. Myers read the timeline of facts to us. After that, we went into the hallway and used the BookFlix program from Martin Library on the Smartboard. We listened to the fiction story, Martin's Big Words and the nonfiction story, Martin Luther King. We used the Smartboard to practice new vocabulary words and played two games using facts and vocabulary from the story. Then it was reading workshop time. After that, we had writing workshop. We wrote an acrostic (name) poem about Dr. King. Please look in my mail today. I will share it with you. It was full of facts and opinions about Dr. King. On the back, we wrote a new fact we learned today. At the end of the day, we watched a movie about MLK. We will use the facts we learned today to complete a fact and opinion chart tomorrow morning!

Martin Luther King

Our word of the day today was "find". It was a rule breaker, because there was no "magic letter" to make the "i" say his name. The word "fined" was a verb with a ending. It is a homonyn. It was not a popular word family. In math today, we learned something new. It was called a fact family. We learned that a math fact is a true equation. A fact family uses three numbers. Using those numbers, we write two addition sentences and two subtraction sentences. After we wrote our fact family on the mat, we became "house inspectors" to see if we had the all of the parts of the family. After lunch and recess, we heard the story, My Brother Martin. It was written by Martin Luther King's sister. We listened to the story of MLK as a boy and made connections to own lives on a venn diagram. After that, we had reading workshop time. Then, we played two games. First, we played "hearts" to practice spelling word wall words by heart. Next, we played the "word exercise" game to practice reading and spelling words. In writing workshop today, we used the computers to type a date and a fact about Martin Luther King from history. Then we drew an illustration. Tomorrow, we are going to sort the facts into a timeline of MLK's life. At the end of the day we had phys. ed. I was a very busy day!

Inauguration Day!

It was an exciting day today in our classroom. We were all excited for our new president to be sworn in! Our theme this week is the inauguration and Martin Luther King, Jr. We learned today that the two themes are very connected. Our word of the day today was "now". It was a rule follower. We practiced the difference between "ow" in cow and "ow" in snow. During our lunch recess, we watched the inauguration. We saw Joe Biden be sworn in as our vice president. Then, after recess was over, we all watched Barack Obama be sworn in as president. We also listened to his first speech as president. We were amazed at the huge crowd of people in Washington DC. Mrs. Craig even watched from our room. After the speech, Mrs. Myers read us a story with photos from other inaugurations. We learned that there are many parts to the inauguration. Ask me what things Obama did today for his inaugural events. After this, Mrs. Myers read us a story about Barack Obama. We learned lots of new facts. We recorded the facts on a sentence strip with a partner and shared them at the end of the lesson. Ask me to share three facts with you tonight. Then, we had reading workshop, but today we read with a partner from the Barack Obama and Martin Luther King books. Later, we had a spelling test. Finally, it was time for writing workshop. We were very excited to meet the Obama family. Mrs. Myers showed us pictures of his wife and daughters. Then, we wrote a letter to Sasha, Malia, Mrs. Obama, or President Obama. Mrs. Myers is really going to mail them to him. We were very curious about what it would be like to have a dad as the president, live in the White House, or get to go to the inaugural balls with the Jonas Brothers or Miley Cyrus. We hope to get a letter back from them soon. After the last recess, we read the story, Happy Birthday, Martin. On the easel, we compared Dr. Martin Luther King to Barack Obama. They were the same in many ways. Ask me how they were the same and different. It was a really busy day!

A Blizzard of a Day

Today seemed like a blizzard! We were so busy ending our marking period. Our word of the day today was "oil". It was a rule follower. We learned the new sound "oi", which was a vowel dipthong. We learned that the sound "oy" also says this same sound. We had music and lunch later in the morning. After lunch, we had a Smartboard lesson. Mrs. Myers showed us the Book Flix site on the York County Library's website. We listened to the story A Snowy Day. Then, we read the story, Snowy Weather Days. It was a nonfiction story with new vocabulary words. Then, we played two games that matched the stories. We can visit this site, if we have a library card. It has lots of great books. Then, we had math. Mrs. Myers gave us some of the math district assessments. Then, it was time for writing workshop. Today, we worked with a partner in Mrs. Lauber's class on the laptop computers. We showed them how to use the drawing tools to make a winter scene. Then, we wrote a simile sentence about our picture. Some of us did not finish our simile, so we are going to finish it for homework. At the end of the day, we finished our fourth center. We also finished our art center. We even had sharing! We are excited to see what happens on the big football game on Sunday! Mrs. Myers and three friends say, "GO RAVENS!" Six of us say, "GO STEELERS!" Four of us say, "GO EAGLES!" have a great, long weekend!

Winter Connections

Our word of the day today was "who". It was a rule breaker, because we can't hear the "w". Also the "o" says the sound of "oo". This word is a question word sometimes. In math today, we practiced place value. We played game to practice place value with a partner. It was called, I have... Who has... After the game, we did a math worksheet to practiced writing and drawing tens and ones. After lunch and recess, we read a story called, When will it Snow? It was a good story for making connections. We made BIG connections to Martin's feelings in the story. We made a chart on the easel of the feelings and then picked one to explain on our worksheet. We had a short reading workshop. Then, we stopped to practice writing to 100. Mrs. Myers met with some of us to count by 2's, 5's, and 10's. Then, it was centertime. At the art center, we could add the arms. Tomorrow is our last day of centers. In writing workshop today, we talked about the writing "plan" we should use every time we write a story. We tried it out in our journal writing. Everyone is finally finished with their "Gingerbread Adventures". Look for them to be posted in the future as a podcast! We ended the day with art!