Dear Parents,

            I am looking forward to seeing the great memory posters that the students put together for their writing.  The 1^st grade has already shown so much growth in their ability to follow direction and in their enthusiasm for learning.  I am excited to see what sort of ideas they will be coming up with to write about.  In addition to having their own memory poster for brainstorming purposes I will be giving them other writing tools like a sound chart, traveling word wall, and a my favorite words book. 

            At the beginning of this year when I gave the 1^st graders a writing assessment to see what they were capable of, many of the students let me know that they could not write.  This idea of not being able to write is something we need to make sure to shake out of them.  :)  At home you can help by encouraging your child to write about something you did recently that he or she enjoyed.  Even drawing a picture about it and then telling you about what he or she drew is being an author and he or she need to know that.  By building his or her confidence up, the transition into real writing becomes more natural and your child will be much more excited about it. I often tell them when they don’t want to spell something out, “Just write down the sounds that you hear and I bet I can read it.”  They usually get excited when I can.  Or you can have them read it with you.  J 

            To add on to the writing, this week I will be sending home the spelling sentences for the week that they will be tested on Friday.  Please read the explanation about why I choose to use sentences instead of just having them spell the words.  Also, we don’t want to have the 1^st graders memorize the words we want them to be able to recognize the patterns in the words and be able to spell the words out.  For example, the word families or patterns for this week are –at, -an, -ad.  So you can also have your child practice spelling hat, dad, or pan etc. We want them to be able to sound out words, so the more words you expose them to the more practice they get using their phonetic skills. If you have any questions please blog or email.  J 

            Have a wonderful week!   

                                                                                                            Sincerely,

                                                                                                                        Ms. Andrade

Technology and Writing Collages

Dear Parents,

The first grade had a great week last week celebrating their good behavior with the pajama day on Wednesday.  They also proved how responsible they are when the class used the whiteboards during math for the very first time on Tuesday.  They all followed directions very well and had lots of fun making up math problems to write on them. 

 This week we have some exciting news in that the school has now purchased enough laptops so that the 1^st grade will be able to have a cart of laptops in our room all day on Monday and Wednesday.  I am really excited about this as I just attended an informational session on technology and will be using many resources from discover education online.  I will be integrating the use of the laptops as often as I can to make learning that much more fun for the first graders.  Discovery Education has a brand new science website that offers all sorts of videos and virtual labs for children to explore.  You will also be able to access what your child is doing by logging into the website with the log in that I give your child. I have already created accounts for them, but it takes some time for the students to be put into the system. 

 The website is http://science.discoveryeducation.com.  Also, there are some great catholic resources on prayers and mass and the sacraments online at www.ctnba.org.  If it stops you from viewing anything you can log in by using the username “superkids” and the password “1^st grade”.  (It is closely connected to discovery education but for discovery education you need a different password. )

 Finally, I will be sending home a piece of white construction paper for writing homework this week.  It will be due no later than Monday, October 13^th. If you finish earlier you may have your child bring it in at any time.    I would like you to help your child make a collage of any important events that have happened in their lives in the last year.  Also, pictures of important people in their lives are important to include as well.  You can use photos of your own or cut out photos from other sources like the newspaper, magazines, or pictures off the internet.  (For example if I were to work on my own I would put pictures of my family, pictures of Spain from my trip, pictures from snowboarding trips.  I might but the USF logo to show I have gone to school there.  Anything that might spark your child to think of a specific story in their lives.)   We will be using this poster as an aid in writing class.  It will give your child something visual to look at while they brainstorm a topic to write about.  In 1^st grade the most valuable writing topics to use are the ones from their own experiences.  We will be using this collage all year long.  Feel free to use both the front and the back of the paper. I will be laminating them so that they will last the whole year.  Good luck and have fun!  J 

 Have a wonderful week!  Don’t forget we have half day on Wednesday and no school on Friday! 

Sincerely, 

Ms. Andrade