Thank you Veterans!

Ready to cheer for our Veterans!

It was very exciting to meet the service men and women who paraded down our hallway on Thursday. The halls were lined with all the students who cheered, waved flags, and sang along to patriotic songs as the veterans walked by. We also heard a few answer interview questions on the morning news. The text we read, Veterans: Heroes In Our Neighborhood, had beautiful illustrations depicting a current neighborhood job of each veteran in the story, contrasted with an illustration of what they once did when in the navy, air force, army, or marines. 

Despite another short week, we were busy writers in Writer's Workshop this week. One day we each chose a 'gold star habit' to focus on while writing. Some chose using lower case letters, using the lines to place the letters correctly, remembering capitals or periods, or being aware and changing reversals as their goal while writing. Another day, we wrote about favorite activities in autumn and decorated the tree at the top of the page with fall colored tissue paper. We were also inspired to write a sleepover invitation after reading Porcupinie's Pajama Party. Our writing collection is growing!

A fun chapter book read- aloud!

Writing about favorite fall activities

Gluing on the tissue paper

We are proud of our writing

 

My light is up on the ceiling!

In learning about how light travels, we brought out mini mirrors and flashlights. Turning the lights off in the classroom added to the fun as each partnered group experimented with what happened to the light when it was shining on the mirror. The kids noticed that light bounced off, or reflected when they aimed the light at the mirror only to see the light reflect on the ceiling! They also held up word and number cards in front of the mirrors and saw that the images were reversed.

The light on my mirror has reflected to my face!

We introduced two book series this week that brought plenty of laughs and that we completed reading response papers for. One was Scaredy Squirrel and the other was Duck At The Door. There are several more books in both series that we look forward to reading!

Welcome, Max!

Squirrel is always prepared for anything, or is he?!

What math strategy shall we use? That is a question each child is deciding now that we have been introduced to so many methods of solving addition and subtraction problems. We are using mini posters of each strategy and volunteers are each choosing one they feel comfortable with to solve the same problem. Will they...draw circles for each number, circle the highest number and count on, use a part/part/whole model, a ten frame, a number line, a doubles plus 1 strategy, or will they make a ten to solve problems whose sum is greater than ten? Here are some of our volunteers showing each strategy.

Choosing a strategy

This Wednesday we return to the library. Many children have returned their books to the class already, but if yours is still at home, send it in any time between Monday and Wednesday. 

Thanks for the shoe boxes that are coming in for our Thanksgiving diorama. I'm heading up to the attic to get some I've saved as well. 

Looks like a chilly, frosty day, but at least it is sunny. Enjoy!
Mrs. Dagley