Autumn Fun

Ready to decorate our classroom for fall!

A change in seasons always brings new themes and seasonal fun. We traced, cut, and decorated paper pumpkins to hang in our room this week, and next week we will learn about changing leaf colors and enjoy fall leaf activities and crafts.

Ta da!

Our own designs

Cutting carefully

Adding a face

Wait 'til you see it!

Fancy!

Smiling pumpkins

Place the tissue just right!

 As we continued to learn about materials that light can or cannot pass through, we had some very good fine motor practice making tissue paper pictures on peel and press sheets. We hung them in the stairwell windows for everyone to see, and when they saw the sun steaming through them and lighting them up, they were delighted!

I did it!

The window display!

Concentration!

The stairwell window destination!

Another fun science activity was going around the school in search of items that were either opaque, transparent, or translucent.

Translucent window

Transparent door window

Opaque lego wall

Opaque painted wall

Transparent fire extinguisher case

Translucent gel cling decorations

Opaque lockers

Transparent hand sanitizer bottle

 Writing activities this week have focused on personal narrative; writing about things that are important to us, writing about something we are an expert on, and making sure we are matching our illustration details to our words. We also wrote a 'Guess who I am' paper to put in the hallway.

Out in the hallway!

Busy writers

Writing about something important to us

 During phonics, we spelled an assortment of sight words by searching for friends who had letter cards to make our words. Once assembled, we sang the associated song to help us remember the spelling. 

w-a-n-t

l-i-k-e

v-e-r-y

l-i-t-t-l-e

 During our read-alouds, we contrasted fiction and non-fiction books about owls. We read some fascinating facts about all the varieties of owls and then used our prior knowledge when reading the fictional stories about owls.

Owl books!

The puzzle experts struck again, this time building an underwater puzzle. What great team work and puzzle building skill! 

On to the next puzzle!

Here are a couple of buddies enjoying a good book, and here is an exciting vampire teeth prize from the prize box:

Watch out!

Enjoying a good book

 We can hardly keep up with the loose teeth falling out. We sang our tooth song to Ben, Aidan, Maggie, and Hayden this week!
On the morning news we learned about fire safety, and Darby's dad was one of the fire fighters teaching us tips! We also celebrated and sang to Emerson this week, who had her birthday on Monday.

Of course the big news was our first laptop math test! I am so impressed and proud of their effort and stamina. (I would have taken a photo but I was too stressed!) Just learning to log on with passwords, enlarge the screen, scroll to see all answers, and navigate the test questions was a feat in itself. Then of course 20 math questions followed, but I am happy to say that their hard work paid off! We are now learning about number combinations using ten frame models. This topic is a short one, so they will have the laptop opportunity again soon, this time going at their own pace.

The other big news is that homework begins Monday. A homework snap type folder will go home with the packet and a book on Monday. They can work on the phonics, math, and book all week and return it by Friday. If they finish before that, they can also return everything early. Spelling tests will now be every Friday on the spelling words in the homework. We already practiced a bit on list 1, so the homework spelling begins with list 2.

Library is on Monday as well - remember to return your book.

Have a nice fall weekend,
Mrs. Dagley