Ms. Kaley's Classroom Room 24

Hello!

Our first full week of school days went off to a great start!  This week the students were introduced to their planners, their Scholastic Daily Starter warm ups, and Spiral Math.

Click on this link to see our classroom’s planner: Work Planner 2.0 This year I added little images to help students quickly see the subject area.  This icons will be helpful reminders where to record their work.  The first graders are doing really well with the planner and it will take them a few weeks to get the hang of it.  2nd and 3rd graders are taking to it like ducks to water.  They are old pros and are doing excellent planning themselves when they plan to do their follow up works.

Reminder: if your child isn’t completing their follow up works that are due or part of their lesson I will send a kind reminder email for them to complete their work at home.

Work expectations during normalization: From the first day of school until October 1st is our period of time we call in Montessori “Normalization.”  This is a very important adjustment period for students to learn the classroom expectations.  As the weeks go on during normalization I look at the progress and adjust students work capabilities and also move them to any groups I think they need to be in.  All the groups I have cover most of the same content, but it is just the level of difficulty that is adjusted.  Some times the child is in the right group, but the work needs to be adjusted individually.  Ms. Misha and I always look to see what your child needs.

After normalization ends then I will look at putting together reading helpers.

Field Trip September 21st.: The permission slips are made, we are still waiting to see about transportation.  I have 2 chaperones who emailed me and I can take 2 more chaperone helpers (please email me if you can).  Show is at 12:30pm and should go until around 2:00.

Lessons from this past week:  There are so many lessons I give throughout the week that I cannot mention all of them. however, the schedule that I posted last week and the hard copy I handed out during Sneak a Peak went off to a great start!  I was able to try out our new lesson schedule and all the lessons on that plan were given.  I wasn’t able to complete all the UURC reading tests for the new students, so I am going to work on that this coming week.  Math U See math testing for the beginning of the year began also this week.  All 3 levels were given the 100s chart to see if the basics can be shown.  If your child wrote a number backwards then technically it is marked wrong, but a note is made that they “know” the number and need a numbers handwriting lesson.  I also made notes if your child had to use any of the concrete materials we have in our class to help them complete it.  This week, I will be giving the next tests called the Alpha and Beta tests.  Every level will be given the Alpha first.  It is a test that looks at basic  adding and subtracting using 1 digit numbers (the units).  If your child gets a passing grade on the Alpha and might be able to complete the Beta test, that test has a few parts to it: rounding, multi-digit adding and subtracting, time, and word problems.  Your child will have all of this upcoming week to complete it.

We began working on first writing prompt to see where the kids are.  Our first 12 weeks will be all about writing Narratives.  Each week I will give the class a whole group lesson and then they continue to work on their skills during their writing group and by themselves.

We did History and Zoology lessons this week.

History #1: Big Bang lesson, Story of Time

History #2: Big Bang lesson, Roman Numerals lesson from 1-10

History #3: Big Bang lesson, Clock of Eras

Zoology #1: Living and Non-living

Zoology #2: 5 classes of vertebrates review

Zoology #3: 5 classes of vertebrates review and intro to invertebrates chart

Whole class science Fridays– Intro to Scientific Method and 5 senses walk outside.  Recorded then shared what we saw, heard, tasted, smelled, and felt.

Next week, the students will be introduced to their next daily expectation work called Word Work.  It is a work that each student has in their binder and walks them through daily activities with word exercises.  The next expectation after that will be Text Time.  Another work that will be in their binder. They will be reading passages to work on for the week and answer reading and comprehension skills.  By the week of September 17th, my hope is to have all 3 expectations going simultaneously.

Have a great long weekend!  Happy Labor Day and upcoming week!

Ms. Kaley and Ms. Misha