Dec. 21st

Winter Break! Happy Holidays to all of you! Ms. Swchartz, Ms. Ooton, and I are so thankful for all the wonderful gifts we received. It was so thoughtful and we feel so lucky to have such wonderful families!
These past few weeks have been busy. I was gone two days the previous week. One for a training and another day to visit some local tutoring organizations. I am on the board of a great non-profit organization called North West Children's Fund, that supports over 30 organizations around Seattle for at-risk children and their families that help try to end the cycle of child abuse and neglect and are devoted to improving child welfare.

Gingerbread Boy This week we devoted our afternoons to a gingerbread unit. We read four different gingerbread books, made our own gingerbread characters, made our own ginger bread recipe, and our own how to books. Finally, we wrote our own endings and decorated our cookies to enjoy! It was a fun filled week.

Music

We ended the week with a wonderful music concert. The Students did a fabulous job with both performances and were so proud to be up on stage. Thank you to all the families who were able to come and see the kids perform!!!

Africa Continent Study

Last week we saw an amazing presentation by Lucy’s mom! She showed us pictures from a trip she took to Uganda where she participated in a Ugandan wedding ceremony! It was so great to see photographs of a traditional wedding ceremony! We learned about the culture of a Ugandan wedding ceremony and noticed similarities and differences between a traditional wedding that we might see in the U.S. in comparison with the one we learned about this week! Please ask your student about this! We also had Lena’s mom come in and share with us her experience in Kenya. She taught the students how to greet one another in Swahili and then had students practice the new words they learned by singing a song. Ask your child to sing with you: “Jambo. Jambo rafiki. Habari Gani? Mzuri Sana!”

This week we wrapped up our African Continent Study with an African Market celebration! We had rice balls and lentils made by Ruby and Nathan’s parents, from room 206, and the parents of Kaz, Henry, and Charlie made rice ball and brought in Ingera bread. We also had plantains and shredded chicken, bread and olive oil with spices. We lit our kinara candles for Kwanzaa and celebrated the last principle which is unity or umoja!

Writers Workshop: This week in writing we finished our All About Books!! We added the dedication page, cover page, glossary page, and favorite things page, and the all about the author page. We had a writers celebration and Ms. Claytor and Mr. Case, Mr. Glenn and Ms. Tedi, Ms. Stout and Ms. Lee all came to read our writing! It was a wonderful celebration and our students are proud of the work that they accomplished!

Star Student

Nina has been working so hard the week before. She finished her language work plan and her weekly work plan. She has pushed herself as a learner in readers and has moved up several reading levels. She has become a writing machine! She also stepped up this week and invited a kindergartner to sit with her at lunch and be a recess buddy for him. She invited him to play and show her all the things she does at recess. I know that really filled that kindergartners bucket! Way to Go Nina!!!!!

Lucy will be the star student when we get back. Lucy really pushed herself as a writer, working on her all about book. She was so focused and driven and wrote a ton about SHRIMP!!!! She also finished her pink language work plan, which she worked on almost everyday. Lucy always comes to school with an excitement to learn. She has been a kind friend to everyone in class and a great role model for everyone. WaY to go LUCY!!!!!!!

Enjoy the rest of you break!! I am currently enjoying half of it in sunny Tucson, where I just visited Biosphere 2. Next week I will be headed to snowy cold Idaho! Hope your spending time with your family, friends, and creating your own adventures. See you in January.

Welcome back!

Worktime

The students came back ready from break and focused. This week for work time students have learned more practical life works that focus on multi-step directions, fine motor skills, and concentration. Many more kindergartners have received language work plans and moved up to a new language work plan. The kindergartners have been learning about place value through golden beads and a work called birds-eye-view. It has been wonderful to come back and see all the growth that is happening!!!
Africa

This week for Africa students have learned more about Kwanza traditions, the candles (kanara), and weaving a Kwanza mat. The students have also learned about different geographic locations and important mountains, landforms, and rivers in Africa. On Dec. 20th we will have our final African celebration during the morning. If you have anything to share or bring in please let us know!!!





Readers Workshop In readers this week we have introduced a little bit about non-fiction. We compared the differences between fiction and non-fiction books. We also looked at the cover page to get ourselves ready for the book. We focused on thinking about what is this book going to teach us and then reflecting what did we learn. We talked with a reading buddy, " What is the main idea, and how do you know? We will continue non-fiction through January delving deeper into features and information non-fictions offers.

Writers Workshop: This week in writing, we have been continuing our great work on our all about books. We focused this week on doing a quick sketch and then trying to add words. We have also zoned in on trying to stretch our topic over multiple pages, making sure each page has a clear focus. We then learned about headings (tells us what each page is about) and how we can add headings to our own writing. Our next goals will be to continue to learning about how to add diagrams, captions, table of contents, and editing.

Student of the Week: Mateo has been working very hard this week. He finished his work plan and really pushed himself to do some challenging math. He was motivated and driven this week to keep up with his work. Mateo has set great goals for himself and is trying to meet those goals. He always comes to school with a Can do attitude !! He has been a great 1st great leader and role model. WAY TO GO Mateo!!!

Novemeber 15th

THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My post is a little later this week, but it is because I have been able to have a chance to meet with almost all of you for conferences. Thank you so much for taking the time to come to talk about all the wonderful things your child is doing at school. I love getting to share with families all the growth your child has made in only a few months. Thank you again to all the families for coming to meet with Ms. Ooton and I.

I also wanted to say a big Thank you to all the kids, and help of Dakota's Mom Sauntia, for surprising me on Friday with birthday balloons and wishes. The students each gave me a wish and a candle to blow out. It was such a warm filled last day before break and very thoughtful of everyone, THANK YOU!!!!

Native American Assembly/Chief Leschi

On Thursday we got the treat of joining the rest of the school at a Native American storytelling assembly. Students got the chance to take an active role in voicing different characters and doing actions that made the stories come alive! We also learned about a important Native American that our school and community are named after, Chief Leschi. We learned how he stood up for his peoples rights, and we painted a portrait of him with spices! See these great paintings displayed in the hall.

Continent Study: Africa! Many of our new works over the past couple of weeks have been focused on the continent of Africa. Student have been learning to Africa’s different climate zones, research and give presentations on different animals that live on the continent and most recently, begun a study of Kwanza.

Readers Workshop

In readers this week we learned some new sight words: that, his, are, and for. The students did fun activities to practice saying these sight words such act like you are tossing glitter as you say each letter in the word. The students did a great job looking for these sight words in their stories. Keep practicing all the sight words we have learned over break! A, and, at, are, for, he, his, I , it, in is, of , on the, that, to, was, you.

Writers Workshop:

This week in writing, we started on our first page of our all about unit. We learned about zooming in on important parts of our topic and how to draw a close up. We also learned about fancy words that help our readers understand our writing and did our best to spell those fancy words. Next week, we will be adding more pages to our all about book! Ask your student about their topic to help them get ready to write more about it next week!

Science We wrapped our science a few weeks ago but I wanted to share some great pictures of the students learning about snails and worms. The students loved this unit and being able to have a hands experience learning about animals. Our next science unit will be wood!

Student of the Week:

William has been working very hard at writers workshop and his all about book! He challenges himself at work time by working on his sandpaper letter, math works, sensorial, and practical life. He is respectful to others in our class, shows responsibility with his learning and our classroom environment, and is peaceful to others.

Nov. 11th

Continent Study: Africa! The students have really enjoyed learning about Africa. This is week for Africa we have learned about different flags from numerous countries such as South Africa, Senegal, Kenya, Morocco, and Ghana. The first graders also had a project to research a African animal. The presented their animal research to the class on Friday. Please ask your child what animals they learned about. Please let me know if have any artifacts or would like to come in an share any connections you might have to Africa.

Special Guest

This week Katie Busby came in to talk to our class about a very health food, persimmon. She talked about the benefits to eating persimmon, such as a great source nutrients like antioxidant Vitamin A, Vitamin C, and FIber. She brought some for all the kids to taste and then we voted on whether we liked it, just thought it was okay, or didn't like it. The results were 19 students enjoyed the taste!! Thanks again to Katie for getting us to try something new and healthy. Ask your child what they thought.

Readers Workshop In reader’s we have talked a lot strategies to figure out those tricky words. We talked about taking a look at the cover, thinking what words we might come across in the story. We also talked about using a picture walk and the context of the story to take our best guess. We learned to STOP, and CHECK for UNDERSTANDING. This helps us to make sure those guess we make, make sense with what we are reading about. Practice this with your child’s reading at home.
Writers Workshop:

This week in writing, we started our non-fiction units. The students had a chance to brainstorm all the things they are experts on. There were a lot of great ideas such as dinosaurs, basketball, gardening, jump roping, and school! We also learned about how to tell what we know to a partner and then go back and write down all the facts we know. We made it our goal this week to write by drawing the reader in, having a great lead to our stories.

Student of the Week:

Ian!! has been working really hard to push himself in reading and writers workshop. He tries to choose work from every area to work on each day. He pushes himself to work on more challenging works and keeps his focus on his own work. He is always ready to learn and participate at the carpet. Way to be a great leader, keep it up Ian!

Continent Study Africa!

We have started our Africa continent study! We read some books about Africa and researched some things that we didn't know, but learned! We looked at Africa in an Atlas and also learned about some animals that you may see in Africa. We noticed similarities and differences in some of the cultures in Africa in comparison to ours. We also learned about the different terrain that Africa offers; dessert, rain forest and the Savannah. If anyone has traveled to Africa and would like to come in and share their knowledge with our class and room 206, please let me know! Guest speakers are so powerful and students love learning from a variety of people! 

Readers Workshop

In reader’s we have talked a lot about our characters in our story and reflected on how they are similar and different to us! We took a closer look at the setting in our stories to help us re-tell what happened. We ended our readers celebration by making our own leaf men characters. Please ask your child these story element questions each time you read. Who are the characters, what is the setting, and re-tell the story!

Writers Workshop: This week in writing, we are also wrapping up our small moments unit! We chose one piece of writing and edited it. We ended this unit by having a celebration with some special guests coming in to give us compliments on our writing! Mrs. Guzmán’s class joined us by also sharing their stories and some treats! The students felt so proud of their work and it was wonderful to have them share that with someone else. Look forward to reading these stories at conferences. Our next unit will be All About Books!

Parent/Teacher Conferences!

Please remember to sign up for parent/teacher conferences! If you need to check your time, you are more than welcome to come in and look at the conference sheet! They are coming up soon! I will send home a reminder about it soon.


Student of the Week:

Henry works hard on his language work plan and chooses challenging works for himself everyday. He holds himself accountable for his choices during work time and is showing his leadership skills by focusing intently on his work! Henry loves learning new works and is always participating. Way to go Henry !!

Peppi's Woods Planting day!

A huge THANK YOU to Jana Robbins for organizing a school wide event for the kids to plant plants in Peppi's Woods, helping to contribute to Green Seattle Day that took place on Sat. Unfortunately I wasn't able to be there on Friday, due to a wedding, but I heard so many amazing things about this event. Our class was able to plant many non-invasive plants in the woods with their 4/5th grade buddies! What a wonderful event for the students to come together as a community and make our forests great. Thank you again to Jana and all the volunteers for making this day happen!

Harvest Party!

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU for all of you who helped make the Harvest Party happen! We had such a great time, getting to spend time with each K/1 class and making fun crafts. We also had so much fun at our feast! The decorations and the help was greatly appreciated. Thank you again for helping us celebrate fall.

Carving out the pumpkin!!!! On Tuesday we were able to meet our new class Buddies from Mrs. Deese's class. Each child was paired up with a 4/5th grade buddy. With our new buddies we dug out the pumpkin and sorted through the seeds and guts. IT was so much fun to for the students to get to know their new buddy. Look forward to hearing many more things we get to do with our buddies!

Student of the Week:

Gibson has been working incredible hard at work time. He has challenged him self with his reading, and math works. He has especially pushed himself with writing and adding more details to his stories. He loves learning new materials and has been a pleasure to have in our class. Keep it up!!!

Oct. 25th

Wow what a fun field trip yesterday! The kids had so much fun exploring and jumping in a hay maze
,

riding a steam train, petting animals, and even getting to go on a roller coaster!!!!

The best part was that everyone got to take home a pumpkin. Thank you to all the families who helped chaperone this field trip, it was a very successfully 1st field trip. Ask your child what their favorite part of the day was!

Harvest Party:

Next week on Oct. 31st we will be having a Fall Harvest Party. This party will be for all of the K/1 classrooms. We will start at 9:00 and go until 11:15. Each class will rotate to another K/1 classroom to participate in a fall craft such as water coloring pumpkins, lacing webs, gluing pumpkin seeds, Q- tip painting pumpkins, and fall number Bingo! After all the project we will gather together in the lunch to celebrate with samples of different fall foods. Students are not allowed to wear costumes or bring costumes to school on this day, this is simply a FALL celebration. If you have signed up to help with this celebration we will be sending out more information on each specific task next week. Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank you!

Readers Workshop This week students have been working on getting to know their characters. Some ways we can get to know our characters are by what the say and do. We can also recognize our characters emotions and feelings. By trying to remember characters actions, feelings, and what they say we can re-tell our stories. Every time after we finish a book we practice telling It’s about, First..., Next...., Then.... And Finally! When you are reading at home with your child, have them look for the characters actions, feelings, or things they say. After your finished reading try to have your child re-tell what they just read!

Writers Workshop: This week our class has been working on unfreezing our characters to help our stories come to like. We can do this by showing their actions, what they are thinking, and feeling. We also worked on slowly down with our writing and telling it bit-by-bit and step by step. This helps us to really zone in on that small moment. Finally we focused on making sure we spell words we know in a snap. (Sight words-and, the, a, at, I, it, in, of, you)

Student of the Week:
Unity Unity has been doing an outstanding job this year. She is always pushing herself for a new challenge. She has been a warm and welcoming 1st grader to new Kindergarteners, kids at lunch, or kids on the playground. Keep up the great work UNITY!

Open House:

Open house night was so much fun! Thank you to those who were able to make it out. Students loved getting a chance to show their families their desks, their classroom and some works! We have done SO much learning over the past month and a half of school! Whew! What a night! If you weren’t able to come, you were missed, but your student’s work was acknowledged by their peers and teachers!


Morning Work:

Our class has been working hard on starting to memorize their simple addition facts from 0-5 for morning work. They have also been working on learning the sight words we, the, at, is, of, and here. We are also working hard on learning math vocabulary and using that language during work time and morning work. We’ve learned to use the word “addend” and “sum” as well as the words “addition” and “number sentence”. Please use this language at home with your student and quiz them on their addition facts 0-5 while you are walking with them, on the bus, or driving home with them in the car!

Readers Workshop, MAP testing, Pumpkin project This week students met in reading groups during work time. During Readers workshop this week the 1st graders took their map test. They did a great job taking their time and trying their best. The kindergartners from Mrs. Guzman and Mrs. Bolsters class joined us Mon-Thur. to learn about pumpkins, the pumpkin life cycle and even try pumpkin seeds. It was great for everyone to meet kids from different classrooms and work together to do something new!

Writers Workshop: This week our class has been working hard on fancying up their work by adding voice, actions, and feelings to their pictures and words. We also used a rubric to make sure we wrote about something that happened and our pictures/words match our story. Students went back and re-read their writing to see if it makes sense, and thought about what else they could add to their story. Next week? Characters!!

Student of the Week:

Brandon Brandon is always following directions, being respectful in the hall and classroom, and a peaceful friend to everyone at Leschi! He has worked very hard this week on taking out many challenging works and trying to work the whole work time! Keep up the great work Brandon!!

Oct. 7th

Science: This week we started our very first science unit of the year: Animals 2X2! Our class is now a home to several goldfish, snails, and earthworms which students will study in detail over the next several weeks. In our first lesson we talked about how we, as good scientists, can use our sense of sight, smell, touch, and hearing to make observations about the animals in our room. Students then began to practice making observations about our goldfish. Next, students will learn key vocabulary words like gills, fin, tail, eye, mouth, and scales, to help describe how our goldfish breathe, swim, see, and eat. Our class is very excited to put on our scientific thinking caps as we spend more time with our fishy friends next week!

Work Time: The students of room 204 continue to challenge themselves each and every day during work time. This week, more kindergartners began working on their pink language work plans and some students have also begun to work on their math binders. As a class, we learned several new works this week, including the teen board, which helps students to build the numbers 11-19. Some great things to work on at home with your student to build their confidence and independence during work time are practicing the numbers 1-20 and reviewing letter sounds.

Readers Workshop: It’s time for buddy reading! This week, students have been learning how to read with a partner. As a class we discussed how to share a book with another person, how to help each other read the pictures and the words, as well as how we can identify the important parts of the story and share them with one another. Ask your student to show you how to buddy read when they during story time at home!

Student of the Week: This week’s student of the week is Dakota! He has been working on pushing himself to take on more challenging works. His quote in reading group this week was, “ We have to challenge ourselves, that’s what gets us ready for 1st and 2nd grade” He has done exactly that and with a smile on his face. He comes to school everyday ready to learn and that attitude spreads to everyone around him. Way to go Dakota!!

Work Time: Work time is going really smoothly. Kindergartners are understanding work time behaviors and learning how to focus. First graders are managing their time and holding themselves accountable for their work plans. All students are building their confidence towards independence. THis week our class worked all the way till lunch! This week we also focused on handwriting skills, whether it was building those fine motor skills, or writing our best letters. We have also started to get ready for our science unit by learning the different parts of a fish. Ask your student what they are working on!

Readers Workshop: This week we continued working on strategies to figure out tricky words. We learned the strategy stretch it out, hope over, and take your best guess and move on. We also learned that readers also check, does that sound right? The past two days we worked on retelling after we read. We read several great mentor text and practiced as a class talking about what its about, first, next, then, and finally. Work on this strategy with your child after reading with them.
Writers Workshop: This week in writers workshop we have been talking about small moments and how to write a small moment in 3 steps: Think of a story in your life, picture it in your mind and put it on paper. We practice the strategy of sketching your story, touch each page as you plan it out, and writing your story.

A great goal is for students to tell their story across the pages and have a beginning, middle, and end.

Work Time: This week many students received their pink language work plan. All the students have been working very hard on matching objects and labels, matching picture and labels, and writing their words in their language journals.

We also introduce four new sigh words this week. A, of, the, and
.Students were able to practice reading and writing these words through out the week. We even were able to test out the new chalk board wall!!!

Writers Workshop: This week in writers workshop we have been working on understanding what a small moment is. Writers think about a big topic (summer vacation), a smaller topic ( the week you had swim lessons), and a small moment ( your first day of swim lessons). Writers think about how to zoom in on the small moment and write about that.

We read Fireflies and picked out our favorite small moment from that book. Ask your child what their favorite small moment was.

Star Student:

This week’s star student is Kieran. Kieran has been really challenging himself in all areas at work time. Kieran has really been participating in readers workshop and pushed himself with his writing to keep writing more. He has been a great leader in the line, out at recess, and in the class. Way to GO Kieran!!!