Stars Unit! We have started our stars and constellations unit! So far we are what stars are and their life cycle. Students are very excited about this unit, so ask them what they have learned so far!

Lion King

We had a very exciting assembly on Thursday. Several actor and actress from the Lion King came to our school to talk about what it is like to perform. We even had the two young girls (11yrs, 9yrs) that play Nala in the musical. The students were able to ask them questions, do a little acting themselves, and sing Hakuna matata as a thank you! It was a wonderful experience for our whole school!!!

Donors Choose:

Donors choose is currently having a promotion that they will match any donation made for the next 7 day. When someone donates to your project and enters the code INSPIRE, DonorsChoose.org will match their donation dollar for dollar. Check out Room 204's project or other Leschi projects. http://www.donorschoose.org/donors/search.html?state=WA&community=18300:3&school=35959


Work time/ Words their Way

Work time has been going well. Students have been focused and remembering to be independent learners. We also started focusing on words-their-way more this week. Students did an excellent job practicing their words sorts and hopefully they enjoyed working on them at home as well. Let me know how its going for you student!

Readers Workshop In readers this week we talked about identifying the setting. Students looked at many different ways books to find the setting. The setting is where and when the story took place, but students also took a deeper look. Learning how the author described the time and the environment.

In readers this week we talked about identifying the main character. Students helped to determine the main characters feelings, thoughts, personality, and actions. We learned about how the main character is often the protagonist. They also learn about characteristics of a protagonist. We then took a closer look at supporting character, and how they can sometimes help the main character. Finally students learned about the antagonists in stories, such as the Fox in Dr. Desoto!

Writers Workshop In writers this week we brainstormed settings for our fiction story by thinking of some great setting for our stories. We also thought about what it might be like at those places using our 5 senses of touch, taste, hear, sight and smell. We also used descriptive language to write out our settings. We practiced identifying place, time and environments of settings and we noticed that place and time affect the environment. We used words to visualize our settings to help paint a picture for our writing audience. We also started imagine our characters. What their personality is a and physical features and why those are important for the character.

In writers this week we brainstormed adventures for our characters. The student’s thought about the problems their characters might come across. They thought of ways to write out those problems in an exciting way. Then they went back and wrote solutions to their stories. Making sure to have a clear way their characters problems were solved. Ms. Ooton read the story Dr. Desoto about a pair of mice dentist that outsmart a Fox! This was a great example of an exciting an adventure that can happen to characters in stories. Ask you child what adventures their characters went on!

Ms. Ooton’s Corner  

Hello all! It’s been a joy getting to know students more and more throughout the year and I’m excited to share some things they’ve been learning. I’m also happy to say that I gained my substitute certification in January and can now sub for Mrs. Castiglia when she has to be away from class.  
One of my favorite parts of this past week was when students explored the settings of different stories and worked to identify the place, time, and environment in a number of books. I was blown away by students as they took their understanding of setting to the next level by drawing detailed pictures of the settings they envisioned as I read Owl Moon. Students didn’t even stop there! They all pushed themselves to write down descriptive words they heard that helped them create their image. I’ll be back next week to share more of the fabulous things the students in room 204 have been working on!

This past week it was so exciting to see students take so much ownership over their work during work time and other independent work times throughout the day such as reader’s and writer’s workshop. Students have been challenging themselves to the utmost, picking out language and math works that stretch their thinking - so much so that Lyndsay and I were able to add three brand new work centers to work time the past few weeks including an iPad center where students can use technology to practice reading, writing, and math skills; a listening center students can use to follow along with stories and build their reading fluency; as well as a station for jiji math. I am looking forward to seeing how our students utilize these tools and continue to blossom into independent scholars throughout the spring!

Student of the Week

Dylan has been choosing quiet and more challenging works during work time. Dylan has been focused on writing and is really creating some great fiction stories. Dylan also does a great job contributing to our classroom discussions about characters and setting. Dylan has really focused on his language work plan and trying to push himself to learning to read and spell more words! Way to go Dylan!!!!!

Aisha has been writing a bunch of amazing fiction stories this week. She loves adding many details to her writing and pictures. She has become so much more focused on her writing and is really pushing herself as a writing. She does a great job at work time finding a work to work on, and focusing on that work. She has been a great friend not only to students in our class but to any new student she meets on the play ground.

Exciting News !

I have some exciting news that I wanted to share with everyone.  Mr. Castiglia and I are expecting a new bundle of joy Aug. 30th!  We can’t be more thrilled and I know I will need all of your expert parenting advice.  I plan to return back to teaching after my maternity leave.  I will be telling my students on Monday, but I wanted to let you all know first. Any helpful advice is welcome!

Dr. Seuss’s Birthday!

We celebrated his birthday this week by reading many of his incredible stories and writing. We read about his life story and how he came to be Dr. Seuss. We also made rhyming Cat in the Hat, hats and made Thing1 and Thing 2 puppets with Mrs. Gardner’s class. Ask you child what story they life best so far.

Readers Workshop

In readers this week we talked about the difference again between fiction and non-fiction. We took a look at some great fiction stories, such as Piggy and Elephant and Woolbur. The students helped point out elements of fiction writing such as a made up story that includes: characters, a setting, a series of events (beginning, middle, and end), and a problem and solution. When your reading with your child at home, ask them if the story is fiction or non-fiction. See if they can point out the elements of a fiction story to you!

Writers Workshop In writers this week we are starting our fiction unit! The students wrote their first fiction story, and they were so imaginative! We then looked at some other first grade writing examples of fiction writing. The students pointed out how the writing examples had characters, a setting, a problem/solution, and a beginning, middle, and end. They continued to work on their writing making sure to include all those fiction writing elements. Next week we will take a closer look at characters and setting.

Student of the Week

Aislin has been working really hard this week on our new fiction writing unit. Her first fiction writing was three pages long.!She has grown so much this year as a student and continues to challenge herself. Aislin is always making new friends and inviting others to play. She is incredible kind and respectful to everyone. She really has stepped up as a kindergarten leader in our classroom. Way to go Aislin!!!!!

Black History Thank you to everyone who came to Black History Night Celebration. It was so wonderful to see the hard work everyone put into their projects. I know the students loved learning about the different historical figures and especially getting to sing!!!!!

READ ACROSS AMERICA

This Monday, March 3rd Dr. Seuss’s Birthday. His birthday celebration starts the week of reading across the nation as a way to get families, students, and the community to come together to share their love of reading.!!!!!! We will be dedicating this day to some fun reading projects, as well as exploring more of Dr. Seuss in the month of March.




Readers Workshop

This week in readers we reviewed different strategies we can use to figure out tricky words. Not only can we sound them out, we can hop over a word, take a guess, or look for chunks of letters we know! We also made sure to always ask ourselves if what we are reading makes sense, and go back and re-read if it doesn’t. We even used these strategies to uncover a secret message. Please ask your reader what strategies they are using!

Writers Workshop This week for writers, we finished brainstormed ideas for persuasive writing topic. Student’s were able to drive in and start writing their own letters. We learned who to write to, our main audience. We learned how to state our opinion in a polite way, and how to list our reason’s using big feeling words. They ended their letters in kind ways. The students also tried to not just write about things they want but things they want to change. We choose our favorite letter to fix up and publish. Ask your child to read their letters to you.

Student of the Week: Owen!

This week Owen has been working incredible hard on his work plan and challenging himself. He has learn how to set challenging goals for himself and learn how to achieve those goals. All this hard work has paid off, because he has also moved up several reading levels! He has been participating more in our readers/writers discussions. He also gave some really nice complements in our classroom meeting. Way to go OWEN!!!!!