We are continuing to learn words with letter blends, including “ch”, “sh”, “th”, “st”, “sp”, and “tr”. We are also learning strategies for multiplying, including adding groups of the same number, for example 4 x 5 is the same as adding four groups of five, or 5 + 5 + 5 + 5. This week we also started our mini-unit on Animals. Last week we compared and contrasted body parts of people and animals. This week we are learning about the five basic classes of animals: Mammals, Birds, Fish, Reptiles, and Amphibians. On Monday, students brainstormed names of animals and chose which class each belongs to. We will learn more about each animal class, and each student will choose an animal that they want to see at the zoo, then they will report some facts about that animal.

Next week will begin our new unit on Animals, which will compare and contrast mammals, birds, reptiles, and fish. For the next couple weeks, many of our students will be focusing on their times tables. The kids are really excited about a new math computer game in our classroom called “Timez Attack”. The graphics are really fun and feel like a real adventure video game. The students are having a lot of fun and learning multiplication skills too! Today Mr. Lee visited our classroom and took three photos of different body parts of each student. We are going to compile them together and decorate and frame the pictures to make into great Father’s Day gifts.

This week we are reviewing all the vowel sounds and working on students generalizing the long vowel sounds. Each day we are spending time reviewing some of the vowel vocabulary words introduced over the past several weeks. This week we are still working with the body. Our focus over the next five days will be on body systems. Monday we learned about the respiratory system and how the lungs work. The students are very excited about the giant body cut out we have of Tom, one of our instructional assistants. We all worked together to cut out his silhouette on butcher paper. Slowly, the students are constructing more and more of his internal body structure as we learn about what is inside the human body and why.

This week we are getting further in depth with the body. Each day this week will focus on one of our senses. Today we learned about the sense of touch. In the morning we made a list of the things you can do with your hands and the things you can do without your hands. Then at art we taped our thumbs to our fingers and painted eggs. The lesson was to teach students the importance of their thumbs when touching and working with their hands. It was a lot of fun and very messy! In the afternoon we learned about using descripitve words with the sense of touch as each student got the opportunity to reach in a secret bag and describe what they felt inside. On Wednesday we are going to spend the day on the sense of hearing. This will include a lesson where we blindfold the students and make sounds such as ringing a bell or ripping paper and the students must identify the sounds without using their eyes. This week the letter of the week is “y”. Each day we will focus on a different sound the “y” can make depending on what vowel it is paired with. Today we worked on the long a sound with the letter why in words like: play, day, stay, and away. Tomorrow we will be working on the oy sound as in toy, boy, and joy.

This week we will continue our focus on the United States and map-reading skills. We have pushed our big treasure hunt from last week to later on this week and the students are excited to read their own “treasure maps” and use the key to find their treasure. This week in art the students have painted their clay pots and they are ready to be fired up. We used our homemade playdough from last week to make maps of the United States for a more tactile experience in understanding maps. The letter of the week is “O.” We will be focusing on the long “o” sounds that come from both oa words such as “goat and boat” as well as from a silent e such as “bone” and “cone.” This week we will be finishing up our month long unit on different cultures. Next week we are going to start a new unit on the body.

This week we are focusing more attention on reading maps and understanding map keys. The country we are focusing on now is the United States, and more specifically, the different regions in America: NW, NE, SW etc. We will also focus on Oregon and what makes where we live special. Tomorrow we will be making clay maps of America. On Friday the students will get their own “treasure maps” and have to follow the directions and the map key to find their treasure. The letter of the week is “i” and the students are working on the long “i” sound usually matched with the “magic e” that makes the “i” say its name, like in fire, slime, and kite.

This week we are studying Brazil, and we will make Carnivale masks. We are also learning map-reading skills, including the history of maps, the four basic directions, and typical features found on maps and globes. For the letter of the week, we are back to “A”, and this time learning different words that have the long-A sound, such as “day”, “play”, “wait”, and “tail”. For math, we are learning to add larger numbers. For art, we are continuing to work on clay pots.

Before the break, we practiced making pinch-pots with Play Doh. We went on a walking field trip to Safeway to buy snacks for a Friday afternoon party. Students prepared by being in teams and each team chose a salty snack, a sweet snack, and a drink to buy within a budget of $10. At the store, each team went to find the items on their list, and used a calculator to make sure they were within budget. Then students took turns using the self-checkout machines to buy the items. Last week the letter of the week was “Y” and words included you, year, yes, and yellow.

This week we are reading fairy tales about princesses, including Princess and the Pea, The Frog Prince, and Cinderella. The letter of the week is “X”, so we will learn common words beginning with the prefix “ex”, like exit, extra, exercise, excel, and explore. For math, we continue to work on subtraction problems and strategies. For art, we are working with Play Doh to prepare for a project using clay.

For our Folk and Fairy Tales unit, we read several versions of Jack and the Beanstalk, naming all of the characters, and comparing how each story was similar, and how they were different. We also discussed how magic is involved in a fairy tale, like Jack and the Beanstalk. This week we are reading different versions of Little Red Riding Hood and answering the 5 “W” questions. The letter of the week is “W”, so words of the day are Who, What, Where, When, and Why. For our Three Pigs printing project, we are putting the pictures of the pigs and wolves in front of the printed houses to make scenes from the story. We are also planting some beans of our own to see how fast and how tall they will grow.

This week we are doing some activities related to the 100th day of school. We are practicing counting by 1’s, 2’s, 5’s, and 10’s to 100. We checked how far we could walk in 100 steps. We flipped coins 100 times to see how many times they landed on heads or tails. We will also collect groups of 100 objects. We are also reading a few different versions of Jack and the Beanstalk this week and do more story comprehension activities.

This week we will read several versions of The Three Little Pigs, and answer the questions Who? Where? When? and What? We will also compare how each story is similar and how each is different. Students will also do some story sequencing and draw scenes from the story. On Tuesday, we worked in the garden with Julia, helping to put more cedar chips on the pathways. We will also continue working with money and adding coins.

This week we will begin a unit on Folk Tales and Fairy Tales, starting with Goldilocks and the Three Bears. We will use these familiar stories to learn the basic elements of stories– the Who? What? When? Where? Why? and How? We are continuing working on money skills, this week adding up the totals of mixed groups of coins. We are also working on writing names on Valentine cards to exchange this Friday.

This week we will do some activities based on the sense of touch, including Brain Operation, the Mystery Box, and the sensory tub. Mr. Lee led an activity called See It, Feel It, Touch It, Taste It, sampling and guessing the names of ten kinds of breakfast cereal. The letter of the week is S, and words include see, saw, sat, soon, and sound. We are also continuing working with coin names and values.

This week we are doing activities related to the sense of sight. On Monday morning Gregory joined us from the Cooley Gallery to show us some samples of the art we will see there next week. He also showed us some optical illusions. Read alouds this week will include Theo LeSieg’s “The Eye Book” and some of Walter Wick’s “I Spy” books.
The letter of the week is “R” and words include ran, red, rug, row, and ring. We continue to study coin names and values, and learn how many cents, nickels, dimes, and quarters add up to one dollar.

The letter of the week was “P”, and words of the day included “pop”, “pool”, “peel”, and “Post”. This week the letter is “Q”, and words will include “quick”, “quack”, and “queen”. We will be reviewing coin names, coin values, and how many of each type of coin adds up to a dollar. We have been doing tactile art activities, including working with Play Doh, and making paper mosaic hearts.

This week we will focus on the sense of taste, with activities to talk about various types of food, and to learn about the different types of taste: salty, sweet, sour, and bitter. We will read books about food and taste, including “Dinner at the Panda Palace”, “It’s a Spoon, Not a Shovel”, and “Yum! MmMm! Que Rico”, which is about foods from the Americas.

For January, our theme is the Five Senses. This week we are focussing on the sense of hearing, with listening activities, music, sound effects, and reading Horton Hears a Who. The letter of the week is O, and we will focus on the short, long, and double-o sounds in words. We are also spending some time this week to review the classroom rules and routines. On Monday Mr. Lee brought in a game called A to Z– students chose a topic such as “things made of metal”, then brainstormed words and pushed the letter that each word begins with.