Spelling Words May 27 - June 4

This weeks spelling words are high frequency and diphthong 'ou' words. Enjoy the 4 day weekend!

1. almost
2. knew
3. thought
4. took
5. picture
6. sound
7. hound
8. shout
9. loud
10. mouse

Spelling Words May 21 - May 27

This weeks spelling words are high frequency and diphthong ow/ou words. There is no school next friday, so the homework will be due on Thursday instead. Have a great week!

1. along
2. goes
3. great
4. idea
5. pull
6. how
7. down
8. clown
9. now
10. town

Learning on Class Laptops

We have so much fun working on our own laptops! We are getting really good at typing in our own usernames and passwords! We were even able to change the wallpaper on our desktops today!

Spelling Words May 14 - May 21

This weeks spelling words are high frequency and r-controlled 'er' 'ir' and 'ur' words. Have a great week!

1. each
2. once
3. other
4. under
5. which
6. her
7. turn
8. hurt
9. girl
10. bird

Our Science Experiment

Today we conducted a science experiment.

Our QUESTION was: Which type of Hershey's chocoloate melts faster in your hand...Milk Chocolate, or Dark Chocolate?

Our HYPOTHESIS was: We predicted that the milk chocolate would melt faster.

Our MATERIALS were:

1. our hands
2. milk chocolate bar
3. dark chocolate bar
4. pink sticky notes
5. green sticky notes
6. a book

Our PROCEDURE was:

1. Passed out green and pink sticky notes. Half the class got green, and half got pink.
   
2. Teachers passed out chocolate. Pink sticky notes got dark chocolate and green sticky notes got milk chocolate.

3. We gently put our hands over the chocolate.
4. We listened to our teacher read about 10 pages in a book.
5. We peeked and noticed the milk chocolate was melting faster than the dark chocolate was.

Our CONCLUSION was: Hershey's milk chocolate melts faster in your hand than dark chocolate does.

Science is so much fun!!! :)

Spelling Words May 7 - May 14

This weeks spelling words are r-controlled "or" words and high frequency. Have a great week!

1. before
2. cold
3. full
4. off
5. would
6. born
7. fork
8. short
9. torn
10. storm

Finishing Our Response to Literature Pieces

In our writers workshop time, we are finishing up our Response to Literature stories and getting ready to go back and revisit the genre of writing called “Narrative Writing”. We have already taught the students the basic parts of a Narrative at the beginning of the year (such as an engaging beginning, and middle with details, and problem, solution, and an ending with a sense of closure). However, we are now going to dig deeper, and teach them some “author's craft” to make their narrative stories even better.

Examples of some “Author's Craft” are things like:

· Using dialogue (we call these ‘talking marks’ or ‘quotation marks’)

· Using transition/time cue words that move their story though time

· Giving concrete details

· Replacing weaker verbs (such as ‘said’) with stronger verbs (such as ‘shouted’ or ‘exclaimed’)

· Characterization (helping their characters ‘come to life’)


Here is the narrative checklist your child will be using. The narrative stories they write, must contain all of the following elements to meet the first grade standard.

Elements in my Narrative Story:

(does my story have…)

_____ Engaging beginning

_____ A middle that includes:

1. details

2. sequenced events

3. authors craft

_____ Problem

_____ Solution

_____ An ending with a sense of closure