Valentine's Day Info.

For the past few school days we have been taking a break from penguins and have instead been talking about groundhogs! Unfortunately, according to Mr. Groundhog, it looks like winter is here to stay. On the bright side, we learned that the groundhog is right 37% of the time. So maybe Spring is on the way?

We have lots of fun things planned for February! We will be watching the Grade 6 play, having Olympic Day, and of course Valentine's Day! We are making Valentine Eaters to keep our Valentines in. Each student needs to bring a tongue for their Valentine Eater. Any piece of material will work that is about 4 inches long and 2 inches wide. The crazier the material the better! I've seen leather, old socks, bits of dance costumes, etc.

I have sent home a class list for Valentines, but here it is again!

Becky

Austin

Caleb

Grady

Zack

Amber

Sierra

Haylee

Lesha

A.J.

Trysten

Brenna

Maddie

Isabella

Aubrey

Marissa

Jayson

Max

Addie

Dani

Tylee

Here are the snack assignments for our class party on Feb. 14:

Trysten-veggies

Addie-treat

Maddie-fruit

Isabella-meat

Brenna-cheese and crackers

We celebrated Rissa's birthday on Thursday and her mom was so kind to bring our class cupcakes! Thank you Christi!

Gingerbread Catch-up

Apparently I forgot to post pictures of us making gingerbread men (back in December).  The kiddos kindly reminded me today, so here you go!

Home Reading and Bandit E

Welcome to the new layout for my blog! Yes, you are in the right place (that is, if you are looking for Mrs. Sefcik's Grade 1 Blog!).

Coming up this week we have TWO P.D. Days for staff. That means there will be no school for students on Wednesday, January 29 and Friday January 31.

I have been changing up my home reading program for the second half of the year. Please send your child's home reading folder back to school every day. I am doing reading groups every day during Daily 5 and we are using those books during our groups. It is essential that your child has their books here every day otherwise I will not be able to read with them! In many of their reading folders you will find a "word ring". Please practice these words at home with your child every day.

Just a reminder about the wonderful online resource raz-kids. Each child in my class has a subscription to raz-kids and they love going on it during school. They can read and listen to online stories that are just at their reading level. If you need a reminder about their login information, just write a note in your child's agenda and I will send it home! See the side bar for the link to raz-kids!

The past couple weeks we have been learning about the "Bandit E". He is a sneaky guy that hangs out at the end of words, bops vowels on the head and makes them say their name, all the while staying super quiet (eg. cake, made). Students have been looking for bandit e's (aka silent e) in their reading. This last week we went on a "Bandit E Hunt" around the school trying to find those sneaky words. Don't mind the ghetto-ness of their masks!

No School Jan. 31

There will be no school on Jan. 31 for students. Teachers are having a Professional Development Day to be trained on a new anti-bullying program for the school. This is in addition to the P.D. Day on Jan. 29.

2014!

Welcome Back!!

We had such a great week this week getting back into our routine. The students were ready to be back and school and the excitement level was high! We were especially happy to welcome our new student, Dani Smith! I loved watching students watch out for her and make her feel welcome in our classroom. They are so sweet!

We have been learning about the "Vowel Twins" this week. The amazing Miss Jensen made up stories for each of the vowels to help students remember the long and short vowels. The vowel twins' names are Annie (short), Avery (long), Emerson (short), Easton (long), Izzy (short), Mike (long), Molly (sh), Jody (l), Dustin (sh), and Jude (l). We have been practicing determining if words have short or long vowel sounds in them this week so that next week when we start to learn the rules of short and long vowels they have a good foundation.

In Math, we have been learning how to count by 10's to 100. We have also been perfecting our adding skills so that we can start with subtracting next week.

In Science, we have been talking about the seasons and how things change for winter (in particular our class tree).

In Social Studies we have been talking about our community and where Raymond is in the world. We have also talked about the difference between rural and urban.

As we have been talking about how it is a new year now, we have also made some goals for school this year. Just a reminder that students should be reading at least 15 minutes every day. The rest of the school year in grade one is faster paced than the beginning and students will be learning many more rules about reading. If they can practice these rules in their reading at home, they will be successful readers!

Keep up the great work at home! I know I've said this before, but I am so impressed with the amount of parent support that students in my class have! Thank you, thank you, thank you!

We have started our Penguin theme..dun dun dun. This might be my favorite theme in the year and I know my excitement has rub off on the kids. So, if your child has become a little obsessive about penguins I apologize! We will be doing a ton of research on penguins and some fun writing projects about our favorite penguins.

Just a reminder that Scholastic Book Orders are due Tuesday, January 14.

Pizza orders are due Thursday, January 16.

Here we are exploring our Classroom Tree to see how it has changed since the Fall.

 I love these pictures so much. They were watching a penguin clip. Oh the joy!

Have a fantastic weekend!!

-Mrs. Sefcik

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope you all have a safe and wonderful holiday. Here is my present to you: The kids singing "A Bug's Christmas" where you can actually see all of them. Hopefully it works, I tried two different formats!

See you January 6th!

Quick Note about the Christmas Concert

Students need to be at the Cultural Hall at 6:00 tonight, ready to go in their costumes. I am telling students to wait on the bleachers after the concert is over and their parents need to pick them up there.