Week Three- Handwriting, Sight Words, Flexible Seating, and Procedures

Our school year has begun.  We just finished our third week of school in first grade.  We have been busy learning our rules and procedures for our classroom.  I've also been assessing my new kiddos to see where they are.  I like assessing the following at the beginning of the year:

Letters

Sounds

Writing Name

Reading Level

Writing CVC Words

Numbers to 20

My free trial of ESGI just ended, so I debated on purchasing it.  ESGI makes my life SO much easier when assessing letters, sounds, numbers, and sight words that I decided to buy it for myself.  I love how easy it is to use and the letters you can print out for the parents.  I know when my mid-terms are due that all I have to do is print and the parents will know exactly what their child can do and what they cannot do.  If you haven't checked out ESGI, please do.  It will make your life easier! Who doesn't want that??!!

I have noticed my firsties still need practice writing their names on lines and using first letter uppercase and the rest lowercase.  I printed out their names on lines and put them in a clear sleeve.  We use dry erase markers and the students practice writing their names correctly. 

My students always LOVE using dry erase markers.  I love walking around and seeing how engaged they are at tracing their names. 

Here is the name packet I use with my kiddos. 

Names - Editable Names Bundle - Names Activities

Our schedule at the beginning of the day is always a little bit crazy.  Starting after Labor Day my school will serve breakfast.  The students bring breakfast to the classroom to eat.  I always struggled with the kiddos that come in right away and the ones that ride the "late" bus and get to school at 9:15.  It makes for a wild start.  This year I've decided to try out Morning Tubs.  I know my students need this social time in their day for SO many reasons.  I thought I would do Morning Tubs right after breakfast.  That way the students eat quickly and then get to enjoy a little social activity right at the beginning of the day.  I recently had a Donorschoose filled with some STEM toys that are wonderful for my Morning Tubs and I bought some building toys over the summer.  So far, my students are loving the Morning Tubs!

Our rules for Morning Tubs are that the students can choose any tubs, but only 3 students per tub.  So far that has worked out well.

This year I am also trying out some Flexible Seating.  My classroom got 2 Wobble Chairs from a Donorschoose.  My students LOVE the Wobble Chairs.  I am hoping my new Donorschoose project of 4 Wobble Chairs gets fulfilled soon so we can have more.  We also have a low table that the students love to sit at.  And we have some other seating options.  Check out my Classroom Reveal to see the other options.

We are still learning how to make "good" choices with the flexible seating and when throughout the day we can use them.  I also have a table spot for all students.  I got new chair pockets this year for my chairs so everyone has a "home" spot.  So far we keep our headphones and take home folder in our chair pockets.  Here is where I purchased my chair pockets {HERE}.  This is my second time purchasing from Jeannine.  She makes wonderful pockets.  I only had to buy more because the size my chairs changed. 

During Math time, we have been working on rotations.  We did do a whole group activity about filling up a tens-frame with a partner.  My kiddos loved the game.  It will be part of our "tub" rotation.

We can get through about 2 rotations before our stamina in up.  Our goal is 4 rotations so I can pull a guided math group.

My hope is do have a short lesson followed by guided groups.  Practice makes perfect (or at least I hope it does) so hopefully soon I will be able to begin my math time the way I really want it to work out this year. 

I assessed my students sight words knowledge.  I learned that I really need to push hard for sight word knowledge.  We have a lot to learn this year so we have no time to play around. :)  Gish, I must have said that a million and one times this week. LOL.  I am using THESE to test my students knowledge of sight words.  I want them to know 100% before going to the next list.

I like to incorporate movement and fun in my classroom.  We plays Swat a Word to help us practice our words as well as have fun with them.

My students told me over and over how much fun they thought the game was. (Wahoo!! Win Win)

I began my whole group reading lesson this week.  My school district uses ReadyGen. (No comment!).  

This was our first time using a book in their hands during our whole group lesson.  We talked about what they should be doing during the lesson.  Where their hands and eyes should be.

They seemed to love following along with their own book.  I told them they get to do that now since they are big first graders!

We had a great week in First!

Thanks so much for stopping by!

Have a Wolfelicious day!

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Time Flies

I can't believe we are already in the middle of October!  Boy, this year is flying by!  My class has been very busy.  We just started our second nine weeks.  I feel like there is too much to do and not enough time.  What happened to kids being allowed to be kids?

Anyways...

We had a super busy week (like every week).  We learned numbers 0 through 5.  We got out manipulatives to help the students better understand the numbers.  I love seeing the students' faces when I get out manipulatives.  They think they are so cool.

This year I have noticed my students have more trouble than usual with sight words.  I keep coming up with more and more ways to help them learn them.  One of my new things to do is have a code word for my door.  Every time throughout the day we come into class the students give the word a high five and say the word.  (I hope this helps them).

This year in order to be highly effective we have to have our objectives posted.  I have went round and round with how I want to do this.  I have looked and looked at Pinterest but I think I have been doing the easiest way for me to get them posted.  I go over what we are doing every morning with the students.  This is how I decided to post my objectives.  Super easy and quick! 

This week we went over the Noun PowerPix.  It was so cool to see the students understanding what a noun is.  I did this activity over two days with the post it notes.  The students really had a great time using the post it notes and posting them on our poster.  I know we still have some work to do on getting all students to know what a noun is, but lots of students are comprehending it.  I am hoping this will help the students make sentences too.

Another way I am trying to help my students learn their sight words.  We did this activity every day this week.  We read the sight words first.  Then I would have the students get out a certain color and then color the sight word that I told them to color.  On Friday, I gave the students the words again, but this day was the full page.  The students were so excited for this whole page.

This week I changed up my Scoreboard.  It seemed like the students were getting a little bored with it so I decided to add the Turtles to it.  I know my son likes the Turtles so I figured my class would too.  I also added the level so it would seem more like a game.  Also, I decided to count the tallies each day instead of using it the whole week.  I think for my kinders the whole week was too long for them to really get excited about.  I told them that if the turtles won we would take time to dance in the afternoon.  Although Shredder kept winning this week, I hope they earn their dance party next week. (hopefully they will since the full moon will be over).

This week my kiddos were very talkative.  To help with them talking so much we had to go over the classroom rules.  Everyday we practiced them.

Thanks for stopping by!!  Have a Wolfelicious day!

The Brothers, W, and Sight Words

It was another busy week here at Wolfelicious!  We learned about my favorite letter.  Can you guess what letter it is?

Yeppers, its letter W.

We made 'wigs' for the letter w.  Aren't they adorable. 

In Social Studies we learned about the Wright Brothers.  I always enjoy teaching about the Wright Brothers since I am from Ohio!  I think it is important for the students to know where the Wright Brothers were from.  

This year I taught about the Brothers a little differently than other years.  This year we read a few stories about the Wright Brothers and then we completed a couple writing about them.  We also watched the Peanuts movie "The Wright Brothers at Kitty Hawk" which is about the Wright Brothers and the perfect way for my kiddos to learn more about the Wright Brothers, since Snoopy is my favorite character.  

Look at how focused all my kiddos were during the movie. I think they love Snoopy too. 

Here is the writing we completed after coloring an airplane on the other side.  I wrote this out under the document camera.  I asked the kiddos to tell me what they knew about the Wright Brothers .  These are the things they knew about them. 

I was really impressed at how well their writing was when completing this.  I guess our practice at our handwriting has been paying off. 

I have noticed my students having a very difficult time with their sight words this year.  We practice them every single day. We always cheer them, sing them, and use flash cards to practice them.  Then also they are in a couple of the centers I have.  I feel like I am doing so much to help them learn the words.  This past week I added sight word sheets to help them too.  You can check out the sheets. 

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Wolfelicious-Aka-April-Kreitzer-Wolfe

This week we practiced our words by partnering up and going on a reading trail.  I laid the words in a trail around the classroom.  I partnered the kiddos up. (High student with a low student).  Then I showed them what I wanted them to do. One student jump and read and the other student is the coach.  Helping the student, not telling them the answer. The students really enjoyed doing this.  

I added two new centers to our reading centers.  I add the Smartboard sight word game and then a letter game.  Both seemed like big hits.  With the Smartboard game the student taps the circle and a sight word comes up. Then they tap the back circle and pick out a new word. 

The letter center the students had to put the letter in order on the blue board.  

It was another amazing week!  Next week I have to assess my students for grade cards.  I can't wait to see their progress.  

                         

Robots, Sight Words, Phonograms, and Beginning Sounds

Another week is over. The kiddos are at home with their parents and I am home with my family!  It has been a wild week with it being a full moon.  Here are some of the things we did last week...  

Our reading buddies came on Friday to read with us.  Every class at our school has partnered up with another class in a different grade level to be reading buddies.  My class is partnered with 3rd grade buddies.  All the students look forward to reading with their buddy. We try to meet with our buddies twice a month.

I added a new center to my ABC Center.  Beginning Sound iPads.  I printed out and laminated the letters that we have covered and the students then match the picture (app) to the iPad.

Practicing our letters and sounds.  We are practicing writing the letter correctly on the lines.

My students are having trouble with their sight words.  I decided to print off the sight words to have the students rainbow write them.  Then we added them to our Poem Notebook.

And more sight words...

We made our robot hat for the letter R.  The kiddos loved making these this week!

 We also practiced our oral language/oral writing.  I have taught them gestures to help them remember the beginning of a sentence begins with an uppercase and the end of a sentence ends with an end mark.  When the kiddos do Teach, Okay!  They practiced their sentences using college talk.  College talk is talking in a complete sentence.  Then I asked for students to share their sentence with the class.  Here is a video of one of my girls.

(I like to go to music.)

I am loving the different WBT strategies.  I just know by using these techniques that I will have the smartest class!

   

Lesson plans, Dental Health, and Sight Words

Working, working, working on getting my lesson plans finished.  

I have now made it to the end of April, however I do have some of the last few weeks finished, just not completely put together.  I now feel if I go into labor tonight (wishful thinking) I have enough planned and ready to go.

Top view of lesson plans.  I actually have one more crate on the right. This is everything for the rest of the year.

I tried to put everything together that my sub would need.  Copies of what the students are completing and any projects they are working on.  Also, sight word flash cards and sight word word wall words.  Phonogram posters and word family posters.  Basically everything my sub will need for the week is in the crate week by week.  On some weeks I even added what books she will need to get from our library.

This has taken me a while to do, however I think it is worth it.  I really only had to make 2 weeks of lesson plans for my sub for when I leave, however I wanted to make sure my students were covering everything they needed to by the end of the year.

I do like how I have put everything together in the crates.  I may do this every year to help make the year flow better.

This week I had to test my students on sight words, phonograms, and letters for mid-terms.  Once I was finished assessing all the students I wrote down what each child missed.  Then I had my assistant write out flash cards for the students so they could practice at home.

This week we also studied Dental Health.  Here are some of the writings we did.

The first writing we did together.

The Dentist is my friend.

The Dentist is my friend.

For the next writing, I gave the students a picture of a tooth and they had to write about it. 

I brush my teeth.

I wanted to concentrate on writing during this unit.  We have been working on starting with an uppercase and adding an end mark.