week of January 13, 2020

Mrs. Borden and Mrs. Jones’ Newsletter (week of January 13, 2020)
Handwriting/Writing:  We are almost through our Handwriting Without Tears book for Letter and Number formations.  When we send this (orange) book home, it may stay at home for review and you can see the huge improvement in writing since the beginning of the year.  Our focus since we came back from break has been on different types of sentences (question, statement, exclamatory) and how a paragraph has several sentences about a single topic.  We will then continually review our letters (capital and lowercase) as well as number formations while we move into our Building Writer books.
Reading:  We have been working on our unit essential question of: Why do we like stories? We have been focusing on: discussing themes and author’s purpose, comparing/contrasting stories, making inferences and predictions, describing plot, and visualizing details as we hear different types of stories.  We also review characters, setting, plot, and problem/solution when we read any type of story to keep those skills fresh.  We have been working really hard in our small groups on many early literacy skills such as: first sounds in words, all sounds in a given word, writing first/last sounds in words, blending sounds together, reading words, and writing words. 
Math:  We have been working really hard on comparing numbers to 10.  We have been using our math vocabulary such as: more, fewer, and equal.  Our latest lessons have been making one more and one less of the object we are counting (like fish) and writing the new number.  We are also working on counting to 100 each day, next number in a sequence, and writing our numbers correctly (especially the teens).  We have completed our Spring Math Winter benchmarks and the skill that we are working on now is counting dots and circling the correct number (0-20).  Our strategy for that skill is to make a line through the dot as we count them in order.
Science/Social Studies:  We have had a mini-author study focused on Jan Brett.  We read The Mitten and completed a writing activity with what would fit in our mitten.  We also read The Hat and The Three Snow Bears.  We have discussed animals in winter along with characteristics of winter.  We have quite a few stories about ice and snow to read as well that will fit in with properties of water.





Reminders:
Ice cream: The ice cream day in the cafeteria has been moved to Wednesdays, just so you are aware.  If you have any questions, feel free to contact us.
It can be a little chilly in our room at times, so if you would like to send in a dress code approved sweater/long sleeve to leave in their cubbies that would be appreciated.  It must be solid colored without a hood per the dress code.
Important Dates:
Monday, January 13-  Day 4
Thursday, January 16- Start of the 3rd Marking Period
Friday, January 17- Spartan Dress Down Day ($1 donation)

Congratulations!  We are so very proud of our Math DIBELS scores!!!  The growth everyone has shown since the beginning of the year is amazing!!! We will be sending the reports with the report cards for you to review.  Reading DIBELS will be next week, keep up the great work! 