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Exciting News! All First Gtade Parents and Students!
First grade will be performing for the next PTA meeting (February 2nd at 7:00 pm)!
If your child will be joining us, make sure your first grader is on stage in the cafeteria, ready to perform by 6:55 pm next Thursday evening.
First graders should wear clean jeans and a solid colored shirt.
Can’t wait to see you there!

The 100th Day of School, Fractions, Data, and Flat Teddy

Friday is the 100th Day of School and we are so excited. We will travel to other first grade classrooms to do lessons the 100 way. Be sure to look over our booklet and ask your child about their understanding of the concept and just what 100 looks like. Thank you for sending in food items for our 100 Day trail mix. We will choose 10 items and count out ten of them to make our individual 100 snacks. We are learning about collecting and recording data in many kinds of graphs. We looked at concrete, picture, bar and tally graphs. Later next week we will begin fractions, studying 1/2, 1/4, and 1/3. Many of the students have yet to master fractions and I am looking forward to helping them gain a better understanding. We will work with dividing whole objects as well as dividing groups of objects equally.

Look for a letter and a Flat Teddy coming home next week. As we learn about our next American hero, Teddy Roosevelt, we will be gathering information about our national and state parks by asking families to mail Flat Teddy to a relative in another location who will enjoy taking Flat Teddy to a park in their part of the country. It's simple and fun and not to be stressful in anyway. If you get a response we will be charting our returning Teddies on our immersion board with a map of our country and a star where Teddy visited. This process can sometimes get a little lengthy, so please be thinking of relatives or friends who might really enjoy the experience with a timely turn around. Our focus is on national parks, but local parks are great too!

Harriet Tubman was the focus of our informational writing this week. Each child completed his graphic organizer in a "time-line" format and wrote from that outline. Harriet Tubman lived the life skills of courage and perseverance.

Keep reading at home and continue with IXL and Raz reading! Thanks for all you do!

Harriet Tubman and Informational Writing

Yes, we tied with Mrs. Aronson's Alligators for an opportunity to dine with the administrators on the stage on Monday. Thank you for making our evening at Chick Fil-et on Tuesday a huge success and as much fun as sprinkles on ice cream. It was my pleasure to serve you and to see so many siblings there too. We are learning about our heroine of the year with our study of Harriet Tubman. Her life was not easy and she makes the life skills of perseverance and courage come to life for the students. We will make an illustrated time line of her life for the hall and also practice writing in the genre of informational writing. Currently you may view your child's goals for 2012 displayed in the hall.We are finishing up our chapter on money. Our goal is to be able to count different coins and make fair trades to $1.00. We are counting bills and adding of paper money! In Fundations we are adding the suffix ,s, to words and listening for the /s/, or /z/ sound that it makes. In Words Our Way you will see our work with consonant blends. This and more is keeping us busy at school. Join us for lunch soon.In a housekeeping note, please be sure your family name is inside every jacket or coat. We go outside when the temperature is above 40 degrees F. Your child will need a jacket. The 100th day of school is next Friday. Thank you for volunteering to send in an item for our 100 day trail mix. I will send a note with our request from each of you who respond. We will travel to several first grade rooms that day and we'll be doing everything the 100 way!

Happy New Year Read All of the Announcements and More!

Welcome back to the second half of first grade. Many exciting things are happening in the Butterfly classroom. Today we welcome a new student to our classroom. Her name is Aina Ishiguro and she is from Japan. We can't wait to learn more about her. Today we read a book about life in Japan and we have a Japanese/American dictionary handy. Everyone in the class is willing and excited about helping her understand our classroom routine and American school in general.

I am somewhat disappointed to say that our student teacher will not be coming until March 13. I am sorry for the mistaken information.

Tuesday evening is our Chick-fillet night and the Alligators and our classroom have a little contest going to see how many children we can get to come for ice cream and sprinkles between 5-6. I will be there at that time but feel free to come and sign in any time that evening.

In math this week we are  making change for coins up to one dollar and looking for ways to convert the coins to the fewest to make that amount. The children are making progress! Our minute math is rolling right along with the children moving into subtraction facts.  If I want to skip it ,I get a lot of opposition! They all want to improve at their own rate. Our ultimate goal is knowing 100 facts addition and subtraction, to 18 in five minutes or less... with 100% accuracy.

In writing we are making resolutions and setting goals for the coming year.

You probably noticed several papers for parents to read about the Six Flags reading program. Keep the log and start tonight recording your minutes read. Slow and steady will get it done! It is a lot of fun for the children to earn such a fun ticket.

Social studies finds us reviewing the continents and oceans, and where they are on the globe  a map. Next week we will learn about our American heroine, Harriet Tubman.

Please help your children with the spelling words this week. A four day week makes it difficult to do what we have 5 days to do normally. Thanks for your help in this!

 

Dear Students and Parents,

The first ever Sope Creek Family Movie Night is coming on January 20, 2012.  It is being sponsored by the Student Council.  We will be showing The Smurfs and National Treasure 2.  Popcorn and drinks will be available for purchase, but you can BYOC (Bring Your Own Candy).  We will be expecting that you bring your parents because this is a family event – no drop offs, please.  So mark your calendar – January 20 7:00-9:00 in the cafeteria and the media center.  Optional donation for Must Ministries gladly accepted.

Thank you

The Movie Night Committee

 

Sacagawea Live

We confirmed much of what we knew about this famous working mother and learned even more. The myth busters we based on a fascinating "Being there" experience provided by our great PTA! Our actress was perfect and kept us enchanted for over 45 minutes with her tales of the Shoshone  woman who braved the west to guide Lewis and clark to the Pacific Ocean. The children were her Little Pomps and she taught them folklore and fact, all with the underlying message of respect. Enjoy the picture below and be sure to make it part of your dinner table conversation tonight.

We also were treated to a chorus holiday concert and learned more about solid shapes and their attributes.

Friday we will be comparing and contrasting two holiday stories. One concerns a wicked green creature who wants to steal the happiness of Whoville. Can you guess?  If it is not too much trouble, we will be wearing green on Friday to set the mood! Don't worry if you have no green to wear, it is just a suggestion and not required!

 

Cogat Scores are In

We have received first grade CogAT scores.  The vendor does not distribute individual score reports for students/parents.  If you would like a copy of your child's scores, please contact the teacher.

The CogAT measures reasoning and problem-solving skills in three different areas: verbal, quantitative, and nonverbal. Reasoning skills develop gradually throughout a person’s lifetime and at different rates for different individuals. Reasoning abilities are good predictors of success in school and are important outcomes of good schooling.   More questions?  Please download the following reference form with Frequently Asked Questions.  Download FAQ CogAT

Keyboard Sticking1

Please be advised that my keyboard at home has been sticking and I don't get the shift when I need it to begin a sentence with a capital letter! I promise we do use capital letters to begin a sentence and practice that every day. I should have done a proofread with my reading glasses. I am sorry for the errors!

 

Please remember to find some pictures of whole foods or healthy meal chioces for our dinner plate activity on Friday. Send them in any time this week.

Hi Parents! Friday is our first grade Polar Express Day. Our story wil be read at 8;20 or so to be followed by lots of fun and skills based activities. We will have an experiment by Mrs. Malone.just before lunch.
In addition to wearing our PJ's and gym shoes on Friday I have a home work assignment for you.please send in between 5-10 pictures of healthy food to be used in a nutrition lesson after lunch on Friday. the brighter the food is in color the better, but look for balance. thank you to our nutritionist, Mrs. Marjoram.
Any food magazines would be welcome for our cutting out part. Thanks!!!!!

Dear Sope Creek Famiy.
We are holding our annual Holiday Bear gift card program and would like you to consider making a gift card donation to help our Sope Creek families during this holiday season. Bears with store and amount designations are posted on the main bulletin board in the school lobby. Please consider helping by taking a bear and obtaining a gift card. Gift cards can be returned to your child’s grade level counselor by December 15. Your generosity will help to make this a brighter holiday for many of our children and their families. Thank you in advance, and may each of you have a wonderful holiday.
Your Counselors

This week flew by. We learned about Thomas Jefferson and his contributions to our country. We reviewed skip counting, even /odd numbers and ordinal numbers. We began minute our math daily quiz.
Next week on Friday we will hear "The Polar Express" from our guest reader, Ms. Appleyard, sip hot chocolate, and WEAR our PJ's all day. It's a PE day so wear or bring your sneakers! The day is one memory maker for first grade. Thanks to the parents who volunteered to send in donut holes for our hot chocolate. We'll write about the Polar Express and do some math related to the story. Later that day we'll have a nutrition lesson from Molly's mom.. We like to keep a balance!
Please pull out your spare change and count money up to $1.00 with your child. To count money one must be fluent in counting by 5, 10 and 25's. It's developmental,.. we will introduce the
counting of coins and continue to work on it as the year progresses. Many of you will be putting in lots of volunteer hours helping us with our party and all the things you do. I know how hectic this time of year is and please know how much the gift of your time means to us!
Next week we will begin our trip with Lewis and Clark as they explore the way west for Jefferson. Go to Nathional Geographic Kids online to follow at home. Hearing and vision was tested this week. All seems to be well with our crew. Enjoy this magical time of year with your children!

We had a great first day back in the classroom. Please read the message below and come out to join some of the staff,
Seasons Greetings!

Tuesday 11/ 29 is Sope Creek Spirit Night
at Chick- Fil- A - Woodlawn Square 5:00- 8:00

Students will have a great time catching up with friends and will explore the many ways to be SMART!

Give yourself a break from cooking and head on over!
Free Ice Cream!

The class with the highest percentage of students attending will earn lunch on the stage with Mrs. Whalen.

See you there!!


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