K-1

Mar 16, 2014

Design and Ownership

In the K/1 classroom and in every classroom at Parker, the children are inspired to take responsibility and ownership of their learning. This became apparent as the K/1s prepared for Sudent-led Conferences this past week. The children received much support and encouragement from their teachers, as they spent time going through their work and choosing material to share with their families at Student-led Conferences. The children also practiced sharing their work with one or two of their peers. During this preparation process, the children reflected on their work, "this was a long time ago my writing is much better now," a child commented while going through her Language Arts folder. Another child's comment, "I only did a little response sheets but I read a lot books, I'm gonna do more response sheets next time it's just that I like to read more than write." Another child (a kindergartner), "I didn't finish my writing in the frog book." "You don't have to finish you could say it's a work in progress," was the response from a first grader. There were other similar comments from several more children and they all reflected the ability of our K/1 Parker students to reflect, plan, take responsibility, recognize consequences from their choices, and take ownership of their work. It's quite amazing and it all begins in kindergarten!

The photos show children writing the morning message. Since the children began taking turns writing the morning message, there has been much excitement and anticipation. They are excited because writing the morning message is writing for a purpose. The anticipation involves sharing the morning message, at morning meeting, and talking about the picture the child chooses to draw along with the message. There is a "Morning Message Words" sheet posted next to the white board to help the children with their spelling. Also the children receive support from their teacher, as needed. The purpose for the children writing the morning message is to encourage the children to write for an audience, develop confidence in sharing (public speaking), practice writing letters, words, sentences, and create a message and a picture.

The photos also show children engaged in science class. The children are working diligently on making predictions, designing, and constructing a Marble Escape Course Design. This week the K/1s concluded their exploration of Force and Motion. During this study the children were mainly challenged to determine what changes a ball's motion. In the following, I am quoting Kate, our science teacher. "The children performed lots of experimentation with pushes, pulls, drops, bounces, ramps, sizes, and shapes. The K/1s hypothesized, tested and analyzed their results for how surface materials, applied forces, height, ramp angles, curved paths and surface texture make a difference with how a ball moves. Collaborating in small groups to construct a 6' path for their marble, the K/1s eagerly applied appropriate skills, learning, and force and motion concepts to help their marble make it through."

Have a peaceful week,

Liliana

Mar 6, 2014

Read Across America 2014

A fun day for everyone!

A special visit from Mary Poppins!

Author and Illustrator Sylvie Kantorovitz

We read and

read and

read!

We read some more....

Mary Poppins introduced the storyteller.....

Story teller Ken Busman

The Cat in the Hat led the parade.

Keep smiling!

Liliana

Mar 2, 2014

K/1 Happenings - three days before the February break and four days after the break.

During this time the K/1's continued with their usual routines. In Language Arts the children chose work from a variety of activities including the "frog" books, reading responses, independent reading, reading with a teacher, and reading with a buddy. I worked one-on-one with every child to assess and get a more detailed picture of where everyone is in their learning journey. I do these individualized assessments at least three times a year. Although I am aware, at all times, of everyone's learning needs and accomplishments, these more formalized assessments serve to show me more precisely the next step needed for every child. I will be sharing your child's progress in the next progress report due, I believe, in a couple of weeks.

We have continued, also, to read books by John Burningham. The children ask to have these books read to them over and over. We reviewed all that we have noticed about Burningham's books, and discussed our next unit of study - Birds of the Northeast. We borrowed some books from the library and will begin to read about birds next week.

The K/1's are looking forward to finishing illustrating the story books they wrote several weeks back when we began learning about story structure. The children have been illustrating the books in Art class, with Susie. The children dictated their stories to their middle school buddies. The buddies were instructed to take the children's dictation and work with them to reinforce story structure skills they had learned in language arts classes.Before the books were given to Susie, each child met with an adult to edit the story. During this time each child reviewed whether the story had a beginning, middle, and end. Depending on the child's readiness, punctuation was also discussed. Also depending on the child's readiness, we discussed what it means to write for an audience. The reason the stories were dictated was to free each child to focus on story structure. At this age usually children focus more on letter formation and phonetic spelling when they write independently. The stories are typed because they are considered published work, and we wanted them to resemble a book. The stories have animal characters because they were inspired by our fall study on homes and habitats.

The children have been taking turns writing the morning message. Almost everyone has had a chance to write the message. We have a few more children needing to take a turn, then we will begin the round again and will keep it up until the end of the school year. Every day we draw a name from a bag and that's how the children take turns. The children look forward to this activity with excitement every day.

We enjoyed Addie's mom reading to us, and doing an activity (see photos).

In Science with Kate, the K/1's continued their study on Motion. They conducted experiments with ramps -predicting the speed of a ball travelling down ramps at different heights (see photo). The K/1's also are in the process of designing a "marble escape course." The course includes a ramp, a curve, and a rebound. The children worked in groups of 2-3 to design the tracks. They will be testing their ideas in the next science class. Then they will be meeting as a group to discuss what worked well, what didn't, and how they fixed the problems.

In First Grade Math, the children reviewed naming and describing 3-D shapes. We read Sir Cumference and the Sword in the Cone a Math Adventure by Cindy Newschwander. The book introduces the "Two's Test." The children tested this on their own. They found it quite challenging but also fun. The "Two's Test" or Euler's Law, involves counting edges, sides, and corners of solids then adding and subtracting according to a formula, and the answer is always two. Also the children have been working on addition and subtraction story problems. They have been exploring best ways to use counters to come up with an answer. Before the children solved problems independently, they gathered on the rug to solve story problems, as a group, using counters to come up with an answer. The children shared how they arrived at an answer, with the group, or a partner.

We are looking forward to Read Across America Day. For details, please make sure you read the email introducing this blog post.