Happy New Year!

Happy New Year everyone!  We started the new year off with a bang!   You should have heard the excitement in the air on the first day back!  You'd think two weeks apart was a lifetime.  Added to the happiness of seeing each other again, there was SNOW!   We have a schedule to use the sledding hill and our days to sled are Mondays and Thursdays, but luckily, we had a chance to use the hill on Wednesday to celebrate 100% of our class meeting their reading goals for December.  By Thursday, Mr. Hoekstra had to close the hill, so at least we had one chance to sled and will hope for more snow soon.

Accomplishing lessons and activities seemed to take longer than I anticipated this week.  Probably because there was a large amount of socializing going on and we need to get back into our routine.  This week will be much better I'm sure.

In math we began chapter 6 this week.  This chapter involves telling time.  Our curriculum requires that the children know the names for the parts of a clock (face, hour hand, minute hand), and can tell time to the hour and the half hour.  I do teach the kids about how to tell time to the five minute intervals as well, but they will not be tested or do practice activities requiring it.  In the photos below, we were practicing building various analog times on mini clocks, and writing the digital time on gel boards.

We will also be starting IPals on Fridays from now until the end of the year!   Mrs. Sikma's third graders will be partnered up with a first grader.  Half of the pairs will do IPad activities while the other half works on laptops.  They will alternate weekly.  When using the IPads, they will work on various educational apps with their partner.  On the laptops, they will work on IXL activities, which are math activities specifically aligned with our curriculum.  Mrs. Sikma and I are very excited to start IPals.  Not only will it give the first graders a chance to learn how to use the IPads and practice their skills, it also gives the third graders the opportunity to 'mentor' a younger student!  Check out the photos below of our initial trial run!

This weekend I saw some friends from a neighboring district with a son in first grade.  I was so happy to hear that he has been visiting "Fabulous First Graders" regularly and trying out the links and playing various learning games!   Please allow your child to view our blog!  It is fun for them to see themselves on the blog, and the links are first grade/lower elementary specific.  The games may be fun, but they also learn from them!  If you have other suggestions for links I can add, please let me know.  

Have a great week everyone.  May 2012 be the best it can be!