We're Reading!!

     This week has been full of amazing progress from all of the students.  We have mastered our first 5 sight words and the -at and -an word families.  I cannot begin to express how proud I am of my students.  They continue to amaze me every week.  I have added a small video of two of our students reading.  I would've added more, but for some reason the sound didn't record right for the others.  I'll make sure to add a video of each student over the next few posts so all parents can watch their child.  I hope you are enjoying watching your child become a reader as well.  Each day the students are so excited to learn more and grow as readers.  They're finding sight words and words that they can read in all of our stories and during center time when they go to our classroom library.  I can't wait to see how well they're doing by the end of the school year.
     As well as becoming growing readers, they're growing as writers as well!  This week we read If I Ran the Zoo by Dr. Seuss.  March is reading month, so we make sure we read at least one extra book a day.  The students have been wanting nothing but Dr. Seuss, so I thought it would be fun to do a writing activity with it.  After reading the story I asked each child to draw what type of animal they would have if they owned a zoo.  The animal could be real or make believe.  After drawing their animals I  had them write ______'s Zoo and then list what animals they had.  I did NOT help with their spelling.  I am working with them to try and sound out and "stretch" words so that they can work on their spelling.  There are stages of development that go along with writing.  As you look at the different pictures you can see how they are progressing as writers.  They were very proud to be writing on their own.  No, the spelling is not correct on all words and they are missing vowels, but this is a stage in writing.  They are doing excellent and I'm very proud of how well they are doing with their writing.  We will be doing many more writing activities as the year progresses.
     Don't forget we will be having a fundraiser dinner this Friday March 23 at the school.  There will be speakers, a comedian, and the students will be doing a small activity for everyone.  I hope to see you there.  I have said this before and will say it again.  I am very happy to be working for this school.  I have never worked with such supportive parents and amazing students.  I look forward to everyday that I get to work with them.  I hope you have a wonderful week and enjoy our pictures and video!

Here are Abdulhamid & Yunis Reading!

These are our zoo writings.

Our class hand with all our names inside.

We're Reading!

I am a very proud teacher this week, actually I am every week but I'm extra proud this week.  We started our Ready2Read program and the kids love it.  We started with 5 sight words and then reviewed the -at family.  Next week we will be learning the -an word family and continuing our 5 sight words: the, and, see, I, a.  Almost all of the students can read the 5 sight words with no hesitation.  This is wonderful!  I am so proud of them.  We started building our sight word caterpillar and did our color by sight word activity.  I did not need to help them at all!  We reviewed the color words as a class and then I let them go to finish the worksheet on their own.  They were so excited to show everyone that visited our classroom that they could read.  We created our -at word family book that they got to take home and share with their families.  I hope you enjoy reading the stories with them.  They will get one of these every week to go along with the word family they are learning.  The great thing about the books is that it also corresponds with the sight words we are covering.  I will move students up when they have no hesitation in reading the sight words.  My suggestion would be to keep them in an area so that your child can start to build a library of books that they know how to read.  Practicing daily helps them gain a love for reading and also helps them review the words that we've already learned.  Enjoy the pictures of our activities this week.

Here is our Sight Word Caterpillar 

We will keeping building him every time we get new sight words!

 

Working on our Color by Sight Words

Here is some of the graphing we've been doing in Math.

We got new centers for March and the kiddos love them!

We've been reading to our "Reading Buddies" (stuffed animals)

ISofL Helps Out!

We are collecting items to help those effected by the tornados in Southern Indiana.  Anyone donation makes a difference.  The older students will be taking our donations either tomorrow or a day next week.  We are asking for monetary donations (even $1 can make a difference), storage bins, personal hygiene items, etc.  I have contacted the organization and they've said they are blessed with lots of clothes and bottled water so those are not needed.   Let's show the community that ISofL wants to help out too.  Have a wonderful day!

Ready2Read

I am so excited to announce that we are starting our Ready2Read program this week!  The kiddos are having so much fun reading their 5 sight words for this week.  Today i'll be sending home a book that covers the sight words and the -at family. We are going to read it in class today as a group.  Please read this with your child.  It is proven that you become a better reader by reading.  This book takes just a few minutes and reviews what we are learning this week.  The best part is they are all so excited!  There is more information about the program on the link attached.  There are many wonderful things on her blog as well.  We have Level 1 Units 1-8 of the program if you were wanting to look at some of the material we will be doing.  Depending on how fast we move through the program we may be getting to Level 2.  Today I will also be sending home the flash cards of our 5 sight words for this week.  We have colored them in class and they are yours to keep at home.  We make a word wall with them in our classroom and you can do the same at home or just keep them to practice.  I am so proud of my class.  They are doing a great job and we're having so much fun learning!  I'll post pictures of our activities that we do this week over the weekend.  Wishing everyone a great day!

Here is the link to the Ready2Read information.
http://moffattgirls.blogspot.com/p/ready2read.html

Open House

     Thank you so much to the parents and students that came out yesterday! I was so proud of the students. They have been working hard all week to prepare for it.
     This week we had a visit from Kenzie's mom who is a dentist. The children loved listening to her teach us about how to take care of our teeth. We have been talking about our teeth and how to keep them healthy so I was very proud to see them raising their hand and answering all the questions she had for them.
     Also this week we finished learning the letters in the alphabet. Because of early dismissal on Friday we did not get to take our assessment so we will be doing that this coming week.
     Next week we will be starting sight words! The students are so excited and so am I! I have such an advanced group of kids and they make my job lots of fun. We have a new program called Ready2Read that we will be starting. I will be typing up information about that and sending it home very soon.
     I hope everyone was able to stay safe on Friday. I am from Indiana and a town only 5 minutes away from where my entire family lives was completely devastated.  Many families were effected by this tragedy. Thankfully my family got to a safe location and none were hurt. Please try to keep those who were effected in your thoughts and prayers as they go through this hard time. There are many places taking donations if you would like to help out to whas11.com and fox41.com have lists of drop off locations.
    Again I want to thank all the families who came on Saturday and also the kind words from the families. It is very rewarding to a teacher to hear the kind words that I have received. Thank you so much and I will see everyone tomorrow =)