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Welcome to First Grade at New Boston Central School. I am thrilled to be welcoming so many outstanding children into our classroom community. I hope you have had an exciting summer, I sure did. Where did you go...what did you do this summer? Many people buy t-shirts for these wonderful memories. Now is your chance to create the perfect t-shirt to share with your new classmates. You can include pictures of where you went, who was with you, what you did – the possibilities are endless. We will be sharing our t-shirts the first few days of school to help us get to know each other. I have included a blank t-shirt in your welcome letter. Decorate it anyway you want. Be sure to put your name on the back of your paper and bring it to school on our first day together.
School Supplies: The only school supplies that you will need are a backpack and a pocket folder (binders are too big for our mailboxes and NBCS will provide all of your writing and art supplies). Your pocket folder and backpack will be used to bring papers to and from school. You can pick any design or color for your pocket folder that you would like. We have found that the flat, heavy cardboard or plastic folders seem to be the most durable and will fit the best in your mailbox. Please label your backpack and folder with your first and last name. I would love to meet you before school begins. Please feel free to drop into the classroom on Thursday, August 29, 2019 from 1:30 – 2:30. You will have a chance to see our new classroom and get reacquainted with friends. **Mark your calendar: Back-to-School Night, September 9th at 6:05 p.m. (more details to come later). Check out the "First Grade Facts" link on our web page for additional important information. I am sure you have many questions for me at this point. Bring your questions and your smiles with you. I am looking forward to an outstanding year together.
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It’s hard to believe that this will be the last Math Giraffe update for the year. Field Day last Friday was SO much fun! A huge thank you to Ms. Baines and to all of the volunteers. These last two days (actually 1-1/2) will include one last problem solver (we just can’t get enough of them), some writing, some reading, some crafts, and tying up some loose ends. It feels like your children just walked through the classroom door for the very first time. And now, they walk back out that same door pounds heavier, inches taller, more responsible, more mature, and much wiser. We have loved watching their personalities unfold day by day and marvel at this splendid miracle of development. During our first grade experience together have lived, loved, laughed, played, worked hard, learned, and enriched each other’s lives. So many wonderful memories were created this year. Thank you for sharing your amazing children with us. Best wishes to you and your family for the many more memories that await you. Cindy Blythe, Lynn Queen, and Chris Belanger  Our last full week of school will be a little mixed up.
Tuesday we head to Odiorne Point for our Field Trip visiting the Rocky Shore. Remember to check and double-check the checklist that was sent home for the items your child will need. The weather is not looking too promising – I’m keeping my fingers crossed that this is one time the meteorologists are wrong and I’m happy with it! Friday we will participate in Field Day. Please have your child wear their yellow class t-shirt and sneakers, bring a hat, put on sunscreen/bug spray, and bring a water bottle. We will be fitting in our Wonders program his week. The Essential Question is: What is a tradition? What traditions do you know about? We will be learning about different traditions in other cultures as well as discussing our own traditions. Our spelling and phonics focus is three-letter blends. As you have noticed, the words have been getting so difficult. We continue to practice them daily in school. strike, spray, splash, split, scrape, three Our sight words are: your, heard…with exposure to: before, front, push, tomorrow. This week with our Wonders program we will focus on the Essential Question: How can weather affect us? We will be talking and reading about different kinds of weather and how it affects our lives. A nice connection will be made between this year’s cold and rainy weather and the forecast for the remainder of the school year. Our Spelling Words this week are words with: wr, kn, gn: gnat, gnu, know, knife, write, wrong. Our high-frequency words are: been, their - - with exposure to: children, month, question, year. Did your children share with you our “spelling test” results. Everyone had so much fun spelling all the words. It was important to work as a team and then share out together! We will have another “spelling test” this Friday. Your children discovered that the better they were able to spell these words...the more help they were to their teammates. Just a reminder that we will be presenting "Best Time Ever" at the school’s last Community Meeting on Thursday morning. Please make sure your child is wearing sneakers to school. They will be wearing their yellow t-shirts. As you know during the course of the day we have many movement/brain breaks. Your children love these exercises. In fact, since the first day of school we have exercised for 8054 minutes (134 hours). Wow! We will continue exploring lights and sound this week with Mystery Science. This week’s focus will be: How do boats find their way in the fog? Below are pictures from last week’s investigation. Your children successfully sent “secret” messages to their friends using a flashlight. Be sure to ask them about this. Our field trip to Odiorne Point is next Tuesday, June 11th. This week we will start learning about the Rocky Shore. Make sure you sign and return the permission slip. We would love volunteers - - just make sure you have been designated as an approved volunteer. This week with our Wonders program the Essential Question is: Who helps you? Teamwork is the key to making any task easier and a lot more fun! We will also focus on jobs that people do to help children. So many community workers play an important part in our lives.
Our Spelling Words are: haul, cause, saw, claw, paw, dawn. Our sight words are: love, friend - - with exposure to: brother, father, mother, picture. We will be reviewing and practicing these spelling words and spelling patterns all week. Beginning this week and running until the end of the school year – there will not be any more “formal” spelling assessments or homework sent from school. HOWEVER – please continue to read with your child every night for at least 15 minutes. Just a reminder about Tuesday’s Field Trip:
Have you heard about our three baby chicks? They are adorable and very loud! Your children have loved learning about the life cycle of a chicken. Using time-lapse photography we were able to capture the hatching process. It was amazing to watch. The chicks worked so hard getting out of their egg shells! Our chicks will be with us until Friday.
This week in our Wonders program we will focus on the Essential Question of: How can we work together to make our lives better? We will be reading and talking about ways people can work together. This is a perfect connection to what we have discovered at school - - it is much more fun to work with a friend to accomplish a task. Teamwork makes the job easier and better.
Our spelling words will be various spellings of the “u” sound: moon tune, flew, blue, fruit, soup. This will be tricky because there are no patterns to follow. Our sight words are: enough, door - - with exposure to: answer, brought, busy, eyes. We will continue to look at 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional shapes. Ask your child what polygon is and what the characteristics/rules are for them. (Straight lines, no overlapping, no openings). We will also firm up our knowledge on clocks and telling time to the half-hour and the hour. Hard to believe but we are gearing up to the last weeks of school. Yikes! We are starting (and finishing) assessments. We had a little scare this morning...our incubator broke down. We weren't sure when this happened over the weekend. We were able to get another incubator and transferred the eggs over. The good news is that when we candled them at the end of the day - we saw movement. Yahoo!
This will be an assessment and review week for us. As such, our Spelling Words will be some of the challenging Sight Words: learn, build, would, climb, more, sure
A couple of reminders: if you haven’t signed up for a Spring Conference yet, be sure to go onto the link sent via email and select a day/time. Upcoming Events: Tuesday, May 28th: Pete the Cat at the Capital Center Thursday, June 6th: we are presenting at the last Community Meeting Tuesday, June 11th: Odiorne Field Trip Friday, June 14th: Field Day Tuesday, June 18th: Half Day, Last Day of First Grade We had a wonderful visit with Mrs. Sue Makowiecki, a former member of our NBCS family. Mrs. Makowiecki is an expert on animals. She brought her egg collection in to share with us. We learned about the eggs from an Ostrich, Emu, Goose, Turkey, and Pheasant. Mrs. Makowiecki taught us about adaptations and camouflage - - two important concepts that are necessary for survival. We were thrilled to see frog eggs that Mrs. Makowiecki had found in her pond. She also shared some information about the Kill Deer Bird, which we have encountered on our playground! This rare and wonderful bird lays its eggs on flat, sandy surfaces (our soccer field on the playground is ideal). We all made a promise to try to help protect this bird and her eggs when we are outside playing. A huge and heartfelt THANK YOU to Mrs. Makowiecki for taking time out of her schedule to spend time with us. |
