Leverett School Grade 1 Joyful Learning For Young Children 

Look who showed up in First Grade today for Character Day!

We read books about Fairy Houses and used the nature items we collected in the woods last week to build our own Pumpkin Houses for a small animal or fairy to visit.  Your child will be bringing one home today.

Oh, the fun and the mess it was to gut our own pumpkins!

Then we got to carefully decorate the insides to create a cozy home for a visitor.  We put them on display in our “museum” for all to see.

Here is a peak at Choice Time and what some of our creative builders have been making in the midst of their play time.

Here is a quick peak at what we are learning in math:

We went outside today for Forest Fun.  We went in search of items from nature that we could use to build a cozy animal/fairy home inside the Pumpkin Houses we are making next Wednesday on Halloween.

In addition to making Pumpkin Houses, we are also having Character Day next Wednesday.  Children are invited to come to school dressed up as a character from a book.  Here are the guidelines:

-The character you pick must come from a book, not a movie.

-Weapons need to stay at home.

-No masks that cover your entire face.

-Nothing bloody, gory or too scary.  It’s for school!

Hope you are able to come have some scary fun at the PTO’s Halloween Party, which is here at school tonight.  The kids are very excited about it!

Every week we have a new VIP (very important person) in First Grade.  This special role means you get to bring in something special from home to share with the whole class, and then take questions and comments from your classmates about what you brought in.  Also, when we do our Paths (social curriculum) lesson, the VIP gets to sit in our compliment chair and receive compliments from the teacher, the students, and one you give to yourself.  These are recorded and sent home for families to see and add on to.  Ask your child when their VIP turn is coming up.  Jobs rotate each week and this is one of the jobs kids get most excited about!

Today in writing we sat with partners to read our stories to them and get feedback on our work.  They are becoming great writers AND listeners to their peers’ work.

 

Fall is here!  Look at the bulletin board we made to show the changing seasons, and all that happens to our Earth depending on where the sun is in our sky.

This beautiful tub of pumpkins showed up in our classroom today.  We are saving them to use for a special project on Halloween.  🙂

We had a great field trip today to the Hitchcock Center!

 

When we returned to the classroom, we met our 4th grade reading buddies for the first time.  Children interviewed each other and then took time to read to each other.  We will continue this reading partnership with our new friends throughout the year.

Dear Parents and Supporters of First Grade,

If you notice up above, there are tabs that take you to different pages on our blog full of information about our classroom.  One of them is “Wish List”, which has general supplies we are always in need of.

We also have a special request.  You have probably noticed the flexible seating we are trying to build in our classroom this year:

The kids love it!  Especially the bouncy balls!!  The balls allow the kids to wiggle around while doing their work, which really helps young children focus, accomplish more, and be happier at school.  This year we were lucky to have 4 yoga balls donated to our classroom.  Unfortunately, 3 of them have already gotten a hole in them from a pencil and we are trying to repair them.  As wonderful as they are, we are realizing this is something we will need to repair/replace often.

If anyone is interested in helping us build our collection of bouncy balls and happy kids, and is able to support this new endeavor,  please follow the link below to purchase a ball for our classroom.  We have found the larger size ball works best.

Thank you for considering and please watch for more pictures to come of happy, bouncing kids working away in first grade!

With Thanks,

Alissa

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