Weekly Wrap-Up (Last two weeks)

It has been a very quick two weeks here in the classroom. I apologize for not having a weekly update for you last week. I am folding the last two weeks into this wrap-up. The class has been getting an awful lot done, so let’s see what we were up to, on to the highlights!!!



Math:

We have had a lot of great lessons in math over the past two weeks. We revisited combinations of 10 and focused a lot on this concept. This led us to our unit four assessment last week. This week saw us focus on the place value concept. On Monday and Tuesday we practiced using base-ten blocks to make exchanges and to build two-digit numbers. Wednesday saw us take that place value knowledge and extend it to money. We had a fun activity where a banker collected pennies from the class and then used those pennies to make exchanges for dimes. The class had a lot of fun with this activity. Thursday we touched on greater than, less than, and equal to concepts. This will be something that I plan on re-teaching when we return from break in the New Year.



Science:

We have had a lot of fun in our motion unit these past two weeks. We have looked at the force, which we defined as a push or a pull. This disappointed some kids who were quite excited to learn more about “The force.” This disappointment quickly faded as we got to our hands-on activity. During our class party on Friday we had some fabulous parents help the class explore the concept of collisions. The kids had opportunities to explore and document different collision experiments. Thank you to the parents that helped with this center.



Phonics:

In phonics we have spent a lot of time on two subjects: consonant clusters and long vowel, short vowel comparisons. I was very pleased with how the class internalized both of these concepts. I did have some kids express displeasure with spending so much time on these subjects, but I reiterated to them the importance of practice, practice, and practice.


Writing:

We spent a lot of time over the last two weeks writing letters. Last week, the class, along with Mrs. Miller’s kindergarteners, wrote holiday cards for a local hospice. The kids really enjoyed this activity and particularly loved being mentors to the younger kindergartners. I look forward to more activities like this in the future.



This was a brief snippet of the goings on in the classroom over the past two weeks. We also had a fabulous class party on Friday. Thank you to John and Kelly for helping to organize this terrific event. Have a great break everyone and I look forward to seeing you next year!