It is hard to believe that this is the last post of 2024!  Like most people, Mrs. Underwood, Ms. Morse and I find ourselves wondering how another year has passed so quickly. And, like some people, we find ourselves taking time to reflect upon the paths that we traveled on this trip "once around the sun".  There are many things that we are thankful for in 2024, including our families, our friends, and our health. We are hugely thankful for the opportunity to teach your children at Woodstock Elementary School. Each day we learn as much from them as they learn from us, and it is this type of connection with our students that makes first grade such a fulfilling place to spend our days. We appreciate all you do to support your children in their learning and readiness for whatever the day brings, and we honor the trust that you place in us to guide their development as learners and as people.  This post sends our best wishes for a happy, safe, and peaceful new year.

PBIS Pompom Classroom Celebration: Holiday Craft

Snowy Days Have Arrived!

Thank you for sending your student to school everyday with the snowclothes they need to be safe, dry and comfortable on the playground and in the classroom. It is a lot of gear to manage and first graders are doing a great job! Please also remember to help them pack inside shoes every day OR send an extra pair to leave in their cubby. 

WIN Cycle 2: What I Need

The second school-wide WIN (What I Need) cycle begins next week. WIN is an all-school intervention, extra practice, or enrichment block that meets for 30 minutes four times per week.  During this cycle, students will work in small and large groups to receive data-driven instruction in content and skill areas that will most benefit them as learners. This includes participating in foundational early literacy groups with Ms. Bahlenhorst or Mrs. Hubbell, reading fluency and grade level reading fluency and comprehension groups with Mrs. MacMaster, Mrs. Underwood, and Ms. Morse, a foundational early math group with Ms. Sleeper, or a social emotional learning group with Mrs. Klocek.

Math: Adding and Subtracting Within 20

First graders recently began a new math unit focused on adding and subtracting within 20. Learning goals include applying the properties of operations and using the relationship between and subtraction as a strategy for solving problems. As a foundational understanding of place value and our base 10 number system, students are exploring unitizing, the idea that 10 ones as a unit is called "a ten". They will grow their knowledge of teen numbers as 10 + some number of ones and use this knowledge to add and subtract. First graders will continue solving story problems throughout the unit and learn two new problem types--Add To, Start Unknown ( ____ + 3 = 13) and Take From, Change Unknown (13 - ____ = 10). 

Fourth Grade Readers!

 Fourth grade members of the Wildcat Club have been visiting our homeroom on Wednesdays to read to first graders during lunch. We all look forward to this special time with older students!

Literacy: The Sun, Moon, and Stars and Suffix -s

In Literacy we have shifted our focus from tools to learning about the sun, moon and stars. We have begun to examine literary texts about celestial objects. First Graders are exploring the question, “Why do writers write about the sun, moon and stars?". Our work began this week by focusing on noticings and wonderings about the sun and moon with close viewings of photographs and time-lapse videos. We then began to do a "close read" of two different texts and respond to reading through writing. 

During word study students have been introduced to the concept of base word and suffix. They have learned that when suffix -s is added to a word it sometimes says /z/ like in the word bugs.  First graders have been taught about using a suffix to make a word plural or to use in an action word.  Heart words for this unit include: were, are, who, what, when, where, there, here.

Second Step: Accidents Happen

Our Second Step social and emotional learning program lesson focused on accidents this week.  Building on previous empathy lessons regarding identifying and caring about one another's feelings and how feelings change in different situations, activities and discussions used positive and negative if-then scenarios and role playing to define an accident as something that happens to cause an unintended problem and to practice appropriate responses when an accident happens.  Students took turns modeling language for solving the problem when they are the cause of an accident (such as spilling milk on a friend's lunch or throwing a ball that bounces and splashes someone with muddy water): "I'm sorry.  It was an accident.  Are you okay?" or if they are impacted by the result of an accident: "Thank you for apologizing".

Billings Farm: Tools and Work

 

Halloween Parade!

 

Parent-Guardian/Teacher Conference Schedule

Below is the schedule for parent-guardian/teacher conferences.  I look forward to seeing you to discuss your student's academic and social progress so far this year.

Thursday, November 7th

Alexander-7:10-7:30 a.m. Miles-7:30-7:50 a.m.

Noah-3:00-3:20 Brooklyn-4:00-4:20 Barbara-5:20-5:40

Victoria-3:20-3:40 TJ-4:40-5:00 George-5:40-6:00

Josie-3:40-4:00 Logan-5:00-5:20 Winnie-6:10-6:30

Thursday, November 14th

Euphemia-3:00-3:20 Carter-4:00-4:20

Elliot- 3:20-3:40

Apple-3:40-4:00

Literacy: Tools, Habits of Character, and an Upcoming Field Trip

In Literacy students are examining the book, “The Little Red Pen.” First graders are learning to identify characters' feelings using evidence from the illustrations and text. In anticipation of working with a group to create a magnificent thing for our classroom, they continue to learn about habits of character as personified classroom tools pull together to solve a problem. This week’s focus question was: “What work does initiative help the characters do?”

On Friday, November 22 we will be traveling to Billings Farm for a culminating field trip for the tools and work unit. The purpose of this adventure is to learn about tools on the farm and to celebrate Vermont's heritage of hard work. We plan to leave school around 9:30 and will return to school around 1:00. Students should bring a  bagged lunch, including a healthy snack, to eat at the farm (please plan on packing your child a home lunch on that day.)  Please let me know if your child will need a peanut butter and jelly sandwich from the school cafeteria that day.

Math: All Kinds of Story Problems

First graders are currently working through the final section of Unit 2, focused on understanding, representing, and solving a variety of story problems types including add to/take from, put together/take apart, and compare problems. Students are investigating how to match equations to story problems and write their own equations to match story problems as the investigate the relationship between addition and subtraction. They are trying to make sense of and use equations with a symbol for the unknown, such as 10 = ___ + 6.  This is meaty work!

Try asking your mathematician to solve the following problems:

(Compare) Clare has 8 pencils. Andre has 10 pencils. How many more pencils does Andre have? 

How do you know? 

(Put Together) Diego has 6 pens. His mother gives him some more pens. Now he has 9 pens. Howm many pens does Diego's mother give him? 

How do you know? 

Look For and Return Parent/Teacher Sign-Up Sheets This Week!

Parent/Teacher conferences are on November 7th and November 14th! Gold conference sign-up sheets are in your child's orange folder this week and we encourage you to indicate your first, second, and third choice of time slots and return the gold sheet to school ASAP.  We will do our best to honor your selections, however conference times will be scheduled on a first returned, first assigned basis. Thank you.

Helper of the Day!

 Helper of the Day is one of first graders' favorite classroom jobs. Duties of this daily position include (but are not limited to 😀) acting as line leader, messenger, paper passer-outer, and retrieving and returning the lunch cart from the cafeteria.

Halloween Parade

Woodstock Elementary School's annual Halloween parade around the village green is scheduled for Thursday, October 31. If your child chooses to wear a costume in the parade, please send it to school that morning in a labeled bag; we will allow time before the parade for kiddos to change.  Costumes should be safe and comfortable for walking, have a clear field of vision, and be weapon-free.  Thank you!

Picture Retake Day is November 1...

 ...please let me or Mrs. Hecker know if your child needs their photo taken 

(tiffany.hecker@mtnviews. org). Thank you! 

Math: Put Together/Take Apart and Addend Unknown

                                             

Our Unit 2 math work continues with a focus on put together/take apart and addend unknown problems. This work gives students experience with developing their understanding of the relationship between addition and subtraction.  

Put Together/Take Apart problems involve part-part-whole relationships rather than actions or a change over time. To provide visual support for making sense of the relationships between the total and the two parts, students played the center game Shake and Spill. It’s also used to help generate strategies when students are introduced to problems where one addend is unknown,

The lack of action makes it more likely that students may think of this problem type in different ways. Some students see it as finding how many to add to get to the known part, while others may think of the problem as removing the known part from the total to find the unknown part. Students continue to highlight the ways they make sense of problems with objects and drawings and annotate the problems with equations: 4 + ___ = 9 or 9 - ___ = 4)

Literacy: Digraphs and Habits of Character

First graders began a new unit in our Fundations phonics/word study program on Wednesday.  Most are fluently recognizing, using, and applying the letter/sound relationship for consonants in reading and writing, and many have gained proficiency with short vowel sounds. This week, students were introduced to digraphs, two letters that "stick together" to form one sound: wh, sh, ch, th, and ck. They learned that /wh/ is only used at the beginning of a word and that /ck/ is only used at the end of a word. When "tapping" to spell or read, digraphs get a one finger touch to represent one sound, even though there are two letters.  First graders were also introduced to four new trick words that they need to be able to read and spell automatically: as, has, to, into. Please help your child practice all of our trick words and challenge him or her to be a "digraph detective" by noticing and talking about digraphs in print and in spoken words! .                         

During EL, students are building their understanding of work and tools by considering how habits of character (initiative, perseverance and collaboration) help us do work.  Students will complete various work challenges to deepen their understanding of this concept.  This week students engaged in a collaborative cup tower challenge.  Additionally, First Graders are participating in a series of active, close read-alouds of The Most Magnificent Thing.  They will be closely studying the main character's behavior and actions and looking for examples of habits of character.