Preparing for the Play

October 7th-October 11th 

I think I am saying the play lines in my sleep! We have been practicing the play twice a day everyday this week. We added "costumes" and props today. They had a blast! We have worked really hard to make this play great! We are all so excited to share it with you.

**Important note about siblings coming to the play. Younger siblings are more than welcome to come to watch the play! Space will be limited, but we would love to have them join us. We are asking that you keep your older children in class so that they can continue learning! Do not forget that the play is October 15th at 11:00 am.

We finished our unit on The Three Billy Goats Gruff. Everyone should have come home with a marshmallow/toothpick bridge, and a torn troll (this was fabulous for our fine motor skills)! One other center was acting and retelling, where each child got to act out the story. The other center was a troll grass head. We planted grass seeds in a cup that we decorated to look like the troll. We already have grass growing! I think Mrs. Schultz is secretly more excited than the kids! They loved planting and have been enjoying watching them grow.

Math:

We played a new math game this week called "Let's Go Fishing." The chant goes like this...."Down by the river, down by the sea, Johnny and Sally went fishing with me. How many fish did they get?" Johnny would pull out a handful of "fish" from the "sea" (paperclips from a bowl) and then we would count them. Then Sally would pull out a handful of "fish" from the "sea" and we would count them. We would then look at who caught the most amount of "fish" and who caught the least amount of "fish." This is a great way to reinforce more/less/equal to. You can play this at home as well! We also revisited monster squeeze and a few other favorites.

Literacy:

We discussed a new reading strategy this week! Last week we talked about taking a picture walk before we read. This week we talked about "tracking" our words and remembering to "return sweep" at the end of a sentence to move to the next sentence when reading. We got to use witch fingers to help us track our words this week. How fun! We practiced tracking our words with the Five Little Pumpkins poem. One of our favorites!

We practiced more of our sight words and sounds with pretzels and marshmallows. What could be more fun? I am not sure if we did more eating or spelling, but we had a blast! This is another fun way to get practice with sight words and sounds. For sight words, you can call out a word and then have your child make that word out of pretzels and marshmallows. If your child needs more practice with certain sounds, you can call out a sound and have your child build that letter with pretzels and marshmallows. At the end, you must eat them! :) At least, we did!

We also did a very similar activity with yarn, glue and paper. I would call out a word and the kids had to spell that word with yarn and then glue it down. The same goes for sounds and letters. I called out a sound and the kids had to glue that letter down. We kept these at school, so that we could add to them next week!

We will be needing lysol wipes in the near future! We wipe down tables after snack and lunch to keep the germs away. We also wipe down at the end of the day. Lysol wipes are quick and easy! If you find them on sale or have an extra tube of lysol wipes at your house, send them in! As winter approaches, these are a must to help protect us from the germs!

We also need a few more people to send in battery powered tea lights. We will be using these to place in our pumpkins after we carve them! You can find them at the dollar store.

We are going through stickers like crazy! We love to add stickers to our books and pictures. If you ever find cute, cheap stickers...send them in as well!

Our park adventure was a success! Thanks to all the volunteers! We will go again next week.

Conferences are coming up! Please make sure you check the sign up genius and be sure you have signed up for a convenient time.

Dad Pumpkin Carving: October 29th. Don't forget!


One other reminder.....Don't forget to check out the Shutterfy website that our room parents created. There are some cute pictures up! We have been trying to remember to take more pictures during the day to post to this website! We have some very photogenic students. ;)
https://mrsschultzkand1stgradeclass.shutterfly.com

Enjoy this beautiful weather! Get outside and play this weekend!

Hugs,
Mrs. Schultz