Goodbye to Ms. DeYoung!

Today, we said thank you and goodbye to Ms. DeYoung as she heads back to school to continue her own learning to be a teacher in the future. We wish you well!

Phonics Lesson 77 ar & Phonics Lesson 78 or & ore: Mar 2-6 (Reading Practice Book)

Phonics Lessons - Mar 2-6

Lesson 77: ar

The /r/ sound is a tricky sound. When we put the /r/ sound after a vowel, it completely changes the way the vowel sounds. It makes what we call an ‘r-controlled’ vowel. The r-controlled vowel ar usually represents the /ar/ sound. This can come in the middle of a word, such as the words bark and part. This can sometimes come at the end of the word, such as car and star. It can also sometimes come at the beginning of a word, such as the words art and arm. 

The sound /ar/ us produced by starting with our jaw dropped and our mouth open almost making the short /o/ sound. Then, we raise the sides of the tongue and partially close our mouth to make the /r/ part of the sound. Your voice is on.

In this week's text called, The Garden, students are looking for all the words that have the /ar/. They are looking to highlight the whole word with this spelling pattern. Students are also asked to illustrate the story to demonstrate their understanding of the text.

Lesson 78: or, ore /or/

Another r-controlled vowel sound is /or/. This sound is usually represented using the letters or and ore. The or spelling can come in the middle of a word, such as fork or corn. It can sometimes come at the beginning of the word such as orb. It can also come at the end of a word, such as for. However, when we hear /or/ at the end of a word it usually is spelled with a silent e like in the words more or store. 

For the /or/ sound, we begin with our lips rounds, almost like we're going to say /aw/, but the /r/ pulls the sides of our tongue up to say /or/. Your voice is on and this is a continuous sound that can be stretched out.   

In this week's text called, Marvel at the Shore, students are looking for all the words that have the /or/ sound based on the two different spelling patterns or, ore. They are looking to highlight the whole word with this spelling pattern. Students are also asked to illustrate the story to demonstrate their understanding of the text.

Heart (Irregular) Words of the Week

Heart words are words that do not decode or follow the spelling rules that we have been learning. We have to know them by 'heart'. However, once we learn more spelling rules, they may be only temporary heart words and the rules will come along later! In the meantime, we have been focusing on reviewing and learning the words below with focused in class practice. These will eventually (if not already) be on spelling word lists or word rings. 

This week we are reviewing:

• four
• fourth
• forty
• people

This week's new words:

• pretty
• nothing

Fluency Grids
With each lesson, there is a fluency grid with the lesson focus that is intended to help students recognize the phonics rule and assist in reading it with accuracy and automaticity. At home, challenge your young reader to read the word (aim is to decode/read each word within 3 seconds) and then recall it each time they see it within the grid of mixed up, repeated words. A couple minutes of practice is all they need. This acts as a warm up before reading the text that also applies the same skill while building on all the previous skills as well. Each week we are building on the previous week to become more fluent readers so we can focus on what the text is sharing rather than spending all the time decoding the words.

Homework Reminders
Students have been working on the story or stories in their Reading Practice book this week that will come home each weekend. At school, they work with a partner to complete their fluency grid, read with someone their story and highlight the focus words. Following, they are illustrating a picture for the text to show their understanding. 

At home, students are to finish the above tasks and read to an expert the week's lesson(s). After completing, parents are to initial at the indicated spot at the top. 

This week, we are have completed two lessons so there will be two stories to complete in their white Reading Practice booklet after the clip. Please see the information letter in the front of the book for more, detailed information about this weekend practice book coming home. Please return on Monday (or Tuesday if there is a no school day on Monday).

Happy reading!

March Reading Room

This month we are exploring fiction and non fiction books relating to St. Patrick's Day, Spring and optimism. Here are some read aloud books that we will read in class and some additional books for students to enjoy about the topics. Click on a book to listen/watch the story! 

Happy reading!

I Think I Can...I Think I Can...I Think I Can

We spent this week learning about the meaning of PERSEVERANCE with Miss DeYoung. 

Books About Perseverance

We read these stories:

Videos and Songs About Perseverance

We watched these short video clips:

We have a pretty good understanding of perseverance is. We created a brainstorm, with Miss DeYoung, of our ideas throughout the week and now have it posted in our class:

We are working on how to change our mindset to really focus on knowing we are always learning and it is ok to make mistakes. The next while, we are going to focus more on the strategies to try when we are feeling challenged and want to give up!  

February Estimate Jar

 

We were so excited to get to do our Estimate Jar for February to wrap up our month! 

Each student wrote down their estimate on their white board of how many Valentine's lollipops were in the jar. 

We discussed our rules for counting objects. We decided that counting one item at a time would take us a long time so we did groups of 2 to speed things up and practiced our counting by 2’s today.

Then for the big moment...we all took a turn going around the class and sharing our estimate. We compared numbers and how far away our estimate was from the actual total we had of the candy packages.

Olivia F was our lucky winner!!! She was just two off from the 24 treats we had in total! She knew our tradition is to share the treats with everyone in class and students brought home their treats! Olivia got to take home the leftovers! Score!

We are excited for what our March Estimate Jar item may be. We will soon get to find out! 

March Newsletter & Calendar

March Newsletter

Another super detailed newsletter for reference for the month of March! Please take some time to read when you get a chance (as we know families are extremely busy) and access if there are any questions that should arise along the way.  

March Calendar
This is our March calendar of events for Grade 1/2! Although we can send home a paper copy, this blog has the most up to date information! Check out the blog calendar regularly for upcoming dates and information &/or the Homework & Reminders page for any questions.

**A printed copy will come home for those that requested a paper version of the above documents.**

Phonics Lesson 75 -le Ending & Phonics Lesson 76 Ending Review: Feb 23-27 (Reading Practice Book)

Phonics Lessons - Feb 23-27

Lesson 75: -le ending

We have learned about syllables which helps us read and spell bigger words. Besides open and closed syllables and the vowel sounds that made with those, we also have another type of syllable. 

A final stable syllable is the final syllable that the sound is always the same. One common final stable syllable is consonant +le. The le spells the /l/ sound like at the end of the word puzzle and apple. 

To decode words with the consonant + le. we can cover up the last three letters (the final consonant + le) and look at the first syllable. We can decode this as usual with our open and closed syllable knowledge, then we read each syllable and blend it together. 

middle - mid +dle 

table - ta + ble

In this week's text called, Maple Fudge, students are looking for all the words that have the le stable syllable to end the word to make the /l/ sound (ie.maple, uncle). There is a tricky one in there that has an additional ending - can you find it? They are looking to highlight the whole word with this spelling pattern. Students are also asked to illustrate the story to demonstrate their understanding of the text.

Lesson 76: Review Ending Patterns 

This lesson is all about reviewing the endings that we have been learning about the last few weeks. With all the bus cancellations and absences, this will be important to take the time to review to really build this knowledge and application of these skills. 

• long vcc (vowel, consonant, consonant) words as in:
• -ild spells with a long /i/ sound like in the word wild, child, mild
• -ind often spells with a long /i/ sound like in the word mind, blind, kind
• -old spells with a long /o/ sound like in the word told, bold, cold, gold
• -olt often spells with a long /o/ sound like in the word bolt. colt, holt
• -ost often spells with a long /o/ sound like in the word host, most, post
• Yy making the long /i/ sound like in my
• Yy making the long /e/ sound like in baby and puppy 
• -le at the end of a word like in table and puzzle

In this week's text called, A Trip to the Jungle, students are looking for all the words that have:

• long vcc (vowel, consonant, consonant) words as in -ild, -old, -ind, -olt, -ost
• Yy making the long /i/ sound
• Yy making the long /e/ sound
• -le at the end of a word

As a tip, try to look for one at a time and aim for about 8 words total. 

They are looking to highlight the whole word. Students are also looking to illustrate the story to demonstrate their understanding of the text.

Heart (Irregular) Words of the Week

Heart words are words that do not decode or follow the spelling rules that we have been learning. We have to know them by 'heart'. However, once we learn more spelling rules, they may be only temporary heart words and the rules will come along later! In the meantime, we have been focusing on reviewing and learning the words below with focused in class practice. These will eventually (if not already) be on spelling word lists or word rings. 

This week we are reviewing:

• both
• four
• fourth
• forty

This week's new words:

• people

Fluency Grids
With each lesson, there is a fluency grid with the lesson focus that is intended to help students recognize the phonics rule and assist in reading it with accuracy and automaticity. At home, challenge your young reader to read the word (aim is to decode/read each word within 3 seconds) and then recall it each time they see it within the grid of mixed up, repeated words. A couple minutes of practice is all they need. This acts as a warm up before reading the text that also applies the same skill while building on all the previous skills as well. Each week we are building on the previous week to become more fluent readers so we can focus on what the text is sharing rather than spending all the time decoding the words.

Homework Reminders
Students have been working on the story or stories in their Reading Practice book this week that will come home each weekend. At school, they work with a partner to complete their fluency grid, read with someone their story and highlight the focus words. Following, they are illustrating a picture for the text to show their understanding. 

At home, students are to finish the above tasks and read to an expert the week's lesson(s). After completing, parents are to initial at the indicated spot at the top. 

This week, we are have completed two lessons so there will be two stories to complete in their white Reading Practice booklet after the clip. Please see the information letter in the front of the book for more, detailed information about this weekend practice book coming home. Please return on Monday (or Tuesday if there is a no school day on Monday).

Happy reading!