I hope you are all doing well. I don't know about you but I was quite surprised to see the snow this morning, when I went out to cook my breakfast on the grill. As I said last week, if your child is wearing boots to school, please make sure he/she has a pair of sneakers or shoes to change in to. They are welcome to leave the shoes here at school,if you wish.
A view from my deck this morning.
Today the students recorded their New Hampshire learning using Flip Grid. I will go through them tonight and score them. If you want to see/listen to their recordings, click here. The goal of the passport entries, at the current time, is to get 1st graders writing sentences and for the 2nd graders to write paragraphs. As we progress, we will change the criteria for each grade level. The writing has been great and the kids seem to be enjoying this study of the states. Below is a picture of a 2nd grade passport entry. It is great to see what catches their interest as they study each state.
Wednesday's off site day. We will have a meeting at 8:45 on Wednesday. We will be working on a literature project using the book The Day the Crayons Quit. The students will also have to do several asynchronous activities, Please see this schedule or check the last few emails that I have sent you. PLEASE note the homework schedule that is on the linked schedule.
NOTES:
*Several students did not complete their remote writing assignments while they were remote this past Thursday and Friday. Your child will have that assignment in their plastic bag tonight. Please have him/her complete it and bring it back tomorrow.
*Reading Groups Started today. Your child will have a book to share and/or read, this evening. If you child doesn't have a book, it means that they still have one of mine at home. Please find it and return it ASAP.
That is all for now. I hope you have a great week.
I hope you all had a great week and are ready for the weekend. This week we welcomed a new student to our classroom. Otto Duckworth joined our class (in person) on Thursday. Otto is a first grade boy and comes to us from Antarctica. He has spent time swimming with penguins and is working on his role in Happy Feet 3. JUST KIDDING! Otto has moved up here from Massachusetts. I am psyched to have Otto join our class. Speaking of new connections, all of the students will now be in person 4 days a week. It will be great to have everyone in school together and give everyone the opportunity to meet each other.
4:1 Model Notes: Click this link to see the schedule for our class during the newest learning model. I have set it up so that Wednesday's can be as flexible as possible. We will have one live meeting each Wednesday and then the students will have some asynchronous tasks. The idea is that it will give you the most flexibility in your schedule. The asynchronous work can be done at any point during that day. Please let me know if you have any questions.
A student sharing their journal entry
This week we journeyed to New Hampshire. The students did a great job with their passport entries. They will make their New Hampshire video on Monday. Here is a link of the videos they made about their Vermont learning.
Monday will mark the start of formal reading instruction and we will be in full swing with all of our academic instruction. The students have been split into small groups and I will meet with each group daily (every in person day). The groups are not based on grade level but rather on instructional needs of your child. Each night your child will bring home a book to read. Please make sure the book is brought back each day. The books should be kept in your child's homework bag.
PARENT CONFERENCES: In a week or so, you will be sent a link to sign up for parent conferences. These conferences will give us a chance to talk about your child, how their start has been, and about the goal they have set for the 1st part of the year. I would like to have your child be part of the conference. If your child isn't with you and we are doing a virtual conference, we can do have them join via Zoom too. Please be on the lookout for the sign up link. You will receive it via email.
That is all for now. I hope you all have a great weekend.
Peace,
Tommy
A student is practicing the skill of subtraction during math class
I hope you all had a great weekend. I trust that you all saw my email last night and watched the videos that were attached. Remember, there is no live meetings with me this Wednesday.
Today the students journeyed to New Hampshire as they started their study of our 2nd state in our unit of study. This week they are spending their time in New Hampshire. During read aloud time we read the book G is for Granite. You can check it out through your child's Epic book account or use this link.
Pictured to the right and down below are two student passport entries from their Vermont page. This is a great illustration of our green mountains and the other is of our state flower, the red clover.
NOTES:
*Please watch the videos I emailed you all yesterday.
*If your child has a whistle or a loud noise maker, please save it for dinnertime t your house and reserve from sending it with them to school.
*If your child is not bringing home a reading book, each night, it is because he/she still has one at home. Please remind them to put it in their plastic bag.
That is all for now. I hope you all have a great week. Next week starts our 4 days in person. I don;t know about you but I Can't Wait!.
I hope this finds you all well and coming off a great weekend. I feel like we received some bonus early fall weather this weekend and it was nice to have some time to enjoy it. Today the students walked into a classroom full of tables and chairs. We are starting to prep for the return of all of the students. Although the plexi-glass isn't installed yet (will be tomorrow) we were able to space the group at a safe distance and use them today.
Speaking of all the students coming for 4 days a week of in person instruction, we will be moving to our 4:1 model very soon. This will be a relief for so many parents trying to work and keep their child caught up with school work. I would like to have a informational Zoom meeting (I would like to have a informational Zoom meeting regarding this learning model on Thursday, October 15 @ 8:00 pm. This will give you all time to get your families fed and maybe even in bed. The meeting is not intended for students so please don;t ask them to join. It will give me a chance to go over the schedule and outline what the Wednesday (off site day) will look like. It will also allow you to ask any questions you may have. To join the meeting please click this link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/9886582893.
I ASK that you register for the meeting by signing up on this document. This will allow me to know who is attending in advance.
Today's Tom Thumb Award winners from math class (pictured left). These kids won a prize and got a picture with the trophy. You will see there are no girls in the picture. This is not a sexist thing but rather none of the families provided me a first grade girl for my Monday/Tuesday group. Just wanted to be clear 😀.
That is all for now. I will see everyone at 8:45 tomorrow for our Morning Meeting followed by a literature project meeting at 9:45.
Today we started our travels around the United States. The students filled out their passports and dove into learning about the state of Vermont. They all seem really psyched with this project and the writing that is going on (already) is amazing. If you haven't watched the video that I posted (on Friday's blog post), I highly recommend that you watch it by clicking here. If any of you would like to be a guest (virtual) speaker about a state or read a children's book about a state, please let me know.
A Passport Entry
Sorry For the Confusion:
I apologize if there was some confusion with the asynchronous writing tasks for the Monday/Tuesday students. The only writing you have to do for Monday and Tuesday is the Weekly News Journal. I never sent the leaf pictures back home so we will start those Thursday in class and then make it part of next week's work).
Homework Bags & Reading Books:
I wanted to reiterate how the book of choice and/or reading group books are kept track of. I have a lot of books in my classroom library and love that kids can pick out books to read. Each night, I let the kids bring home a book of choice or an assigned reading group book. I don;t waste the time to write down each selection but rather put it in their Ziploc bag and send it home. When they return the next day, I check to see that a book is in their bag. If there is no book a new one won;t be sent home. Please make sure your child brings back the book. in their Ziploc bag each day. I appreciate you developing a routine that will allow your child to be successful with this.
That is all for now. I hope you all have a great week.
Good Morning to all of you. I am sorry I didn't get to post yesterday but I left school right at the end of the day to get to my daughter's soccer game in Lyndon. I love watching my girls compete and love that they get the opportunity to play games again. They won 10-0 and are now 2-0!
This week we read two different books during read a loud time. One book was What Do You Love About You and the other was I Like Myself. We continue to focus on books that focus on each individual and promoting that our differences make us both special and unique. I have linked a video read a loud for each book, if you want to listen to them with your child.
Progress Reports:
I hope you all found the progress reports both informative and helpful. The point of these was to give you an update about your child's pacing and for you to help your child adjust if they need to catch up with things. I also wanted you to know where they were starting (in some areas) to give you an idea of they are doing the work that they are. I also hope it gives you a sense of how important the asynchronous and Wednesday work is in regards to your child's learning. The work being assigned is not busy work but a crucial cog in the development of their academic skills. Although these did take a bit of time to do, I felt the time was worth keeping you all in the loop and giving feedback to allow for adjustments where needed. Please let me know if you have any questions.
A Tour of The United States of America:
Next week will start our Social Studies unit focusing on the United States of America. Throughout the year we will travel to each state to learn about it and document our learning. The research will happen through a variety of means including readings, videos, pictures and other platforms.
Each student will be receiving a passport (see a passport photo to the right) that they will be using to record their learning in. It is very important that this doesn't get lost. Please make sure that if your child isn't using it, they keep it in their Ziploc bag and in their backpack. They will also be using Flip Grid to record their learning. This past week, each child had a chance to record a video and learn how to use this technology. If your child wasn't in school this week, have them go to the social studies section of my Google Classroom, find the flip grid assignment and complete the task.
I am very excited about this unit and wanted to create something that would be interesting for the students, would allow continuous learning whether it is in person or remotely.
Here is a video that I strongly urge you to watch. It is 15 minutes long but it explains how the unit will work, how your child records their learning, and how he/she will be graded. The video cuts out at the 15 minute mark because of time limits. The only other thing that I was going to add was that you can add anything else to any state. In other words, if you love Montana and want to teach your child other interesting facts, feel free to do so when we visit that state. We will be starting with Vermont this coming week. I want to thank Mr. Mongeon for all of his help in creating this unit. The two of us have put some time into it and hope your child enjoys the journey.
NOTES:
*You all did a great job getting your child to bring back all of their work last week. Thank you so much and I appreciate the effort. It certainly makes life easier on my end.
*You may have noticed that you can't access the writing "turn in" sheet anymore. I was asked not to make that viewable by all of you. Sorry for any inconvenience.
*We are getting to the point where kids may be wearing boots to school. I ask that your child brings a change of shoes with them or leaves a pair at school. Since we are sitting on the floor, I want to keep the dirt and water off the carpet. If you want your child to leave a pair of shoes at school just remind them or let me know and I will remind them.
*As great as backpacks are, some children may benefit from having a reusable grocery bag as a school bag. This will offer more space for bringing things back and forth. This is just a suggestion and not a requirement.
