1st Grade Math: Tallying, Numeral Writing, and Missing Addends
In 1st grade math, our learning centered on students working through the concept of determining missing addends and amounts taken away when starting with a given number of dots. They also worked on finding ten and some more with numbers ranging from 10-20. The students also used the greater than and less than notations in a card game with these numbers. These activities are essential for early math development because they build subitizing skills, reinforce proper numeral formation, and deepen part-part-whole reasoning, establishing a crucial foundation for addition and subtraction fluency.
2nd Grade Math: Venn Diagrams, and Data Analysis
The 2nd graders engaged with converting their Venn diagram data into picture and bar graphs and wrote mathematical comparison statements about their findings. Sorting attributes and graphing data are vital for mathematical development because they lay the groundwork for set theory, data literacy, and logical classification, while writing comparison statements teaches students to construct clear mathematical arguments grounded in data.Language Arts & Daily 5 Assessments
In language arts, students continued practicing their independent Daily 5 routines. Having these self-monitoring routines established allowed me to conduct a variety of district-required language arts assessments individually with students while the rest of the class stayed productively engaged in meaningful literacy tasks.
Science Notebooks: Thinking Like Real Scientists
In science, our students were introduced (and for 2nd graders, re-introduced) to Science Notebooks! Science notebooks serve as a central place for young learners to record observations, track their developing ideas, and act like real scientists. They fulfill five core purposes in our classroom:
• Recording Observations: Students use drawings, labels, numbers, and simple sentences to capture what they see, predict, and discover during hands-on experiments.
• Building Scientific Thinking: Notebooks help children ask questions, test ideas, and look back at past entries to see how their thinking changes over time.
• Integrating Literacy: They support early writing and reading skills by combining science concepts with English Language Arts (ELA) through vocabulary lists, sentence frames, and reflections.
• Formative Assessment: I review the pages to understand what students comprehend, spot misconceptions, and offer guidance.
• Fostering Ownership: Keeping an organized log gives students a sense of pride and personal accountability for their learning.
To practice this process, students learned how to make a realistic diagram, label it, use a magnifying glass to zoom in on close-up details, and write "I notice..." and "I wonder..." statements. We practiced this using real apples and flowers, and these notebooks will be used across every science unit we explore this year.
Read Alouds:
Our read-aloud time focused on the arrival of autumn with four seasonal books:
• Mouse's First Fall: A sweet story following Mouse and Minka as they discover the vibrant colors, shapes, and crunchy leaf piles of autumn.
• We're Going on a Leaf Hunt: An adventurous tale of three friends hiking over mountains and through forests to collect colorful fall leaves.
• When the Leaf Blew In: A humorous chain-reaction story showing how a single blowing leaf sets off a silly sequence of events among farm animals.
• Hello Kitty, Fun Fall Day: A cheerful seasonal book following Hello Kitty and her friends as they enjoy classic fall activities outdoors (a huge hit with our classroom Hello Kitty fans!).
Everybody Wins! Literacy Mentoring
Notes & Reminders
• Weekly News Journal: Today your child will bring home their Weekly News Journal in their homework bag. It is their chance to write about something they did this week that they want to share, with the goal of working on quick paragraph writing. For some children, they will write a lot, and for others, they may only write a sentence at this point in the year. When you see the journal, take a look at the note on the inside of the cover. Then read the writing and initial it. Please have your child bring it back in their bag on Monday.
• Parent Volunteer Sign-Up: Your child also has a parent volunteer sign-up sheet. Please take a look at volunteer time opportunities and sign up for any slots that could work for you so I can create a schedule. If you want to do more than 1 slot a week, please indicate that on the bottom of the paper. If you would like to alternate every other week with a slot, please note that as well. Please return these by Thursday of next week.
• Everybody Wins! Forms: Due back by Tuesday.
That is all for now. I hope everyone has a great weekend.
Peace,
Mr. Young
