February 12, 2021

 Good Afternoon,

Today was one of those days where kids arrive full of excitement.  Most first and second graders, the act of handing out Valentines is a very rewarding and joyful time.  They are excited about their cards, love giving things to their friends and love getting cards in return.  Thank you all for following our COVID Valentine procedures.

Our district's leaders have thought more about the food policy during COVID and have come up with the following:  Your child can bring in something for their birthday, if they wish.  The item must be individually wrapped and handed out by teacher.  They will eat it during lunch time to avoid having to take their mask off one extra time during the day.  In a time when kids can't celebrate their special day with family, it is nice that they can still do it with their friends in school.  I would like to thank Kaiya for fighting for the kids on this one.  

This week the student's heard from my friend Genein Letford.  As I mentioned on Monday, she is an author, educator, and speaker.  She talked about the hurdles she has overcome and what it took as well as the concept that we all have diamond ideas in us.  Next week we will here form a basketball coach, a coach I roomed coached with when we toured the Ukraine.  He will talk to the kids about why he coaches, what he hopes to do for kids, and what basketball has done for him.  He lives in Central Maine.

Today was the 100th day of school.  We now only have 70 days of school left.  The first graders spent math class trying to crack the code on a 100th day escape room type activity.  Eventually they were able to crack the code and find the 100th day cake.  The kids each earned an individually, prepackaged cupcake.  Needless to say they were all quite excited

That is all for now.  I hope you have a great weekend.  Stay warm!

Peace, Tommy

February 8, 2021

 Good Evening,

   I hope you all were able to enjoy your weekend.  This week we will visit the state of Illinois.  I have set up a collection of books, in Epic, that focus on this state and some of the features, history and sports teams from that state.  This week's reading focus will have one group continuing to focus on decoding long vowel sounds (with the vce spelling).  Another group will be focusing on decoding two syllable open sound words, and the final group will focus on close reading of books about mammals.  

Today the 1st grade math students continued to work on using doubles facts to solve doubles +2 facts.  An example is if a child knew 6+6 =12 then 6+8 would be 14 because it is 6+6+2.  Last week we focused on doubles +1 facts.

Virtual Wednesday:  This week we will be having a guest speaker join us on Wednesday for our meeting. This week's speaker be a friend of mine from Los Angeles.  Her name is Genein Letford (https://geneinletford.com/) and she is a friend that I met 6 or 7 years ago while working on a project in Lawrence, MA.  The two of us were guest teachers for an acceleration academy and really hit it off. My goal is to invite a variety of guest speakers, whom are people of color, to talk to the class about their jobs and the talents and special gifts that they possess.  The kids will be documenting their interactions with each guest speaker through a "Learning Log."  You will also see a bright pink packet of paper in your child's homework bag.  This is the paper they should use for their weekly news this week.

A Reading Group From Monday

NOTES:

*Please have your child charge their Chromebook each evening.

*If your child wishes to bring in Valentine's , we will be handing those Friday.  To find the guidelines for this and the class list, please read the post from last Friday.  

That is all for now.  I hope you all have a great week.  

Peace,

Mr. Young

February 5th, 2021

 Good Afternoon Friends, Families, and Citizens,

  This week we visited the great state of Louisiana.  The kids have learned about Jazz, food, state facts, and have had a variety of books read to them.  Today, during library, Mr. Mongeon read a book titled Home on the Bayou. "When you take an original, lasso-throwing, boot-stomping cowboy, pack all his belongs in the car and move him from the wide open spaces of the West to swamp country, you can expect run-ins with the local alligators, a snafu or two at home, and a western-style showdown with Big Head Ed, the school bully. A cowboy of uncommon bravery discovers that with the right ingredients, home can be anywhere."  

Valentine's Day:  Several people have asked how Valentine's Day usually works in the 1st and 2nd grade.  Typically we avoid holidays but Valentine's day and the concept of showing you enjoy people seems to be a safe and important thing to focus on (especially in today's world).  So your child is allowed to being in Valentine's.  Please nothing with candy (there is a district conversation going on about candy right now).  Below is the list of names.  If you are doing Valentine's please bring one for each child.  Anything with candy, will not be allowed to be distributed.

Brayden, Otto, Tobin, Elijah, Callum, Arlo, Quinn, Koji, Hunter, Kayden, Vera, Berkley, Ben, Micah, Sierra, Georgia, and Miles.

Have a great weekend.

Peace,

Tommy

February 1, 2020

 Good Evening,

  I am sorry I am just sitting down to write this now but basketball season tends to lead to longer hours on all fronts.  It is 9:30 and I am writing this wondering what tomorrow's weather will bring.  I am hoping it is an in person learning day but the forecast is making me doubt the possibility of that.  We will wait and see what the morning will bring.

Today I sent home a few things in your child's homework bag (the Ziploc bag).  There is a white folder that says Snow Day.  That has paper that your child will need for the meeting tomorrow.  Please make sure he/she keeps it in their bag until the meeting and packs it all back up after.  Everyone did a great job with returning work last week.  There is also a purple paper packet and a writing checklist.  This is for the Weekly News entry he/she will have to do on Wednesday.  

Tomorrow's Schedule (If we have a remote learning day) is listed below.  Please make sure that you explain to your child that if we don't have in person learning, it is not a snow day.  It is a remote learning day and counts toward the number of days of school we are required to attend this year.  When June arrives, the sun is out, and kids want to be outside and done with school, we will all appreciate the work that went into making a remote day happen on a cold day in February.  HOWEVER, I understand that remote days can cause headaches for your own work schedules.  If your child can't attend a meeting because of it, please don't sweat it.  I ask that you do the attendance question and then do the asynchronous work at a better time (for your family) tomorrow.

FIRST THING: Please do the daily attendance Question. 

8:45 Morning Meeting (use meeting link in Google Classroom)

9:45 Literacy Meeting (same link as above).

10:45 Special (Kaiya will announce in an email Tuesday)  You should also do the following at some point today. 

1 Zearn Lesson 

2. 30 Minutes of Lexia 

3. 20 minutes of Epic or Storyline Online (Your choice) If you have extra time, you can go to the math game site listed below. Play the Snowball Fight Game (up to 10 addition or subtraction), the Road Racer Game (using numbers 1-10 or 10-99), or the Shot Clock Game.

That is all for now.

Peace,

Tommy

January 29, 2021

Good Afternoon,

 I hope this finds you keeping warm and avoiding the frigid temperatures.  I want to start by congratulating the class and all of you as a whole.  We had three days of virtual schooling this week and the attendance was fantastic and the level of work, by most, was great.  The students have really improves (matured) since the start of the year and I find the level of focus so much better, as a whole.  Your children are doing a great job!

  This week we focused on Jackie Robinson and talked about the barriers he had to break, the abuse he put up with and how he handled it and how he started to change some views on how people of color were viewed/treated.  We also talked about how Jackie shared similar traits with Martin Luther King in how he handled hatred and violence.  The students finished the week by completing their writings about Jackie Robinson.  Below is an additional video if you want to watch it with your child.

Every morning I do a poll question as part of our morning message.  This allows me to cover the standards on data and analysis throughout the year.  I found the responses to today's question interesting and it may be good to know going into a cold weekend.  Many students explained their reasoning and I think getting some rest is on their minds.  Take a look at the results in the picture.

We have had PE class over the last two weeks of school.  Ms. Ally has been conducting a snowshoe unit with the students.  Although some have not found this unit to be the most fun, (they don't like the physical effort needed) the majority of students have really enjoyed this opportunity.

NOTES:

*Please make sure your child does the attendance question in Google Classroom each and every day we have remote schooling.  I will also remind you on each remote day schedule.

*Please make sure your child has a pair of sneakers or shoes to change into during boot season.

*Do you recognize these boots?  One of your children wore them to school but none of them will take them home.  Please let me know if they are your child's?

That is all for now.  I hope you all have a great weekend.

Peace,

Tommy 

January 18, 2020

 Good Morning,

I hope everyone had a chance to get outside and enjoy nature's beauty over the past few days.  One of my weekend pleasures was getting out in the woods with my dog and just enjoying the vast untouched snow and the simple sounds of nature.  It was very rewarding.

Over the past week and a half we have been talking about the Civil Rights.  I spent some time reading a variety of books about Martin Luther King Jr.  We used Martin's Big Words as our anchor book and will continue to work with this book during our virtual meeting on Wednesday.  This past week we wrapped on the "Candy Experiment" (explained in last blog post) and the kids used Flip Grid to record how they felt about it.  You can view their responses here: https://flipgrid.com/20925ea7.  The responses were unrehearsed and are how they felt.  I found them very interesting and will draw upon their feelings as I tie it into the discussion of civil rights.  These videos also illuminate some of the technical difficulties we deal with and how masks do make it hard to hear sometimes.  

This past week was very interesting from my perspective, as your child's teacher.  This was the first week where I felt COVID and the restrictions were truly effecting the kids as a whole.  There were some very challenging times during specials classes and kids just seeming "frustrated or even down."  I had a meeting where we talked about how they were feeling.  They were more than willing to share about how they are tired of masks, miss sleepovers, and never get play dates.  We talked about why these things are in place and I threw out an idea that they seemed excited about.  Every other week, if they work hard and earn it, I will set aside an hour on Friday's to allow them to have a play date, with friends, in class or outside.  We marked the calendar and I will see how this goes.  I am hoping it helps them a bit.

THIS WEEK"S ASYNCHRONOUS SCHEDULE & WORK

As a whole, the consistency of Wednesday work has started to waiver.  This week I will attach a rubric for your child's Weekly News.  This will help them see the expectation of the entry.  Your child will also have their passport on Wednesday.  Since this is a four day week, I need them to do some work with this on Wednesday.  If they can write about two or three facts on Wednesday, in their passport, that will be sufficient work on this.  

This weeks schedule:

1.  8:45 Meeting with Mr. Young.  You will need your yellow folder and a pencil;.

2.  Weekly News Entry.  Look at the rubric on how you will be graded.

3.  Passport Work

4.  Lexia Core 5

5.  Zearn Lesson

That is all for now.  I hope you have a great week.

Peace,

Tommy

January 12, 2020

 Good Evening,

  Tomorrow will be our virtual day and we have a meeting at 8:45.  Please make sure your child is on the call by 8:45.  We will be working on the start of a project about Martin Luther King Jr. and it will be rather difficult for them to complete it without an explanation of the requirements and process.  I do believe the Weekly News Journals have been recycled (by accident).  So your child has a packet, in their homework bag, that is lab;led for this week's entry.  Please have them use this packet.

  This summer, I met with 7 or 8 friends of mine who are also teachers and people of a variety of races.  When the events of the summer highlighted the racial issues that still exist in our society, I wanted to do more than attend some meetings and pledge to do better.  I wanted to use my position as an educator to help my students develop their own understandings of what racism is, looks like and what the term even means.  I also wanted to learn in a way that would (hopefully) impact them the best.  As I talked with these friends and colleagues, I asked a lot of questions and listened to their answers as well as their stories.  I asked them how does a school, with minimal people other than caucasian The work that we do over the next few months, the books we read, and the people we hear from are mostly a direct result of my conversations with them.  

This week we have already read books about Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks. We have talked about segregation and civil rights.  I focused on how Martin and Rosa both took on laws and rules that were not fair by peacefully fighting for them.  I started a lesson with the students on Monday.  I asked anyone who had blue on to stand up.  All but four kids stood up.  I told them that the four kids would receive some candy every hour.  Everyone else would not receive it.  Immediately several kids objected.  One even said it's not fair just because they didn't have blue. I will continue to pick colors all week and reward kids in the same fashion.  At the end of the week, I will ask each student to make a flip grid video about this lesson and focus on how they felt about it and why.  This will hopefully lead to a bigger discussion but I think the lesson will help them express stronger understandings when we discuss.  

Les Talking to the class about Florida

This week we are visiting the state of Florida.  My friend and retired teacher, Les Nicholas made a video about the state he now lives in.  He is a former high school journalism teacher and if you have a chance you should watch his video.

That is all for now.  I hope you all have a great week.

Peace,

Mr. Young