Goodbye March

For the last day of March we made and flew kites. It was a windy and warm day today...just perfect for our homemade kites! :)

A Special Visitor

Today Hannah's mom brought a special visitor to our classroom...a goat! His name is Alex and he is less than a week old. He had fun following the first graders around the room. We found out that he is very soft and drinks from a bottle. I wonder how many first graders will go home tonight and ask for a pet goat!?!

Readers' Theater-"Today's Weather"

We taped our Readers' Theater today. The first graders are really working hard at reading with fluency and expression. So, after practicing for several days, we wanted to share "Today's Weather" with everyone. :)

Last Names

Here's the graph we made this morning on our Promethean Activboard ("magic board").

Really Great Reading!

I am so amazed at the wonderful readers in First Grade!  They are working on reading with fluency and expression.  Today Hannah read Arthur's Chicken Pox by Marc Brown to the class.  She did an awesome job of reading with expression! :)

Money, Money, Money!

The first graders have been busy learning how to count money.  We practice every day because we know we will need to know how to count money to buy what we need and want!  Many of the children are getting really good at counting different coin combinations.  Here they are stamping money to "buy" food items and playing a money game on the iPod Touch.  Any extra practice counting money at home would be so helpful!

(Click on the photos to view them larger.)

Dome Theater

Thanks to the PTO we were fortunate enough to have the Dome Theater in our school today.  The Dome is a state-of-the-art  mobile digital theater featuring highly innovative, immersive, and educational programs.  We climbed inside and watched 3 movies in it today.  They were "Secret of the Cardboard Rocket", "Earth's Wild Ride" and "Dinosaur Prophecy".

Solid or Liquid?

Today we read the Dr. Seuss book Bartholomew and the Oobleck.  It's about a greedy king who is tired of rain, snow, sun and fog.  His royal magicians create oobleck. It falls from the sky and sticks to everything!  We made oobleck today...and it stuck to everything!  Is it a solid or a liquid?

A Florida Field Trip

Today our Google Earth virtual field trip took us to the Everglades in Florida.  We read in our National Geographic Young Explorers magazine about the Florida wetlands, the mangroves (like in the picture above) and the animals that live there.  We watched a Discovery Education video about Everglades National Park in South Florida, too.  We learned that it is the only known place on Earth where crocodiles and alligators live together.  Manatees were a favorite animal shown in the video.  We ended our "trip" on the beach! :)

Book Report Blogs

Have you checked out our kid blog yet?  I discovered this great tool and we used it again today.  Yesterday the first graders wrote their first "book reports".  They even drew pictures to go with them.  So, today during Centers time the first graders typed their book reports on their own blog post.  I added their pictures and now they are on our kid blog for everyone to see and read!  Just click on your child's name on the left side of the kidblog and you will see all of his/her posts.  Go check them out...and leave them a comment...they love having comments to read! :)

http://kidblog.org/morningsunfirstgrade/student-blogs/

Adjectives and Spelling City

Today we reviewed adjectives.  The first graders had to decorate snakes according to the adjective the snake was saying.  They also had to write sentences using adjectives so that their sentences wouldn't be "boring"!!  They really are becoming excellent writers!

Our sight/spelling words this week are pretty easy.  We are aiming for everyone to get a perfect score on their spelling test on Friday.  I introduced the first graders to a fun, new website today for practicing their spelling words.  It's Spelling City.  I have a link to it here on our blog and on our class website.  The kids can find the spelling list and take a test, learn the words, or play a game.  It really is a fun way to practice those words.  They will have a chance to do this at school, but any practice at home would be great too!  I will continue to add our sight/spelling words each week to that link.

The End of a Great Week

We had such a fun week celebrating Dr. Seuss' birthday!  The first graders learned some facts about Dr. Seuss and we all decided that we are so glad Dr. Seuss wrote so many fun books for us to read!  Here are some photos of our awesome week! :)

Don't Forget

Don't forget...our book orders are due tomorrow!  If you would like to order from any of them, please return the order forms and money or check tomorrow.  You can also order online.  Just go to www.scholastic.com/clubordering.  The username is: MrsHilton  and the password is: BookOrder.  Remember, we earn free books for our classroom when you place an order.  Thanks so much!

Junior Achievement

Today we had a special visitor in our classroom.  As part of the Junior Achievement program, Jamie Holmes will be coming to visit five times to teach the first graders about families, jobs, money and needs and wants.  Today she talked about families and neighbors working together.  Jamie works at the telephone company and has been volunteering in the JA program for many years.  The kids were very excited to see her especially since she is Dustin and Dawson's mom! :)

Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

Today we celebrated the birthday of Dr. Seuss!  We read Dr. Seuss books, watched "The Lorax", matched rhyming words and even wore "the hat".  We will continue doing more fun Dr. Seuss activities all week.  I will get pictures on our website and blog as soon as possible! :)

Money

Today we began our Math unit on money.  We have already been practicing counting money this year, but now we will work on it even more.  Make sure you practice counting any loose change you have laying around at home so you get really good at it!