Does it rhyme?

Does it rhyme? This is a question we are asking frequently in class. For some students hearing and making up rhyming words comes naturally, for others it can be quite challenging. Recognizing rhyming words is important for early reading skills so it's something we'll be practicing often!

This week in Bible we'll study the last plague that finally made Pharoah release God's people. The Passover is a picture of how Jesus sacrifice covers our sins today. We'll practice our monthly Bible verse and watch some clips from 'The Prince of Egypt' to bring the story to life.

In reading and writing we'll cover the letter 'Tt' this week. Students will read and write words using this letter and sound. We begin our first week of writing dictated sentences. At story time, our focus is on hearing rhyming words and understanding opinions. We will state opinions and give reasons for our opinions. We'll move into our second decodable, practicing all our skills as we sound out words and recognize red words in a text.

Everything begins to get exciting in math as we begin learning how to add and subtract to 5. Students will draw pictures and solve equations from word stories. We will learn about the plus and minus sign and use them when we write equations. Students will read equations out loud and check for mistakes. This is a longer, foundational module where we'll work hard to create a clear understanding of addition and subtraction.

In science, we'll continue giving daily weather reports and recording temperatures in the shade and in the sun. Students will help graph and compare temperatures. We'll look for trends and predict the weather for the next day. We'll apply our knowledge of how blocking the sun makes for cooler temperatures and begin designing structures to block the sun.

We'll practice all our skills at center time where students work in smaller groups. During tech time this week we'll play a game where students identify rhyming words.

It's fall and we see lots of spider out! In art this week we'll draw spider webs with oil pastels and add a beautiful watercolor background wash. Watch for our artwork as it gets displayed in the hallway gallery.

I'll be beginning to do one on one assessments with each student this week. We assess student learning in many different ways; through daily work, games, center activities and tests. Combined with one on one assessments, we get a clear view of where your student is and where they need to go.

I love the turn of the seasons and seeing the changes in our students. We are growing up and making great progress.

Mrs. Luoma