Q: What did the blanket say to the sheet?
A: I've got you covered!

Today was another great day in Room 240 – here’s the scoop-

After Independent Literacy Time, we had Morning Meeting. When we finished with Morning Meeting, we worked on moved all of the kids’ stuff from one table and set of shelves to another – quite a process, as you can well imagine. After we got everybody settled and ready in their new spots, we began Reader’s Workshop. Today I taught a mini-lesson (more of a reminder lesson) about how to treat books properly, since we just got a huge number of new books (thanks, PTA!!!). The kids enjoyed trading the books in their Independent Reading book bags for new ones for the week. We also had time for independent reading, and then to write a short reaction to the text in their journals.

When we finished with reading, we had a short song – Down by the Bay (again). It seems to be a crowd favorite – probably because they get to make up silly verses for all of us to sing.

After the song, it was on to Writer’s Workshop, in which I taught the kids about the different ways that writers can use dialogue in the stories, and the way it changed the story. We talked about how to use words other than “said” in their writing: words like “whispered,” “yelled,” “told,” and “asked.” A particular one that appeared in some very choice spots in some kids’ pieces was “sassed.” ☺ Here’s the chart that we made to help remember the words:

After writing, we headed down to the lunchroom for lunch, and then the kids went out for (a pretty soggy) recess. When we got back in, we started a new Cam Jansen book (the Mystery in the Monkey House). We had to leave off at a very suspenseful part! After Read Aloud, it was down to the gym for class with Mr. Hill and Mr. Peterson – the kids worked on jump roping, I think.

When we go back up to the class, we had Math Workshop. Today we worked on writing number sentences (except now in first grade we use the math name for it – “equations”) that correspond to dot pictures of numbers (click here for some .pdf examples of dot pictures). The goal is to get the kids thinking about how numbers are composed (which numbers can be used to make another number, either with subtraction or addition).

For Science Lab, at the end of the day, We began our new science unit – we will be studying space. The kids are excited about it, I think. Today we spent our Lab time talking about the things that we already know about space, and things that we would like to find out. Part of the kids’ homework tonight is to ask someone at home about the significance of the Big Dipper and the Little Dipper – I told them that if they were lost at night (and had a map), they could use those constellations to find their way home. If you want to study up a bit, go here or here.

After all of that, it was time to clean up, pack up, and head out!