Welcome to the First Grade!
Mrs. Hill ~Ms Johnson ~Ms Jeshow ~Ms Stanton
We are so excited to teach your child! First grade is such a wonderful grade because of the great amounts of growth and development that take place during this year. It is important to us that every child has a successful and enjoyable school experience. Please read the following information in order to support your child this year. Together we can make a difference!
Unity
I dreamed I stood in a studio
And watched two sculptors there.
The clay they used was a young child's mind
And they fashioned it with care.
One was a teacher the tools he used
Were books, music, and art.
The other, a parent, worked with a guiding hand,
And a gentle, loving heart.
Day after day, the teacher toiled with touch
That was careful, deft, and sure.
While the parent labored by his side
And polished and smoothed it o'er.
And when their last task was done
They were proud of what they had wrought.
For the things they had molded into the child
Could neither be sold nor bought.
And each agreed they would have failed
If each had worked alone.
For behind the parent stood the school
And behind the teacher, the home.
Author Unknown
Several Ways to Help Your Child Succeed In School
• Work with your child on setting daily goal that are attainable.
• Show interest in their learning.
• Demonstrate through your words & actions.
• Recognize, praise, & celebrate your child's successful completion of a goal.
• Show care and love if your child makes a mistake or fails.
Please Remember To:
• Check your child's Monday folder each week.
• Get your child to school on time (The bell rings at 9:05 Your child needs to be here by 8:45 if he/she is eating breakfast).
• Listen to your child read daily.
• Read to your child daily.
• Be sure your child is dressed appropriately for the school dress code and the weather.
Sample Learning Activities from Connections :
• Describe various community workers and the services they perform.
• Put a series of pictures (or cartoons) in a logical sequence.
• Create a personal dictionary.
• Keep a list of books you have read in a reading log.
• Describe and name as many characteristics (attributes) of a given object as possible.
• Make a set that has more or less objects than a given set.
• Group popsicle sticks into sets of 10's, 5's and 2's. Use skip counting to figure out how many there are.
• Demonstrate and explain why 24 is the same as 2 tens and 4 ones and the same as 1 ten and 14 ones.
• Classify objects according to their similarities.
• Measure objects to find their length using non-standard units such as paper clips, buttons or coins.
• Look at a calendar. What is today's date, yesterday's date and tomorrow's date? What was last Tuesday's date? If we mailed a letter today and it took three days to arrive, what day did it arrive?
Strategies to Help Your Child Read:
Before reading: Ask your child to do a “picture walk” by looking through the pages and describing events or making predictions. Have him/her find some of the pictures' names in the sentences. You may also want to discuss what some objects are called if they do not know.
During reading:
If your child cannot figure out a word , have him/her use the following strategies:
• “Sound it out”- blend the sounds together by stretching out each sound. Example: “rrrruuuuunnnn.” This works sometimes. Other times, additional strategies will have to be used along with sounding out.
• Look at the picture.
• Go back to the beginning of the sentence and try again.
• “Guess the covered word”- Skip it and go on. Think about what makes sense in that spot after reading the sentence. Check the guess by looking at the first letter and then the rest of the letters.
• If your child cannot figure out the word after all of these strategies, you may give a hint or tell him/her the word so that the meaning of the story will not be lost.
If your child makes a mistake , think about why (s)he made the mistake and which strategy (s)he did not use. Then, ask the appropriate question:
If… |
Then… |
The mistake is a grammatical error Example: Sentence with mistake: The dog runned. |
Ask, “Did that sound right?” |
The mistake does not match the picture or make sense in the story. Example: The dinosaur ran. |
Ask, “Did that make sense?” or “Is that what is happening in the story?” Say, “Check the picture.” |
The mistake does not match the letters in the word. Example: The cat ran. |
Ask, “Does that look right?” or “What letter does _____ begin/end with?” |
After reading:
Ask your child to tell you about the story. Be sure (s)he includes information about the following questions:
• Who is this story about? (Should include character's name if given. Also include details like “kind little girl” or “grumpy old man”)
• Where and when does this story take place? (Should include details like a “warm, sunny beach” or “in the snowy forest” instead of just “inside” or “outside.”
• What happened in this story?
• What does this story remind you of or make you think about? (Their connection should be something similar to what happened in the story.)
Other Activities to Support Reading:
• Use flash cards to practice word wall words. Count how many you knew quickly and graph your progress!
• Highlight word wall words in the newspaper or a magazine.
• Rainbow write word wall words.
• Play this sound segmenting guessing game: First person thinks of a word and says each of the word's sounds separately. Second person guesses the word. Example: “c-aaa-t” would be “cat”!
• Make a line of pennies. Separate each sound of a word and move a penny up for each sound.
• Practice blending sounds by putting letters together to make real or made-up words. You can write the letters of the alphabet on objects such as paper squares or pennies.
• Use your letters to make word wall words and words in word families.
• After making a word, change the first, middle or last letter to make a new word.
• Practice adding an ending to your word such as –er, -ing, -s or –ed.
• Brainstorm a list of words in a word family and spell them. Example: sick, thick, pick, quick, etc.
• Read to your child to expose him/her to vocabulary that wouldn't be in a book on his/her level and to model what fluent (smooth and expressive) reading sounds like.
• Have your child reread books on his/her level.
• Practice letter sounds and combinations that give your child trouble: a, e, i, o, u, y, w, qu, ch, sh, th, tr, dr, pl, bl, gl, etc.