Farah's Fantastic Learners

It's the end of the world as we know it........well at least 1st grade!

Dear Families,

We have lots of important dates as the year comes to an end. I look forward to seeing you all on awards day. It has been a fantastic year and I could not have done it without our wonderful volunteers. Thank you so much!

IMPORTANT DATES:

Date	Event
5	Begin to bring animal projects in. Be prepared to share for 3-5 minutes.
5	80th Anniversary celebration - Wear spirit wear!
6	Zoo Field Trip - * WEAR YOUR FIRST GRADE ROCKS T-SHIRT & comfortable shoes.
9	All Library Books are due - Last day to take AR tests.
10	AR picnic - Everyone in our class is attending.
14	Field Day - Wear your First Grade Rocks tshirt and tennis shoes. Apply sunscreen if needed.
20	First Grade Awards Day - 12:30-1:15 in our classroom.
22	End of the year celebration for the students.
23	Last Day of School - NO BOOK BAGS ARE ALLOWED!
30	Report cards will be mailed

Date	Event
5	Begin to bring animal projects in. Be prepared to share for 3-5 minutes.
5	80th Anniversary celebration - Wear spirit wear!
6	Zoo Field Trip - * WEAR YOUR FIRST GRADE ROCKS T-SHIRT & comfortable shoes.
9	All Library Books are due - Last day to take AR tests.
10	AR picnic - Everyone in our class is attending.
14	Field Day - Wear your First Grade Rocks tshirt and tennis shoes. Apply sunscreen if needed.
20	First Grade Awards Day - 12:30-1:15 in our classroom.
22	End of the year celebration for the students.
23	Last Day of School - NO BOOK BAGS ARE ALLOWED!
30	Report cards will be mailed

Welcome Back!

We will continue to prepare for CRCT as we review basic Reading, Writing and Math skills integrated into our Animal unit. 

PLEASE be sure that you are taking the practice tests online as the CRCT is rapidly approaching.  The dates will be April 23-25. We're working so hard in here and we really appreciate all the work you've been doing at home. :)

Important dates:

April 23-25: CRCT!!!

Thanks Mr. DeBetta for the great JA lessons!

Happy Birthday to Lauren!

Congratulations to Luke C. , our Character  Ed. Student of the month!

More CRCT practice

I hope that you are feeling very comfortable with the content of what you are seeing on the CRCT practice tests online. Here's another site that has some printable test and even a practice bubbling sheet. Please be sure that you are practicing online each week for at least 20-30 minutes.

Click here: http://www.henry.k12.ga.us/uge/crct04.htm

Date Change--Movie on the Mount

Due to the expected cold weather on Saturday, Movie on the Mount has been moved to Saturday, March 29. Hope you can make it! 

We have SPRING fever!!!!!!

A Look at March:

Language Arts: proper nouns and abbreviations, using commas in a series, -ing and -ed endings to words, plurals, synonyms & antonyms, correctly identifying the naming and action parts of a sentence, writing informational paragraphs, dictionary and thesaurus skills and becoming more fluent readers!

Math: Money-counting change to $1 and bills to $20, Measurement, Addition & Subtraction—the children should have quick recall of facts to 20

Science: Plants & Animals

**Please remember to practice for CRCT online—if you need your log in information again, please email me.

Important Dates:

March 8th - Movie on the Mount - 5:30-9pm

March 9th - Daylight Savings Time - Spring Forward!

March 14th - End of the 3rd nine weeks!

March 17th - Leprechaun traps due.

March 17th - 21st - Book Fair

March 20th - Report Cards come home!

March 27th: International Night Activities 6-8pm, Silent Auction to raise money for technology**** Mrs. Spooner and I will be auctioned off. Please bid on a chance for up to 4 children to play Guitar Hero and Dance Dance Revolution with us!!!!!

Congratulations to our Character Ed. Student of the Month for February: Luke Roberts

Happy Birthday Yllona!

Thank You’s:

As always, thank you to our wonderful room moms. Mrs. Bouton, Mrs. Tisdale, Mrs. Lebish, and Mrs. DeBetta are so wonderful, once again we had a fun celebration on Valentine’s Day. I appreciate all of our center helpers as well. A big thank you to the parents who braved the bad weather and came out for Technology Night. Our class had the most attendees in first grade. Way to go!!! Last but not least, thank you for all of our teacher appreciation gifts. We feel very fortunate to work with such wonderful kids and parents.

February Facts & Fun

           We are finally wrapping up our weather unit. The kids did a great job with their weather instruments. We have a hodge podge of topics for February. We will be integrating many language arts skills as we enjoy Valentine's Day. We had a great introduction to Dental Health at our WellStar visit on Jan. 31. We will be learning more about Black History and Presidents Day during shared reading and guided reading groups. In Math, we will finish up our time unit and  dive into money. In Language Arts, we'll continue to work on parts of speech, punctuation, writing super sentences with describing words and vowel sounds.

Happy Birthday to Carter O.!!!

Congratulations to Ben B., he is our character ed student of the month.

Important Dates:

Feb. 6th- Early Release

Feb. 7th- Picture Day, Art Show at Mtn. View

Feb. 14th- Valentine Day—please send in your cards and boxes

Feb. 18th- President’s Day-no school

Feb. 19- Teacher Workday- no school

Feb. 22nd- Six Flags reading logs due!

Feb. 26th- Technology Night-6-7:30

More Jan. News

I wanted to add a few special notes to the Jan. Blog: 

A big thanks to Mrs. Lebish and Mrs. Peiken for our Hannukah centers. We had a great time cooking, making crafts and playing games. Way to go Ben B. --he beat me playing "Hannukah Dots".

I could not make it without our fantastic roommoms--Mrs. Bouton, Mrs. DeBetta, Mrs. Tisdale, and Mrs. Lebish organized a wonderful Winter Celebration for the class. I hated to miss it but I heard that fun was had by all!!!!

Happy Birthday to Jacqueline and Joey!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Congratulations to our Character Ed. Student of the Month: Luke R. 

Conferences are going well, thank you for being so prompt. It has been great talking with each family. I am so proud of the progress that the children have made and I have really enjoyed getting to share their work with you.

The kids seem  to love the technology connections. Here are a few sites that I borrowed from a friend's blog--Thanks Amy! Enjoy!

Fun Websites for Kids

www.randomhouse.com/kids/junieb/index.html

www.factmonster.com

www.askforkids.com

www.kids.gov

www.kidskonnect.com

www.scholastic.com/kids/

www.funbrain.com

www.apples4theteacher.com

www.funschool.com

www.starfall.com

http://pbskids.org

http://www.primarygames.com

www.coolmath4kids.com

www.eduplace.com/kids/

We are working on becoming more independent---look out SECOND GRADE, here we come!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

www.randomhouse.com/kids/junieb/index.html

www.factmonster.com

www.askforkids.com

www.kids.gov

www.kidskonnect.com

www.scholastic.com/kids/

www.funbrain.com

www.apples4theteacher.com

www.funschool.com

www.starfall.com

http://pbskids.org

http://www.primarygames.com

www.coolmath4kids.com

www.eduplace.com/kids/

We are working on becoming more independent---look out SECOND GRADE, here we come!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!!!

Happy New Year!!!!! I hope that you all had a terrific time being with your families during our break.

This month we will be studying: Addition and subtraction facts to 20, fractions, time,  synonyms, antonyms, homonyms, nouns, verbs, adjectives, weather, and writing informational paragraphs! Next week, Jan. 14 we will return to our "Book in the Bag" each night.

As you may have noticed, our special schedule has changed due to the addition of a computer lab teacher, Ms. Newhouse. THANK YOU MOUNTAIN VIEW FOUNDATION!!!!! Ms. Newhouse will be enhancing what we are doing in the classroom. She will begin with keyboarding skills as she reinforces our Georgia Performance Standards.

Conference week will be Jan. 22-28 I look forward to meeting with you all! 

Important Dates:

Jan. 21-MLK Holiday

Jan. 22, 23, 24, 25, 28--Early Release at 12:30 due to Conferences

Winter Break is Almost Hear--I Mean Here!!!!

Dear Families,

We are having a great December. Each day is jam packed with fun and enriching activities. The students are becoming more independent workers. Our class is doing so well academically that sometimes I think that I am back in Second Grade!!

This month, we will be working on : Holiday and Family Traditions, Patriotic Symbols, Canada, Magnets, Graphing, Number Sense, Place Value, Shapes, Addition and Subtraction Facts--we are expecting quick recall of facts to 12, Position Words, Blends, Digraphs, Word Endings, Synonyms, Homonyms, Antonyms, Nouns, Verbs, Adjectives. We will be writing more and more--5 sentences is the minimum when we write stories. In Reading, we will continue with our guided reading groups with a big focus on fluency--reading like we speak. We are working on everyone getting on the 12 wall! If your child hasn't told you about all of our Nutcracker activities, please ask. We had a great time incorporating our Georgia Performance Standards with a timeless holiday classic.

I want to commend you all for your diligence in helping the children learn responsiblity and good work habits. Our class has almost 100% turn in rate on homework each week. The homework habits that your child is learning in first grade are very important. I particularly enjoyed looking at the children's responses on the Technology assignments this week! Keep up the good work.

Special Thanks to all of our wonderful center helpers for November and December. Also, a big thank you to Mrs. Lebish, Mrs. Bouton, and Mrs. Tisdale for their stints as guest chef! I am currently serving on a Grand Jury and will miss 7 school days . I appreciate our moms stepping up to keep our cooking tradition alive and well! One of the first things that the kids always ask on Monday is what we'll be making for our snack.

Congratulations to Isaac--he is our Character Education student of the month. Way to go Isaac!!!

Important Dates for December: 

Thursday, Dec. 6--Field trip to World of Coke

Thursday, Dec. 20-Winter Holiday Party

Friday, Dec. 21-Winter Holiday Sing Along and Our 3rd Annual First Grade Polar Express Day--wear your PJ's, we're going for a ride!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Have a great December and Happy Holidays to you all!

November

Important Dates:

Nov. 5th and 6th- No school- student holidays!

Nov. 14th- First grade Thanksgiving play at 9:30 --Be sure to arrive in time to get a great seat. Thanksgiving lunch will be at 10:45..

Nov. 16- Wear your favorite college attire.....Go Dawgs! :)

Nov. 16th- Wellstar in-house field trip on Nutrition

Nov.19-Miss Lunn's last day in our class.

Nov. 21st- 23rd- Happy Thanksgiving! Thanksgiving holidays!

December 6-Field Trip to World of Coke-Information coming home soon!

This month, we will be learning about: Long Ago & Today, Family Celebrations, Patriotic Symbols. We will continue working on: Addition & Subtraction facts to 18, Shapes, Graphs, Place Value, Antonyms, Homophones, Writing Stories-at least 5 sentences( I am very impressed with our writings), Compounds, Plurals, Contractions, Ordering Numbers, Describing Words. We will continue our books in the bag as the main focus in our class is to READ, READ, READ!

Happy Birthday to Dylan!!!!!!!!!!

Congratulations to Alison. She is our character ed student of the month. Ali is very RESPONSIBLE!!!!

Can you believe it??? We were the first class to get everyone on the AR wall. I am amazed at the dedication the kids have for reading. They are becoming fantastic readers!

Special thanks to our AMAZING room mom's. Our Fall Centers rocked. The kids had so much fun.

Reminders:

As the weather gets cooler, please be sure that your child has a jacket each day. We will go outside unless the temp falls below 32 degrees. Even when it's cold, the kids need  5 minutes to run around. Also, be sure that your child's jacket is labeled with their name. As a parent and teacher, I am a frequent visitor to the Lost and Found.

Please send a healthy snack with your child each day.

I hope to see you all at our Thanksgiving play! Have a great month.