Weekly Updates

Past updates

Curriculum This Week 10/20/25-10/24/25

📚 Reading

 When readers finish a book, they make sure they understand and can talk about what they’ve read. One way to do this is by remembering as much as you can and retelling the whole book, including the characters, the settings, and the events that happened. This week we will practice retelling a story across our fingers.  

 Writing

We're using our fingers to plan our stories, too! This helps us remember to include lots of details and a clear beginning, middle, and end. We are also practicing how to improve our work by looking at it with "fresh eyes," thinking about questions a reader might have, and then adding more information to make our stories clearer.

🔤 Word Study

We will continue to focus on spelling words with digraphs. We will also learn how to tell if the “k” sound is made with a “c”, “k”, or “ck”.

🔢 Math

 Our work with 2-D shapes continues! This week we will talk about finding different ways to fill the same outline with pattern blocks. We will focus on decomposing shapes in different ways and seeing how shapes can be combined to make other shapes. We will fill outlines with fewer blocks as well as with more blocks. We will talk about how we can increase the total number of blocks by using smaller shapes. 

🔬Science

We will read Moonbear’s Shadow, a story about a bear who doesn’t understand why his shadow keeps following him and getting in the way. We will also go outside and play shadow tag on the field. Can we “hide” our shadows? We will experiment with making our shadows change size, as well as change shape. Finally, we will design an investigation to track shadows. We will sort our questions about shadows into ones we can investigate at school and ones we cannot. If the weather cooperates, we will investigate our question later in the week.

❤️ Social & Emotional Learning

We will show what we’ve learned about paying attention, managing distractions, and practicing as we learn to draw Pepito, a character from Second Step Elementary animated videos.

💡 Things to Do at Home 💡

• Five-Finger Retell: After reading a book together, ask your child to use their fingers to retell the story. Can they tell you the who was in the story (characters), where it happened (setting), and what happened at the beginning middle and end?  

• Go on a Shape Hunt: When you're driving or walking, look for shapes in the world around you. "The stop sign is an octagon! The window is a rectangle." Ask your child how many sides and points/corners they see.

• Play with Shadows: On the next sunny day, head outside and look at your shadows. See who can make the longest shadow, the shortest shadow, or a silly-shaped shadow.

• Digraph Hunt:  Be on the lookout for words that end with the digraph “ck”. Write down a list of words that rhyme with back, lock, or neck. 

Curriculum This Week 10/14/25-10/17/25

📚 Literacy (Reading & Writing): This week, it's all about bringing stories to life with feelings and punctuation! As readers, we're noticing how punctuation like ! and ? helps us know what a character's voice should sound like. (Does the author want us to read in a loud, excited voice(!) or should our voice go up at the end like a question?) As writers, we are working on bringing the people in our stories to life by adding their thoughts and feelings, as well as using punctuation to help convey meaning.  We are working on adding punctuation as we write, not just when we reread and revise. 

🔤Word Study: We are starting a new unit about digraphs! Digraphs are two letters that make one sound. Digraphs can be at the beginning of a word (then), the end of a word (wish), or both (shack or which). This week, we're practicing reading and spelling words with:

• sh (as in ship)

• ch (as in chin)

• th (as in thumb)

• wh (as in whistle)

• ck (as in sock)

Unit 3 Trick Words will come home this week. 

🔢 Math: We are kicking off a new unit on 2-D Geometry! We will describe, compare, and name some familiar shapes. We will find different ways to fill a shape with pattern blocks. We will record the pattern blocks we used, the number of each shape, and the total number of blocks used. This activity focuses on finding combinations of shapes to fill an outline, as well as on counting and adding. We will also make pattern block designs with a specific number of blocks and then record how many of each block we used. Click here for information on the mathematical concepts in Unit 2, as well as related activities you can do at home. 

🔬Science: We are becoming shadow detectives! We will use a variety of objects to create shadows on the blacktop. We will try to answer questions like: What makes a shadow? How can we make a shadow change its size and shape? What happens to the shadow when we bring the same object into the shade? We will start a “Wonder Wall” of questions we have about shadows. 

❤️Social Emotional Learning: We are learning that making mistakes is a normal part of learning. We are practicing using positive self-talk (like “This is hard, but I can do it,” or “I am going to keep trying,”) to help us persevere when a task feels challenging.

💡 Try This at Home! 💡

• Literacy: When reading together, make your voice match what is happening in the story. Ask, "How do you think the character is feeling right now?"

• Word Hunt: Go on a "digraph hunt" in a book or on signs around town. See how many words you can find with sh, ch, or th!

• Shapes: Look for shapes in your home. "The clock is a circle! The window is a rectangle." You can even count how many triangles or squares you can spot in a room.

• Shadows: On a sunny day, play with your shadows outside! See who can make the longest shadow or the shortest shadow. What happens when you jump?

Curriculum This Week 10/6/25-10/10/25 

Reading: This week, we will practice some of the strategies readers use to make sense of books. We will think about how the pictures in our books fit with the words and what we can learn from studying the pictures. We will also practice making our voice match what’s happening in the story. We will use our read-aloud book, A New Kind of Wild by Zara Gonzalez Hoang, to practice making inferences and figuring out a character’s point of view by trying to imagine what they see and feel about the things in their world. 

Writing: This week, we will focus on revising our small moment stories by adding on and saying more. We will practice adding actions as well as dialogue–the exact words people say–to help bring our stories to life.

Word Study: We continue to work on blending, reading, and spelling short vowel words with three sounds, as well as spelling this unit’s trick words: the, a, and, is, his, and of. We continue to work on using a correct pencil grip when writing.

Math: We will continue to focus on subtraction this week—solving story problems and playing subtraction games (Roll and Record Subtraction and Five-in-a-Row, as well as One or Two Less).  During our discussions, we are sharing subtraction strategies, talking about how to translate our mathematical thinking into written solutions, and using standard notation (10-6=4) to represent subtraction situations. We will wrap up our first math unit at the end of the week by solving several story problems independently. 

Science: This week is all about scientific observation! We'll be closely examining natural objects, drawing and writing about what we see in our new science notebooks, and starting our year-long observation of the big tree in the courtyard to track how it changes with the seasons.

Social Emotional Learning: In this week’s lesson, we will practice using helpful thoughts to encourage ourselves and keep going while learning a dance together. Positive self-talk helps us work through mistakes and challenges. 

💡 Try This at Home! 💡

• Reading: When you read together, ask, "What do you think that character is feeling? Why do you think that?"

• Math: Look for subtraction in everyday life. "I have 8 apple slices and you ate 2. How many are left?” or “I had 8 apple slices before you ate some. There are 5 left. How many did you eat?”

• Science: Play the "Down, Out, and Up" game on a walk! Take turns describing one thing you see on the ground (down), one thing you see straight ahead (out), and one thing you see in the sky (up).

• Encouragement: When a task is challenging for a family member, ask your child, "What's a helpful thought we could say to encourage them?"

Curriculum This Week 9/29/25-10/3/25

Reading: This week, we will talk about paying special attention to the vowels in words we are decoding to make sure we have the right vowel sound. After we figure out a tricky word, we can do a slow check to make sure we have it right. We say the word slowly as we slide our finger under it and check that all the letters look right. We will also start to talk about the good habits readers have to make sense of books. It’s really important to notice little confusions in a book and to ask, “What’s going on?” We can reread to clear up those confusions. When we read fiction stories, it’s important that we know what’s happening with the characters, and when we read nonfiction books, we need to make sure the information makes sense. 

Writing: This week, we will talk about how writers have to be careful that their tiny seed stories don’t grow into big watermelon stories. To keep our stories small, we can begin and end our stories close to the main event.  We will also talk about how writers tell what happened in small steps, bit by bit, when they are writing a small moment story. 

Word Study: We continue to work on blending, reading, and spelling short vowel words with three sounds. Your child needs to recognize and be able to hear and “move around” the beginning, ending, and middle sounds of a word. We will also talk about the difference between words we can tap out with our fingers (consonant-vowel-consonant words) and “trick” words. Trick words are words that have an irregular spelling part or an untaught element and cannot be completely sounded out. Words like the, are, said, to, and of are trick words. We will learn these words by listening for the sounds and mapping them to the corresponding letters so we can quickly and automatically recognize these words. Often, just one part of the word is irregular (marked with a heart). For example, in the word said, the middle “ai” is the irregular part; the beginning and ending sounds can be sounded out. The trick words for this unit came home last week. 

Math: We will focus on subtraction this week—solving story problems and playing subtraction games (One or Two Less, Roll and Record Subtraction, and Five-in-a-Row Subtraction).  These games involve subtracting one number from another, with initial totals up to 12. We will share our subtraction strategies during class discussions. Some of the strategies children use to solve subtraction story problems are: counting all, removing a group, and counting what is left; counting back or down; and using a number combination they know (I know 6+6=12, so 12-6=6). We will connect the problems we solve when playing the games with number equations.  

Science: Much of our science time this fall will be spent outdoors. In our first unit, we will use our senses to observe seasonal changes. This week we will play I notice, I wonder, It reminds me of... We will practice both observational skills and norms for outside learning by looking at different leaves and sharing our observations, questions, and connections.

Social-Emotional Learning: In this week’s lesson, we will discuss what we’ve learned about distractions and the importance of paying attention. We will also talk about how it takes time to learn something new. If we want to get good at something, we must do two things: practice and keep trying. 

Curriculum This Week 9/22/25-9/26/25

Reading: We will talk about the good habits reading partners have before, during, and after reading a book together. We will practice giving book introductions to our partners. We will also practice helping our partners when they are stuck on a hard word by reminding them to slide through the sounds rather than telling them the tricky word. We will talk about how to  “grow ideas” together as we read. We can talk about what we are noticing, what we are wondering, and make connections to other books as we read. Asking our partners, “What do you think?” helps keep the conversation going. Giving book introductions and “growing ideas” are good habits you and your child can practice during reading time at home as well. 

 Writing: This week, we will continue working on writing tiny seed stories. Tiny seed stories are small moment stories that focus on the little stories inside a bigger “watermelon” story. For example, “My Day At School” is a watermelon story, whereas “The Fun Recess Time” would be a small moment or seed story. Inside one big watermelon story are lots of tiny seed stories we can write. We are working on beginning and ending our stories close to the main event. 

Word Study: This week, we will work on blending, reading, and spelling short vowel words with three sounds. To help us blend and segment sounds in words, we will learn how to tap out sounds (either with our fingers as shown below or tapping along our arm with a hand). Ask your child to demonstrate for you. Here is how we would tap out the word “mat”:

Math: This week, we will play number games, solve story problems, and share our strategies for combining or adding numbers. You can find directions and online versions of all the games we play during math time (see links above). Your child will be bringing home a set of number cards that they can use to play games at home. Ask them to teach you how to play Double Compare! 

Social Studies: This week, we will continue talking about our classroom community.  We will also talk about the roles and responsibilities of different people, such as Dr. Goodwin, teachers, and students, in our Schofield community. 

Social Emotional Learning:  This week, we will learn that a distraction is something that takes our attention away from something else. We will learn different ways to manage distractions, such as reminding ourselves to focus, turning away from the distraction, changing places, or politely asking someone to stop a distracting behavior.

Curriculum This Week 9/15/25-9/19/25

 Reading: This week, we will talk about the good habits readers use to figure out hard words. In particular, when we slide through the sounds in a word, we need to watch out for digraphs (two letters that stand for one sound, like sh or ch). We will also talk about the bad habits readers sometimes pick up and how we can make a plan to drop them and replace them with good habits. Some of those bad habits we want to drop are “The Freeze” (getting stuck and not doing anything to figure out a word); “The Tell Me” (asking someone what a word is right away); “The Mumble” (mumbling so the person listening can’t tell what we are saying); and “The Blooper” (only looking at some of the letters and guessing the word). You can remind your child to use good habits when he/she is reading at home! 

Writing: This week, we will begin to write our stories down on paper. We can find story ideas by thinking of a person we know, a place we go, or a thing we do. We will also talk about stretching words out when spelling unfamiliar words so that we can hear and record beginning, middle, and ending sounds. We made our first birthday book on Friday and will work on another book for a classmate with a birthday this week. This year, we will make a birthday book for each person in the class (we will cover summer birthdays in June). Making cards and writing letters to family members is a great way to practice writing at home. 

Word Study: We will finish reviewing the consonant and short vowel sounds, as well as lowercase letter formations. We will also practice tapping out “c-v-c” words (consonant-short vowel-consonant words like cat, dog, map). Tapping out the sounds helps us both with reading words and spelling them correctly. 

Math: This week, we will play several number games that involve finding the total of two quantities: Roll and Record, Five-in-a-Row, Double Compare, and Double Compare Dots. We will discuss the strategies first graders use when combining two numbers: counting all (starting from 1), counting on from one of the numbers, or using other known number combinations (e.g., if I know 3+3=6, then 3+4 is one more or 7). We will also solve addition story problems. Our focus is on visualizing and retelling the action in the story and clearly communicating the strategy we use to solve the problem. 

Social Studies: This week, we will talk about several communities we belong to: our family, our classroom community, and our school community. We will talk about ways we help our families at home. We will also fill out a school work habits checklist, thinking about things we do (like whole body listening, following directions, etc) without any reminders, and which things we still need to work on doing more independently. We will brainstorm what classroom jobs we need to help us learn and keep our classroom running smoothly. 

Social Emotional Learning: This week, we will talk about the importance of paying attention.  Paying attention helps us learn and keeps us safe in different situations, such as playing on the playground or crossing the street with an adult. We will learn that paying attention can look different depending on the situation, for example, listening to the teacher during a lesson or playing a game during recess. Click here for a link to an overview of our first Second Step unit on Growth Mindset and Goal Setting. 

Curriculum This Week 9/8/25-9/12/25

Reading: During reading, we will continue to talk about the good habits that readers have--taking a sneak peek, sliding through the sounds to decode hard words, and rereading. When we reread a book, two things happen. Rereading makes our reading voice sound smoother (like talking) and also helps us think more about what’s happening in the book. We will also talk about how good readers push themselves to become stronger readers by reading more and more each day.

Writing: Last week, we learned that writers find story ideas by thinking of a person they know, a place they go, or a thing they do. This week, we will talk about how writers plan out their stories before sketching and writing them down. Our focus in this narrative unit is on writing independently, telling stories with a beginning, middle, and end, and including sufficient details. 

Word Study: We will continue reviewing the consonant and short vowel sounds, as well as practicing the correct letter formations for lowercase letters. We are working on writing our names using correct letter formations and standard letter case (begin with a capital letter, all other letters lowercase). 

Math:  This week, we will count objects in mystery boxes, discuss strategies for counting accurately, and play a new number game called One or Two More. We will also learn a new activity called Quick Images. Students are shown a dot picture for two seconds and then asked what they remember seeing. We will talk about the groupings they saw that helped them remember the images. Visualizing the dots in small groups also makes it easier to find the total number of dots. This is another math routine that we will do in various forms throughout the year.

Social Studies: This week, we will think about the question: What is a community? A community is a place where people live, work, and play together. We will learn about several types of communities and how these communities are similar to and different from each other. 

Social Emotional Learning: We will learn how to use the classroom “Chill Zone” this week. This is a comfortable corner in the classroom with calming tools (books, sparkle jar, feelings mirrors, and mazes). We all have a spectrum of feelings. We need to take care of those feelings so we can rejoin the learning with our classmates. Everyone will get a chance to try out using the “Chill Zone” this week. 

Curriculum This Week 9/2/25-9/5/25

Each week, this update will let you know about our upcoming activities and curriculum. We have been very busy learning the classroom routines and getting to know each other through name games and other community-building activities. Each day, we interview the line leader as a way to get to know each other better. Students ask questions about favorite foods, pets, and activities. This week, we will also talk and write about our hopes and dreams for the school year. 

Reading: This week, we will talk about how readers have good habits. Readers take a “sneak peek” before beginning a book to think about what the book will be about. Your child can practice this when you are reading books together at home. Another habit we will review this week is readers use phonics to solve hard words. When readers get stuck on a hard word, they use the letters to solve it by sliding through all the sounds. We will talk about more good reading habits next week. 

Writing: We will begin Writing Workshop this week. We will be learning what writers do. We can write about anything—big or little—that happens in our lives such as jumping in a puddle, playing with a sibling, searching for a lost shoe, etc. This week, we will rehearse and write some stories together about things that have happened in first grade so far. These stories become texts that we can return to and build upon throughout this first narrative unit. 

Word Study: We will begin our Fundations lessons this week. Fundations is a multisensory, systematic phonics program that provides explicit instruction in decoding, handwriting, and spelling skills. We will review the key words and pictures that help us remember the consonant and short vowel sounds. We will also begin practicing the correct letter formations for lowercase letters. 

Math: This week, our focus is on two big ideas: building a growth mindset and practicing counting. 

-We are learning that our brains grow through hard work and trying challenging problems. We will talk about the power of the word “yet”—“I can’t read chapter books yet,” or “I can’t solve this problem yet.” What a difference that one word makes! When we make mistakes, our brains grow more than when we get everything right.

-This week, we will do a counting activity called “Start with, Get to”. This routine will be repeated with variations throughout the year. Right now, we are practicing the forward counting sequence by “starting with” 1 and “getting to” a larger number. 

-We will continue exploring different mathematical materials such as pattern blocks, cubes, Geoblocks, and Power Polygons. We will talk about the similarities and differences between the materials. 

-We will count and record the number of objects in some mystery boxes. We will focus on counting accurately, comparing our data, and sharing our strategies for counting a set of objects. 

-We will also learn another classroom routine (Build It) that will recur in different forms throughout the year. This activity focuses on identifying, counting, and representing numbers to 20 on two ten frames. A ten-frame is a 2x5 array of boxes.  

For more information about our first math unit (Unit 1) and related activities you can do at home, click here. 

Social Studies: We will begin our first social studies unit, focusing on communities. Our guiding questions are, “What is a community?” and “How are communities similar and different?” This week, we will draw a picture of a community that we belong to as a pre-assessment activity.