WHAT ARE WE LEARNING IN ELA?
Unit 8 Spelling test will be Wednesday, November 5th
Unit 8 Spelling Words: whip, chop, inch, chat, fix, when, whap, chin, ranch, such
11/3/2025
Hi first grade families,
Most of our work in class is done in a whole group setting, with a lot of class participation and opportunities for discussion. There are a few times during the week that students do individual work, mainly so that I can see if they are learning what they need to learn, or if we need to keep working on whatever our focus is for the week. With that being said, many times the only grade for the day is a participation grade. Each student automatically receives 3 points for being in class, one point is given for particiation in phonics and handwriting, the other point is given for participation during the knowledge curriculum part of class...for a total of 5 points per class on days they do not have individual work. Students who miss class will be exempt--it will not count against them. If you have any questions, please let me know.
Here is what we are learning this week in ELA:
Phonics Curriculum Learning Objectives for the Week:
Detective Work: To identify the graphemes in printed words and produce the proper phonemes for each grapheme; to blend the graphemes together to produce real words.
Word Sort: To read real words, identify whether or not the words contain digraphs, and categorize the vowel phoneme.
Phrases to read: To read phrases with a controlled set of hight-frequency words and grapheme-phoneme combinations.
To accurately articulate the phonemes and Heart Words taught in this unit and previous units.
To accurately read phrases and sentences that contain the concepts, words, and phonemes taught in this unit and previous units.
To accurately spell words with a controlled set of previously taught concepts and phonemes.
To build automatic recognition of some grapheme-phoneme combinations.
To build automatic recognition of some Heart Words.
To accurately segment phonemes in single-syllable words with short u, long u, and short o, and long o.
To accurately identify the short u, long u, short o, and long o phonemes in spoken words.
To accurately blend phonemes together to produce single-syllable words.
To accurately substitute one vowel phoneme for another in a given word to produce a new word.
Knowledge Curriculum Learning Goals for the Week:
Essential Question: "Why are books important?"
Analyze the relevant questions on Listening Comprehension Assessment 2.
Describe why books are important.
For the End-of-Module Task, plan a character and problem for a narrative.
For the End-of-Module Task, plan a setting and solution for a narrative.
For the End-of-Module Task, draft a narrative in which a character uses a book to solve a problem.
For the End-of-Module Task, use correct capitalization and end punctuation.
Share knowledge gained from the module about books and libraries.
Reflect on the module topic.
Handwriting: Students are learning and are applying the "3 P's of Handwriting": Pencil, Posture, and Paper. We will begin to learn and practice new letters and their sounds, along with their proper formation each week.
Research points to the importance of teaching handwriting and the benefits of learning proper handwriting techniques. According to a July 2019 article on the Edutopia website, MacKenzie states, "Research has demonstrated a correlation between letter-naming and letter-writing fluency, and a relationship between letter-naming fluency and successful reading development." In other words, teaching handwriting is an important part of teaching students to become fluent readers!
1st Grade Families:
Reading regularly with your child will help them to become more fluent readers themselves. Additionally, practicing sight words with your child will greatly benefit them. A sight word is defined by Julie Rawe (Understood, n.d.) as,"...a common word that kids recognize instantly without sounding them out. Recognizing words by sight helps kids become faster, more fluent readers. Many sight words are tricky to read and spell - they aren't spelled the way they sound."
Here are a couple of lists for you to get started with that, if you are interested:
Kindergarten Sight Words (Dolch):
all, am, are, at, ate, be, black, brown, but, came, did, do, ear, four, get, good, have, he, into, like, must, new, no, now, on, our, out, please, pretty, ran, ride, saw, say, she, so, soon, that, there, they, this, too, under, want, was, well, went, what, white, who, will, with, yes
First Grade Sight Words (Dolch):
after, again, an, any, as, ask, by, could, every, fly, from, give, going, had, has, her, him, his, how, just, know, let, live, may, of, old, once, open, over, put, round, some, stop, take, thank, them, then, think, walk, were, when
HEART WORD LISTS: At fall conferences, you received the first heart word list for your child to begin practicing at home with you. We call these words "heart words" because there are parts of these words that students need to learn "by heart" since they are irregular (they do not follow the traditional phonics generalizations). These lists are meant to be done at each students' own pace...when they can independently read the words, sign the page with the parent signature space and send it back to school with them. I will listen to them read it and get them the next list. This will be of great help with their reading fluency. I appreciate your help with this!! Students who have consistently worked on these lists at home with their families have made great gains in their reading fluency.