In these first weeks of school, we'll be doing what I like to call 'Learning to Learn', where we settle in to new routines and begin to build our class community through various activities, like reading together, playing together, spending time outdoors, meeting as a class to chat and listening to each other respectfully. It's through this variety and repetition that we'll establish our core classroom routines and expectations. It's so important to become aquainted with our classroom and each other in this new grade one context. I'm enjoying getting to know each of these kids and how they learn best so I can support them this year.
As part of our first unit of inquiry called Who We Are, we'll be thinking about all the ways our choices and behaviour can impact others. It's through these discussions that we'll build our Essential Agreements and start the year off with a clear set of expectations for everyone. We structure our agreement with the headings: Respect Ourselves, Respect Others and Respect our Environment with lots of discussion about examples for each section. It's with these agreed upon expectations that we can find the all-important balance between fun and focus as we start our learning journey together in grade one.
Here's an overview of our Who We Are unit (early September to mid-October):
Central Idea: Understanding ourselves and others helps us learn and develop stronger friendships.
Key Concepts we're focusing on: Perspective, Responsibility, Causation
Approaches to Learning (Transdisciplinary Skills) we're focusing on: Self-Management Skills, Social Skills and Thinking Skills.
Learner Profile traits we're focusing on: Caring, Reflective and Inquirer
Subject Connections: Social Studies, Language Arts, Health (Social Emotional Health)
For the first part of the school year in math, we'll be focusing on number sense. We'll be counting forwards and backwards through whole group games like 'Buzz' and various other activities while making use of our hundreds chart and number lines to assist us as needed. We'll be thinking about how we talk about numbers (before/after, greater than/less than/equal to, even/odd, single-digit/double-digit, etc.) and develop our skill and understanding with related learning (number sense games, open-ended math talks, etc.). This will serve as a great foundation for all number-related math in Grade One and beyond. Later in September, you'll start to see related activities come home as homework games or worksheets.
In language arts, we'll be introducing and practicing skills we'll need during our Daily 5 Centre time (reading independently, reading with someone, listening to reading, writing, word work and small group time with me). We're working to further develop our independent reading stamina every day. We'll be practicing our skills in various ways and some of that will come home in the form of word work games or activities to reinforce what we're learning day to day.
We've had such a wonderful first month in Grade One! We're getting settled into some key routines that have helped us start the year off in a positive way and I am so proud of the friendships that are developing, how hard they've been working every day to learn and practice new things, to nudge themselves outside their comfort zone here and there.
Building routines takes time in the early part of the school year in Grade One, and is absolutely key in having a successful year with structures kids can anticipate and work within as they learn and make mistakes in order to grow as friends and learners.
Much of what we began in September in Math (Number Sense), Language Arts (Daily 5 Centres to develop and reinforce specific literacy skills that allow them to work from where they) and Unit of Inquiry (Who We Are: self-awareness impacts our learning and our relationship with others) will continue on into October as the pace is slow but steady at this point in the school year! We've already got so much to be proud of in Grade One!