CVC Words

CVC words  were discussed in depth the past couple of weeks.  CVC words are consonant, vowel, consonant words.  We learned all about the vowels and their short and long sounds.  We learned that CVC words ONLY have short vowel sounds and that we can sound them out.  We learned that CVC words are found in a lot of word families!  We had fun making our own CVC booklets and sharing the real words and silly words with friends.

Fun With Triangles

Who says math is boring?  My math teacher husband, would be so upset if I taught boring math to my first graders!  We were learning about shapes, lines, angles, and vertices!  Your kids know some pretty big math words.  We had fun reading The Greedy Triangle and learning that there are shapes that have 7, 9, and 10 sides and angles.  Most of the kids never knew this.  They recognized the typical shapes, but had fun learning about quadrilaterals, nonagons, heptagons, and decagons!  We also learned that triangles can be fit, skinny, turned any direction and still be a triangle because they have 3 lines, 3 vertices, and 3 angles!  We then worked our fine motor skills by tracing triangle cut outs, tracing the lines with our black crayons and painting our book marks.

Classroom Seating

     I enjoy offering different choices for my students.  We move around our room A LOT throughout the day.  We spend time at our individual desks, on our carpet as a whole class, using our alternative seating options, on our stools at my reading table, under chairs, on the floor, etc.  I think it's important for the kids to move around throughout the day.  I know that not all of us work the best at a table and chair.  So, I try to change it up at times. The kids are allowed to sit wherever they want during Guided Reading groups or free reading choice time.  Our math time is split between sitting around the perimeter of our carpet or at our desks.  Other times, I let the kids grab a clipboard and sit wherever they want, after directions have been given.  We spent a lot of time the first couple of weeks, going over expectations of our alternative seating choices, when they were appropriate to use, how to make a wise decision about what works best for us, and who we should not sit next to.  They seem to love their choices!

Directional Words (AKA Prepositions!!)

     We've been working on using directional words with our math and writing.  We decided to have a little fun using our partners and things around the classroom to show that we understood what each word meant!  I handed out the cards and the kids had to come up with their own way to express the word.  I think they did an excellent job!

Under

Behind

In

Between

Bottom

Above

Over

Over

Near

On

Next To

Below

Off

Out

Inside