buttons!

The mathematicians have been engaging with a daily button combination on our calendar. We introduced a new math choice connected to buttons, button sort! 

Xalya and River eagerly sorted our button collection by color, using ten frames to count how many in each group. Then they labeled their collection, using numbers and words on a small sticky note.

Through our morning message, we have continued to show button combinations in different ways. Using pictures, number trees, and equations. The children have also been engaging with button combinations through the solving of math story problems. 

These problems encourage students to use what they know about combinations to five to solve for how many in all. We will continue to build off of these problems; taking away buttons, adding buttons, figuring out how many combinations we can make with five buttons, and solving for missing addends. 

Buttons provide endless opportunities for developing counting and cardinality skills as well as operational thinking! Through the children's work, we have talked about the different ways to show our thinking. We can show our thinking with a picture, using information from the problem, we can show our thinking with math hands, or we can show our thinking with numbers and equations.

over and under the snow

The children have been engaging with different books about animals in winter, teaching books and storybooks. We have compared genres, developed our language and vocabulary, and learned about how animals adapt and survive during the colder months. 

This week, Celeste read Under the Snow and Over and Under the Snow. The children talked with a partner, sharing what they have learned about animals in winter, and connecting it to animals that can be found over or under the snow. They sorted animals from the text, further developing their language and using visuals as another way to show their thinking. 

We are readers, writers, and scientists. To connect our learning across content areas, the children used pictures and words to draw one animal over and one animal under the snow. They used sound power, books, and the classroom to add two labels to their scientific drawing. The children's written responses to our reading can be found in their Science Journals.

An animal over the snow!

In this small collection you can see Celeste inviting students to show an animal over the snow, modeling how she pictures her plan and then uses her plan to draw like a scientist; carefully drawing a rabbit sitting over the snow. In the following pictures Kiki and Bryn use the classroom as a tool for adding labels to their drawings. In the final two pictures Celeste supports a museum walk share, asking students what they noticed about their scientific drawings. Many children shared stars for their peers, noting careful work and lots of detail.

An animal under the snow!

sound power and letters!

As we continue to strengthen our hearing, isolating, and blending of sounds, we make the connection to letters and text. Our foundational work and play supports students as they write more words and study and read unknown words. 

The children are working on making connections and applying their knowledge and skills with more independence - a rich and challenging process that will continue throughout our year learning and growing together.

Letter Identification-Sound

While playing with letter puzzles during choice, CS is working on learning letters and looks to our classroom alphabet, naming the letters as his peers begin to build the alphabet on the rug. As they connect pieces, they point and read name-picture-sound, just like during Fundations. 

Showing Sounds (in different ways!)

The children have been using sound power to listen for sounds and blend sounds together.

We use tiles to show the first, middle, and last sound in words. 

We connect sounds to letters by building words.

We notice words that end the same or rhyme and make the connection to word families. On Tuesday, the children will work with words that all end with the rhyme in, we will continue to notice the middle sound and ending sound in all of the words!

We use sound power to isolate beginning sounds and think of other words that begin with the same sound.

We use sound power to help us to figure out other words. For example, if I know we, I know be, me, he! 

Application during Academic Choice (one example!)

BM taps the sounds she hears in the word pup, writing a letter for each sound she hears. She adds her label, pup, to her lego puppy. 

When writing motorcycle, we feel and clap the syllables. I draw little syllable boxes on her sticky note, helping to figure out all of the sounds she hears. BM listens for the sounds she hears in each part, writing a letter for each sound. She slides her finger under the parts, blending the syllables together and reading the word!