Truitt Tribune:
February 6th, 2015
A note from the Teacher:
Thank you SO much for the at home reading increase last month! Our class started the month of January at
just 8% participation and by week four we were up to over 40%! I know February will be even
higher! Please remember, you can turn in February calendars each Friday for celebration check-ins, OR
wait until the last Friday of the month. We had two friends celebrate week one with a total of 115 minutes
between them! Way to go....Keep up the good work. All the extra reading practice will help prepare for
our reading benchmark assessments beginning February 17th.
LOOSE CHANGE CHALLENGE!
For the Spring Book Fair we will be conducting a COIN-A-DAY CHALLENGE from Monday February 9Friday February 13. Each student was given a small ziploc baggie with a small note attached detailing the
challenge. All money raised will help buy Jensen students books for our library. Thank you so much for
your support!
Reading/Writing:
As we wrapped up our nonfiction focus this week with a quick check of understanding, it is clear the kids
are beginning to pick up on determining the big important pieces of information from a text, but the
interesting and "fun facts" are still real tempting to report out! We will continue to develop this skill
through out Science and Social Studies this month.
In reading we have switched gears to fiction books and the comprehension strategy: Inferring. Readers
make an inference by using clues from the text or illustration and adding the clue to the schema you already
have about the clue. Inferring is something first graders naturally do and we have been having a blast
making inferences about Me by playing a game called "What's in Mrs Truitt's Bag". For example, one of
the clues was a Starbucks gift card + our schema that this place is big on coffee = we inferred that Mrs.
Truitt loves to drink coffee and maybe stays up too late! :)
Next week we will practice making inferences while reading several great fiction books by Mo
Williams. His books about Elephant and Piggie, or any of his Pigeon books will be so much fun with our
new strategy! Below are the learning targets for the next 2-3 weeks.
I can infer to help me understand a story.
I can identify who is telling the story.
I can write my opinion and support it by giving reasons for my thinking.
In writing this week we starting thinking about forming opinions and persuading readers of our thinking by
sharing items we already loved...our collections! Thank you for sending collections in this week! Our
gallery walk went SO well and the engagement in writing this week was amazing! A big part of opinion
writing is begin able to support your opinion with reasons. We will continue to sharpen our reasoning
skills in written communication and even bring in some tasty treats to enjoy! If you are interested in
donating items for this upcoming lesson please scroll down to the classroom donations links. Thank you!
Math:
Next week we will finish up unit 5 and last year this last 1/2 of the unit proved to be a bit more of a
challenge. Please be sure to look at the homelinks to provide extra practice in greater than and less than
symbols, identifying what digit is in the ones and tens place in a number, addition facts and counting 2 sets
of coins to determine which pile has more AND how much more. I will be giving a practice test this week
to focus in on skills to review before the test. I will also send the practice test home to help guide your
studying over the next weekend. Below is a reminder of the skills and concepts in Unit 5.
Unit five focuses on place value, addition and subtraction number stories, and basic addition and
subtraction facts. Most of the Unit is devoted to extending children's understanding of and proficiency
with, addition and subtraction. The group will be making up and solving number stories as we investigate
place value concepts for tens and ones, addition of 2 digit numbers, and introduce the "what's by rule?'
routine.
Here are some "Do Anytime" activities to match Unit Five skills and concepts:
*Have your child create and tell you a number story that goes with a given number sentence, such as 4+2=6
*Create number stories that involve two or more items. For example,
"Jody buys 2 pencils for 25 cents, an eraser for 5 cents, and a notebook for 35 cents. How much money
does Jody need?"
"I want to buy a cookie for 45 cents and a juice box for 89 cents. How much money do I need? " ($1.3