Saturday, August 29, 2015

Welcome!

Welcome to a bright new school year! I have been in our room getting it ready for all of my smiling 2nd grader to enter on September 8th! I am so excited to meet my new students and start watching them grow! I know it is going to be a fantastic year in room 116!

I will use this blog throughout the year to post important information, events and dates! I will more commonly use our classroom Facebook page for the same purpose! (www.Facebook.com/MissNauta) My hope is that no one will ever feel out of the loop and you will know what is happening on a consistent basis in our classroom! We must work together to make it a successful year!

I look forward to meeting every one this Tuesday, September 1st at our Central Elementary Open House from 5:30-6:30!

Here is to a wonderful year of fun learning and getting to know each other!

Sunday, April 5, 2015

Happy Spring Break!

I hope this finds all of you having a wonderful and relaxing Spring Break! I cannot believe we are already at this time of the year. To think we have a little over 2 months left in the school years is crazy to me. The kids have grown so much and continue to amaze me on a daily basis! Here are a few highlights since my last post!

Reading Month
Last week we wrapped up Reading Month with a school wide celebration! As a school we read over 1300 hours! WAY TO GO MCMILLAN! As a class we read just over 200 hours throughout the month! How amazing! I hope you enjoyed The Lemonade War and the discussion questions each night! It was cool to listen to the students talk about the book in class and also make connections to what we were reading and learning about in class!
4 Hour Readers!

8 Hour Readers!

Lauren was the top reader in the school with 48 hours read throughout March! She won an MP3 Player and an OSMO!

Reading
We have really been growing our reading muscles and learning about the characters in our books! We are reading independently for about 25 minutes each day! YAHOO!! We are also getting more time to read with our partners and to share our learning!


RPEL Visit
We had a visit to RPEL on Thursday for lunch and a tour! The kids did a great job! Have a discussion with you child and see what they thought of the visit! Here are a few comments that were made after we returned! 
"It was so big!"-Abby
"I liked seeing the classrooms."- Elaine
"It was fun meeting new people I haven't met."- Seth
"I liked everything about it."- River
"Why do they have a bucket in their classroom full with juice boxes?" was a questions we will be asking our pen pals. (Hint: They are a green school and do a lot of recycling!) 






Reminders!
* April 17- April Book Orders are due  
* April 24- School Carnival
* May 7- Adopt-A-Reader Family Reading Celebration



Sunday, February 15, 2015

Happy Mid-Winter Break!

I hope all of you are enjoying your long weekend and staying warm! What a great opportunity to get some good reading in! Has anyone tried Moby Max? Another great way to spend some time on these cold days!

We have had some great times playing outside in the snow!

Thank-You PTO!
Thank you to everyone who helped sell chocolate bars for our PTO! We were one of the two top selling classes and were rewarded with a chocolate fondue party! The kids LOVED it!




Kindergarten Reading Buddies
We celebrated out unit of reading with our Kindergarten friends in Mrs. Medema's and Mrs. VanderMeer's class on Thursday! Both groups of kids were able to show off their reading growth! We then got to have some hot chocolate and cookies! Yum!







Salad Bar!!
We had a great addition to our lunch this week! Salad Bar was the choice B option all week and we had so many kids interested! I even had a few kids try it that were not so sure about salad! I had the pleasure of eating with the kids during lunch and it truly warmed my heart to see so many of the kiddos excited for that healthy option as well as being willing to try new things! We can't wait for salad bar to come back in March!






Imagination
I continue to love seeing the kids' imagination!





Valentine's Party
Thank you so much to everyone who helped make our party so successful! I truly appreciate it!








Reminders
* Box Tops are due Friday, February 27th! Can we win the pizza party?
* If you would still like to place a February book order, please send in your order Monday!
* Home Fun Packets are due Tuesday!

Monday, February 2, 2015

Busy 1st Graders!

Reading!
We have been continuing to grow as readers! We have added on to our list of strategies to use when we come to tricky parts in our reading! I will be assessing students this week to see what growth we have made in the last few months! I can't wait to see the results!

Thank-you for helping grow your child's responsibility in bringing their book bag back each day! Reading for at least 23 minutes each night is having a huge impact on the children's reading!

Writing!
We are writing Small Moment stories and looking at famous mentor authors to see what they do successfully! It has amazed me to see how far our writers have come from the beginning of the year! They are adding more and more details and even attempting to add dialogue into their stories! Yay writers!

Math!
In math, we have been focusing on place value and how a number is made with ones and tens. For example the number 37 is made of 7 ones and 3 tens! We are also continuing to build our sense of numbers and how they relate to one another!

We have spent our afternoons in math stations and have been able to try out the OSMO! This is an activity that we use with an I-Pad to build shapes and words. The kids love it and it has really helped them to build their problem solving skills!




Imagination!
A couple of weeks ago I started giving students a random shape to create a picture out of! My hope is that they will use their imagination to create a unique picture! I love looking at what they come up with! Here are a few examples!







Extra Recess!
We earned an extra recess for getting 20 class star slips! We earn a class star slip for showing STAR behavior! We are working towards ours next 20!







Reminders!
* Popcorn Sale Friday, February 6 (25 cents)
* PTO Meeting and Read-In Tuesday, February 10
* February Book Order Due Thursday, February 12
* Valentine's Party will be Thursday, February 12 from 3:00-3:45
* Mid-Winter Break February 13-16
* Box Tops Due Friday, February 27