Dear Parents and Guardians,
I am thankful for another wonderful week with your children! We enjoyed playing in snow, exploring more numbers, and preparing for festivals. Thank you to all of you for contributing to the festivals by helping chop fruit, participating in our walk, helping make the soup, and attending our assembly.
TODAY! Get Creative with your Hands!
You are invited to a Makers Guild day of crafting at Urban Prairie today (November 17) from 11am-5pm. All are welcome at any level of skill, all materials will be provided. We will be working on silk dying, doll making, and much more. All finished products will be sold at the UPWS Community Fair to raise money for the school!
The goal of this day is to crank out finished products. If your attendance (and productivity) is reliant on childcare being provided please contact Sophie Huckabay at sophie.huckabay@urbanprairie.org.
Drop in for a couple hours or stay for the whole time!
Classroom Highlights
We wrapped up our first math block this week by exploring 10, 11, and 12. We spent time discovering the combinations that make 10 then recorded those in our Morning Lesson Books. Again, the more the children understand the various ways to compose and decompose quantities, the more flexible they will be in working with numbers. This flexibility that we are working to create allows children to continue to be open to finding ways to solve problems, rather than simply memorize a procedure that can easily be forgotten.
I introduced a new math tool this week—the Rekenrek! That is a Dutch word for “counting rack” and reinforces the five- and ten-ness of our number system. The tool has two rows of beads, 5 red then 5 white in the top row and then the same in the bottom row. We will be able to use this tool to help solve word problems, find different ways to show quantities, and more. By allowing the children to experience the quantities visually over and over, we are creating this visual memory for them that will support them as they continue to work with numbers. The stronger their visual number sense, the deeper their relationship will be with the quantities. I’ll have some out for you to see next week at the conferences for you to explore!
When we return, we will begin our next Language Arts block, continuing with consonants and short vowels.
Upcoming Events
Makers Guild, November 17, 11am-5pm
No School, November 19-23
Parent/Guardian-Teacher Conferences, November 19-20
Parent/Guardian-Teacher Conferences
I am looking forward to meeting with each of you for conferences. Thank you for signing up!
Please consider these questions in preparation for our meeting and if you’d like to email me beforehand, please do.
How has your child been adjusting to first grade?
What are some “highs”? What are some “lows” of the year at this point?
What questions or concerns do you have?
Thank you!
In preparation for our conferences, the children pored through their Morning Lesson Books, identifying the page(s) they were most proud of and then reported why it was chosen. I am looking forward to sharing those with you!
Lantern Walk
Thank you for those who were able to attend our Lantern Walk on Thursday evening. The children really enjoyed preparing for the Walk and it was so wonderful to welcome so many families to this event. It was a beautiful evening, with fluffy white snowflakes, song, and light!
Festival of Thanks
After bringing in cut fruit in the morning (thank you!), we gathered as a school community in Cricket Hall for a shared meal of soup, cornbread, and fruit salad. Each and every person there had contributed in some way to making that meal a success and that felt good! For the first time, the First Graders had the chance to join their color team and enjoy the meal with them. The tables were set so that the children were sitting with older and younger children, enjoying conversation and a delicious meal.
After a recess, we gathered once again in Cricket Hall for our Thanksgiving Assembly where the children shared gratitude by reciting parts of the Haudenosaunee Address. I was proud of the First Grade who had worked to learn their piece and share it with the school. It was a moving assembly, as most of them are at Urban Prairie! Thank you to those of you who were able to join us.