Animals, pumpkins and a whole lot more!

     During whole group literacy instruction we are learning about What Animals Need.  We are reading a variety of non-fiction and fiction books about animals.  The following are some of our vocabulary words we learning and writing about in class, burrow, hunt, travel, shelter, carry & gather.  The comprehension strategy we are working on is asking questions.  I've been teaching our class that, "good readers ask questions as they read to learn more about what they are reading."
     We also are learning about pumpkins, students have learned and have written about the different parts of pumpkins and are participating in several activities connected to pumpkins. On Friday, during science students will learn about the life cycle of a pumpkin. Many of our read-alouds are about pumpkins and autumn.
    In math, we are learning about 2D & 3D shapes and recognizing them in the environment.  We are continuing to work with groups of five and counting as high as we can.

Important Dates

* This Friday, Oct. 17^th there is no school.

* On Monday, Oct. 20^th at 10am our whole school will have our picture taken in honor of Legacy’s 10-year anniversary.

* Friday, Oct. 24^th is picture retakes.

* Thursday, Oct. 30^th is Legacy’s annual Trick or Treat Festival at 6pm.

* Our class Halloween party will be on Friday, Oct. 31^st at 11am. I will email out a volunteer sign-up page for parents to provide goodies, craft materials, etc. in the next week.

* The October Scholastic book order is due Monday, Oct. 20^th. (I'll send home the order form tomorrow) Our class online code is: H6MZ7,  I promise that the turn around time on this book order will be much faster than September’s order! If I process our class order on the 20^th, the books should arrive within a week. J

Literacy

We just finished up our apple study.  Now during whole group literacy instruction our class is reading books and poems about healthy foods.  Some of the vocabulary words we are reviewing/learning are: vitamin, breakfast, supper, health, enjoy & need.  The comprehension strategy we are learning is inferring.  I've been telling students that, "good readers use what they already know to make a smart guess about the story."  You can help your child infer by providing them with everyday examples.  Let's play a guessing game. Use what you already know to make a guess...Where would I be going if I had a baseball and glove? A blanket and a picnic basket?  A backpack and homework?

This morning students will be participating in the school districts annual hearing and vision screening.  This week we will be studying different types of Colorado leaves and looking at various leaves with magnifying glasses.  We also are beginning to learn about Word Families. Children are recognizing and creating consonant-vowel-consonant word patterns. So far we have studied the AT & AN word families. Examples of WF words are cat, bat, sat, mat etc.