June!

Happy June! Oh, my the weeks are flying by quickly. On Friday June 4th we had our first grade salad celebration! It was so fun to watch the kids eat what they had worked so hard to grow. Thank you so much to Stacy and all the garden volunteers that made this fantastic project possible! Our first grade picnic is on Sunday June 6 from noon to 2:00. We will be there come rain or shine, although I do hope we have a bit more shine than rain. Remember to bring your own food and any beach toys you may want. It is a fun way to celebrate the end of our school year. Thursday June 10th is our field trip to the Zoo. Please make sure your child has a sack lunch and comfortable shoes. If you are helping that day, please bring a backpack, or something to carry lunches in, and some way to keep track of the time. Come to the classroom around 8:45. Look forward to seeing you. Monday June 14th is field day. If you can volunteer for this day, please contact Mr. Harrel our P.E. teacher. The event happens in the afternoon from 1:00 - 2:30. I would like to invite all classroom volunteers to the classroom on June 15th at 2:20 so we can properly thank you for all of your wonderful help. June 16th we will celebrate all summer birthdays at 11:00. If you want to send in treats, please let me know.

June 17th is our last day of first grade! School begins at 8:30 and ends at 11:00. Report cards will be sent home with your student.

Thank you so much for making this year so wonderful! I so appreciate each and every one of you. It is always hard to say good-bye, especially to such a great group of kids and parents. I wish you a safe, positive, fun and great summer.

Take good care,

Cheryl Churchill

May

Happy May everyone! Hopefully the sun will continue to shine a little more often. We have been, and will continue to be, very busy in the classroom! On may 7th we all participated in IVE's annual Walk-a-Thon. Everyone was terrific and did a lot of laps! I am so proud of them.

Your children continue to work very hard in their reading groups. In class we continue to read a variety of stories, discuss main characters, settings, and work on making predictions. In writing we are working on adding details to sentences, making sure sentences make sense, checking for correct spelling as well as capitals and endings. Please help your child look for these same things in their writing at home.
I am reading Charlotte’s Web to the class as it ties in well with our upcoming science unit on insects.

Speaking of science, we have been learning about plants. We have diagramed a plant and labeled the main parts, learned about plant life-cycles, looked inside a seed and have planted seeds in class. Your students have learned about all the essential elements needed to grow a healthy plant. Our new science unit is Insects.
On Tuesday, May 11th, the Science To Go program will come to our class to teach about insects!! Students will be able to observe insects and insect parts, play insect games, puzzles, use microscopes to view insects up close, and much more. We will also hatch butterflies in our room! Students will be able to observe all the stages of butterflies! In fact our caterpillars have now arrived and are busy eating! It will be a great experience to watch them go through each stage of their life-cycle.

In math we are currently in Unit 9: Place Value and Fractions. In this unit students are learning more about place value and how it relates to the numbers in our life. This unit also begins to develop students skills in mentally adding and subtracting with multiples of 10 in preparation for adding and subtracting 2-digit numbers. Students are also learning about fractions, fraction words, and the basic meaning of fractions. Please refer to your home-link letter for ways to assist at home. Don't forget to remind your student to do their math homework!

Here are some important dates you may want to remember:

May 6 - Art and Garden Docent
May 7 - Walk-A-Thon - First Grade walks at 8:35 - 9:35 am
May 12 - 18 - MSP Testing (first grade does not do this test)
May 18 - PTA Meeting @ 7pm
May 20 - Volunteer Luncheon - Hope to see you there!
May 24 - First Grade Music Program @ 2:00
May 28 - May 31 - No School - Memorial Day weekend
June 6 - The annual first grade picnic. Information to come home soon!
June 10 - Field Trip to the Woodland Park Zoo
June 14 - Field Day
June 17- The last day of school, can you believe that?

It is truly remarkable that we only have about 4 and 1/2 weeks of school left! The students have all worked so hard, learned a lot, are becoming more independent, and are a joy to teach. Thank you all so much for your kindness and support. We have a lot left to learn and many fun activities and I look forward to it being a wonderful and successful last month of school.

Thank you!

Cheryl Churchill

April 2010

Happy April! I hope all of your children enjoyed their spring break!

Can you believe that April is already upon us? The months seem to fly by so quickly.

We have been learning about oviparous animals. Not sure what kind of animals those are? Ask your student, they should be able to tell you. In fact, if you want to help them post their answers on my blog, that would be great! Have your student answer the following questions: 1. What is an oviparous animal? 2. What is your favorite oviparous animal and why is it your favorite?. Remind them to use complete sentences! In math we are currently in unit 7 which is about geometry and attributes. Students sort shapes by attribute rules, identify 2 and 3-dimensional shapes, make polygon shapes and explore symmetry. In writing we are working on writing several, complete, sentences on a given topic, working on adding details to our writing, and making sure there are capitals and endings for each sentence. I am also teaching students how to edit their written work by re-reading and making sure their writing makes sense and has appropriate conventions.

In science we are learning about oviparous animals and will also begin our plant unit. Our class will have an art docent lesson on April 8th as well as a Garden Lesson. We are so, so fortunate to have these amazing programs. Again, thank you so much to all the volunteers who make this possible!

Important Dates: April 9: Science Fair, April 19-23: spring book fair, April 20: PTA Meeting, and April 28: Multi-cultural night 6:30.

I wish you all a positive and healthy month. Thank you so much for all your support and time.

Happy April,
Cheryl Churchill

February 2010

I hope you all enjoyed your February break! Wasn't it lovely to see all the sunshine?
A huge thank you to Leslie, Stephanie, Shari, Amy and Pete for helping our class create a beautiful auction item. You will not want to miss your chance to bid on this (March 12th)! Thanks, also, to Leslie, Amy, and Stephanie for are most recent art lesson, which was print art. The cards turned out beautiful! We are so fortunate to have these Art lessons! We will be going on a field trip to the Seattle Pacific Science center on March 5th. Please return your permission slip and $10.50 as soon as you can.
Report cards will be coming home on March 19th. Also in March are the following events:
3/5: field trip to Seattle Pacific Science Center
3/12: IVE Auction - Hope to see you there
3/15-18: BookFair
3/17: School Time Change! 8:30-12:53 (Due to High School exams)
3/23: Walk-A-Thon Kick-Off Assembly
3/29-4/2: Spring Break

I look forward to seeing you all soon. Have a wonderful rest of February and a great start to March!

Cheryl Churchill

January/February

January is going by very quickly! We have begun our polar unit and are currently learning about polar bears. We will also investigate the Arctic Fox! Next, we will learn about Antarctica and the environment there. In math we are learning about place value, number stories and basic facts. This month we will also be writing about "How to build a snowperson".
Our stanford testing is fast approaching. We will be testing February 1 - 5th. Please help your child get plenty of rest and reassure them that all they need to do is listen and try their best. You can send a healthy snack to school during our week of testing.
We will celebrate Valentine's Day with a class party on the 12th of February. If you can donate any items or help out in the class, please let myself or Shari Tokumi know. Our class is also collecting Change for Haiti. I always do some type of community project, during the month of February, as it ties in very well with the concepts of love and caring.
Once, again, thank you all so much for your support and kindness!
Cheryl Churchill

October!

It is hard to believe that it is already October! Our class has been building stamina in reading and our reading groups are up and running. During reading time your student is meeting with me, reading to self, working on writing, listening to reading, and going to the ABC center (where students create words, read words, play memory games and all kinds of word work!). We have also been creating poems, writing about "what we know" and learning to add details to our writing. In science we are exploring water. In math our class is currently working on number models, tally marks, skip counting (counting by 1's, 5's and 10's), clock skills (to hour and half-hour) and money (value of pennies and nickels).
We will be having an Autumn party on October 31st. I'll be sending home more information soon. If you would like to donate items for our party, please let me know. We need rice cakes, small chocolate chips, cream cheese, juice and plates. Students may bring a costume (but do not have to). The costume must be able to fit over their clothes. I hope all is going well for you this month. I am looking forward to meeting with you for conference (November 3 and 4th).

Welcome to first grade 2009-2010

Welcome to first grade! I hope you will find our blog interesting and fun. More information and exciting details, about our blog, will be coming soon!