Dear Parents,

Did you see your students’ writing in the April edition of the Forest Park Press? We wrote short reports about the weather in late February, and these were published in the latest edition of the FPE Press. The students enjoyed seeing their names in print. You can find the April edition by going to the Forest Park homepage and clicking on Forest Park Press on the left side of the page.
We’re currently gearing up for a new science unit. The second graders study animals and habitats at this time each year. We learn general information about the differences between forests, deserts, and grasslands. We also learn some information about ponds and rivers, oceans, and arctic regions. We learn a little about the five different taxonomies of animals with backbones; amphibians, birds, fish, mammals, and reptiles. We determine what characteristics of different animals equip them for life in specific habitats. For instance, only certain animals can survive in deserts. The students also learn a little about food chains.
Most of this type of science is learned through books and class discussions and isn’t hands-on. To increase the interest factor and add activities to the science curriculum, the school district provides us with the materials to create “mini-habitats” in our classroom. The students work in small groups to plant a small terrarium that includes soil, a plant, a rock or two, twigs, bark, etc. These terrariums become the habitats for earthworms and pillbugs. While the other animals we’re studying will be larger and have backbones, these are the animals we can successfully observe in our classrooms. The students learn that a habitat provides shelter, food, water, oxygen, and space for the animals living in it.
We integrate the subjects of writing and art into our science unit about animals and habitats. Each grade level gets funds from the Run for the Arts money the students raise each spring to use for some activity in art or music. This year the second grade classes are using our money to have an Artist in Residence come to our classes for five art sessions. The art teacher will work with the students on painting with line, shape, and colors during the first three sessions. The fourth and fifth sessions will be used to paint an animal. The students will be able to choose the animal they’ll be painting (within certain restrictions). The students will also learn to write basic reports and will choose an animal to write a report about. The report writing will all take place at school during Writer’s Workshop. I’m collecting library books about animals that the students will be using for these reports. We may ask individual parents to help their children find information about an animal on a website if we can’t find a book with the information we need.
We will culminate our unit on animals and habitats with two activities. On Tuesday, May 24th all of our second graders will visit The Portland Zoo. We’ll send more information on this in future. We won’t have to limit the number of parents who are able to chaperone, so all parents are welcome! However parents will have to drive themselves or carpool because our bus funds are limited. We won’t be able to have younger siblings on this trip due to safety issues.
At a date to be determined but probably within a week to ten days of the zoo trip, all of the second graders will go to Mill Pond Park on a walking field trip. All parents are invited and younger siblings are allowed on this trip. Parents often meet us at the park instead of walking up and down the hill with us, especially if they have preschoolers. The purpose of the trip is to evaluate the health of the pond and the stream, but we’ll also take our lunches with us and have both recess and lunch at the park. We will send out information about the zoo trip and the walk to Mill Pond Park at later dates.
I hope you’re enjoying the sunshine!
Kathy Fink

January 2011

Dear Parents,

Your second graders are currently learning about a variety of new subjects and are developing many new skills.
In Math we're continuing to work towards the end-of-second-grade goal of memorizing the addition and subtraction facts to 20. I've begun giving the students a timed addition (or subtraction) test once a week to track their progress. Most students will be bringing home an addition facts game to help them master these facts. If your child is still working to memorize the basic facts to 10, he or she will bring home a game specific to facts to 10. If your child has mastered the facts to 10, he will bring home a game of facts to 20. Playing this at home with the help of parents or older siblings should help in memorizng the basic facts and developing strategies for memorizing or quickly calculating answers. Students who have mastered addition facts to 20 wil be working on subtraction facts to 20. Most adults are surprised to learn that memorizing addition and subtraction facts are two separate processes in the minds of children.
We are also exploring measurement in Math. We're learning more about telling time and have learned to use rulers to measure length in inches and cetimeters. We're also learning to read the temperature on a thermometer.
In Science we're learning about weather and how it affects our lives. We've studied the water cycle. Did you know that all the water currently on Earth, in one form or another, is the same water that was on Earth during the era of the dinosaurs? We're also learning to identify the three main types of clouds and what kind of weather you can generally expect ot find under certain cloud conditions.
In Social Studies we've been learning about two subjects. We've learned more aobut Martin Luther kIng and the Civil Rights struggle. We're also learning about inventions and how they've changed our lives.
Valentines Day is Monday, February 14th. We will have a small party in the classroom that afternoon. Our class will exchange valentines at that time. Please look for a copy of this newsletter to go home with your child. That copy will have a list of our students on it so that you can insure that your child is able to give a valentine to all of his or her classmates.

September 2010

Dear Parents,

 Our school year is off to a great start. We’ve been busy getting to know each other and developing classroom routines. At the moment we’re not following an exact schedule due to the need to complete individual beginning-of-the-year assessments. The schedule we will be following was sent home with your children on September 17th. You can see which days the students have P.E., Library, and Technology and when your children are at lunch and recess.

By the beginning of October, we’ll be ready to begin using volunteers in the classroom. I’ll send a volunteer questionnaire home soon.

I’ll begin assigning homework on Monday and there will be an informational letter to explain the homework philosophy and routine. Amy Smith and I plan our homework assignments together and follow the same homework routine. Linda Hendrick’s class and Pam Swandaloeb’s second graders have homework assignments that vary from ours because the two of them are planning and assigning homework together. 

Please remember that next Wednesday, September 22, is a Late Opening Day. Just as we did last year, the teachers meet for two hours of training about once a month on a Wednesday morning, and this upcoming Wednesday is our first training day. School will begin at 10:00 that morning.

We’ve begun our regular literacy and math lessons. Our  Literacy studies revolve around a weekly theme found in our reading book. We have a spelling and phonics component to our Literacy studies, and students will also meet in groups for small group reading instruction. Many of the literacy worksheets students complete in class are related to the theme of the week.

This week the story in our reading book was Iris and Walter, a story about a girl who moves from the city to the country and has to make new friends. We’ve been exploring the theme of making friends and we’ve connected our learning to the second grade Social Studies curriculum, which includes Geography. We’re beginning to learn to read maps and will learn about differences between cities and the countryside. This week your child made a brochure of things to do in Portland and summarized the story Iris and Walter with words and pictures.

In Math, we start the year with a review of some of the concepts we’d learned by the end of First Grade, and once routines are established we move on to more complex math. This year each of the regular second grade classrooms will have four or five additional students because the second graders from Mrs. Swandaloeb’s blended classroom are assigned to our rooms for math.

I would like to ask parents to help me out with a new fad that is causing disruptions in the classroom. Currently, there are plastic animal shaped bracelets that are very popular, and many of the students have them. I would like the bracelets to be left at home. The students have a habit of both taking them off and playing with them while I’m teaching or trading them or giving them away. They’re just too big a distraction for the classroom.

Teachers will be providing more information about a variety of subjects at Back-to-School Night on September 29th. In the meantime, you can contact me with any questions you might have. The first question that may come to mind may involve birthdays because we have several in the near future. We've established the policy of acknowledging students' birthdays in the classroom, but we no longer bring in treats or celebrate the birthdays with any type of party at school.  

Your students may bring a healthy snack to school each day. Our class doesn't eat lunch until noon, and some of the students are hungry by 10:00 a.m. I allow the students to have a snack that isn't a dessert type of snack, such as cookies or candy. Students who bring a lunch from home often just take a snack from their lunch, but students who have hot lunch often forget their snacks. I've provided graham crackers the first two weeks of school, but students will have to remember their own snack once the box of crackers runs out. 

I’ll send a volunteer questionnaire for those who are interested in helping in the near future.

Thank you so much, 

 Kathy Fink

June 7, 2010

This is a very busy week for our class. We're spending time rehearsing for The Lady Bug ball and finishing assessments. We will perform The Ladybug Ball at 10:30 on Thursday, June 10th, in our classroom. The students took their invitations home today, so please look for those in their backpacks. On Friday we will participate in Field Day at 9:00 a.m. This time is for K-2, and 3-5 will have their Field Day in the afternoon. It is also our last Spirit Day.of the year. A note went home on orange paper explaining that each class picks a theme or a color. Our theme is insects (as it has been for the past two months), and we'll be wearing our insect t-shirts. I will have the shirts here at school, and your child can put his or her shirt on over whatever they wore to school. That afternoon, they'll take the shirts home as a souvenier of First Grade.

I know that the parents who are able to attend The Ladybug Ball will do so, and many of you will also be here to help with Field Day on Friday.It's important to remember to stop in the office when you first enter the school to get a visitor pass / volunteer pass. Please remind any family members who might be attending the Ladybug Ball that we need them to sign in also. It's a rule that we are now STRICTLY enforcing that all adults in the building (including teachers and other PPS personnel) wear a nametag at all times. This is the most visible way for us to tmonitor adults in the building.

    The students are looking forward to performing for you on Thursday!   

Thank you so much to everyone who helped out in our classroom this year! I don’t send a volunteer calendar for June because we spend time practicing for the Ladybug Ball, and I’m also busy with assessments, so we have less structured activities the last two weeks of school.
This is also when the homework assignments end, so there will be no calendar or reading logs for June. Please keep your children reading, though! At least 20 minutes a day throughout the summer will help your child retain the reading skills he or she accrued this year.

There are two fun activities coming up in June. On the morning of June 10th our class will perform for parents and younger siblings in our classroom. We will be performing “The Ladybug Ball,” which is a Forest Park First Grade tradition. We’re learning songs and poems about insects that we’ll share with you. This will be in our classroom at 10:30 on the morning of June 10th. I chose morning rather than afternoon because our classroom can sometimes be stifling hot on early June afternoons, even with the air conditioning.

The morning after the Ladybug Ball is Field Day. The Kindergartners, First Graders, and Second Graders will participate in fun games, relay races, etc. from 9:00 to 10:30 that morning.

Please don’t forget the Ice Cream Social to honor our volunteer parents. That event will take place this coming Tuesday afternoon, the first of June.

Upcoming Events in February

Our field trip to the Rock Museum is fast approaching. We've had a tremendous response to our request for parent chaperones for the trip. In fact, each first grade class has 12 volunteers, so we have 36 adults in addition to the teachers! We're concerned about parking at the Rock Museum and are strongly encouraging parents to car pool, so that all parents will be able to find parking. The first grade teachers are sending a list of parent chaperones from all classrooms, so that parents can find possible carpool partners for this event. The list will come as an email attachment. If your carpool is meeting us at the school and then following the bus from the school, please be here at 9:20. The bus will leave the school at 9:30. We will be paying the admission fee with one check. Please remember to turn in your admission fee of $4.50 to the office.

I sent home a note today about our Valentines Party. I included a list of all of the students so that your children can write their valentine cards. They may also make a valentine card container at home.  

February

Since returning to school in early January we've been busy learning about rocks. The students are enjoying collecting rocks in their egg carton containers. We have our upcoming field trip to the rock museum next Wednesday, February 3rd. If you have volunteered to accompany us, I'll soon send out maps and a list of other parents who are going so that you can make plans to carpool.

Our class recently completed our art auction project. We made two framed quilt designs, which ties into our geometry unit in math. This framed art will be on display in the school hallway during the final week or so leading up to the auction. Thank you so much to Amy McMahon, Marie Devlin, and Deb Kerrigan for their work on this project!

Our class will continue this art / math connection with three sessions with an artist-in-residence who will teach us more about quilts and work with us on quilt designs. Our class is using some of the Run for the Arts money we collected last year to fund this. We will have sessions in the classroom for three Thursdays in February, the 11th, 18th, and 25th from 9:10 to 10:00 a.m. each time. We would love to have parent volunteers who could help with this. Please e-mail me if you would like to volunteer. We need one or two parents for each session, but we don't need to have the same parents each time.

Speaking of the auction ... I'm amazed at the items our class parents have been able to put together for our class auction baskets. There are some fantastic items that will be available in our class "Art Lovers" baskets. Thank you to everyone who has helped with this, especially Karen Cook, Stephanie Coyle, and Deb Kerrigan for gathering and coordinating donations.

Finally, the auction invitations were sent home with the students last Friday. There was one lone invitation left on our floor after students had packed up and left the classroom. If you didn't receive an invitation and would like one, I've got it here and could send it on home with your child.

December

It was great to get to meet with parents during the Parent Teacher Conferences and talk about your children's progress. It's so much fun to watch first graders absorb new information. It's amazing how they grow in the course of one school year.

During the month of December we're reading variations of the Gingerbread Boy story. We've read the traditional story plus a few with happier endings (happier for the Gingerbread Boy or Girl). We've been learning to compare and contrast in terms of what is the same and what is different. At the moment, many of our literacy activities are centered on the theme of the Gingerbread Boy.

In Math we're working with word problems, also known as story problems. The most important part of solving a word problem is to know which operation to use. In first grade, we will only work with the operations of addition and subtraction. When we attempt to determine whether to add or subtract, we start by asking, "Will our answer to the problem be bigger or smaller than the number we began with?" For example, in the problem: "Jan had 13 marbles. She gave 5 to her brother. How many marbles does she still have?" we first determine that we're going to subtract because Jan ends the problem with a smaller number of marbles than she had at the beginning of the word problem. We also think of a subtracting problem as being a "separating" problem. The big group of marbles at the beginning of the problem gets separated into two smaller groups --- the marbles Jan gave away and the marbles she kept for herself. Conversely, we think of an addition problem as taking two small groups and combining them into a larger group. We know that if the final answer is going to be bigger than the first number in the problem, we're adding. We also call addition problems "combining" problems. There are a variety of strategies for solving addition and subtraction problems at the first grade level. It's perfectly acceptable to draw a picutre and cross out the items that are being subtracted, etc. Some of the students can solve many of the problems we're doing in their head, but they are still required to show their thinking in some way. This is because as the students go through upper elementary, middle school, and high school, they'll work collaboratively in the upper grades on complicated problems. We need them to become comfortable thinking about and explaining what they did to find the answer at an early age.

Enjoy the Winter Break!

November

We have been in school for nine weeks now and are quickly approaching parent teacher conferences. One of the most enjoyable things about teaching first grade is watching the students grow in their reading, writing, and mathematical abilities in these first nine weeks. The advances individual children experience are amazing!  

Our whole class reading lessons are presently focused on the theme of "Community." We've read stories about families. We're presently reading about classroom communities, and we will soon be reading about the larger communities within towns and cities. Our reading texts also contain a phonics component which helps first grade students build reading skills. We are currently focused on the long vowels ("a" as in cake, "e" as in meat, "i" as in like, "o" as in note, and "u" as in cute) and will soon focus on consonant blends (fr, tr, sl, etc.).

We will soon end our Science unit on Spiders. The students have all enjoyed this and are now spider "experts."

We alternate Science and Social Studies units, and we'll begin a unit on Families and Family Traditions that will run from Thanksgiving to the Winter Holidays.

Throughout the year Forest Park families generously contribute to various food drives. The Fifth Grade is adding a very small drive to what we have traditionally done in the past. There is a program in Portland known as the Backpack Lunch Program. People involved in this program contribute to insure that students who are at risk of hunger on weekends when school lunch programs aren't available have lunches through the weekend. Because we're trying to keep this small, we're hoping to just get one item from each of our students rather than asking our children to make a larger contribution at this time. A letter home with foods that could be contributed will follow in a few days.

Notes for October

   Welcome to our classroom blog. Your children are making amazing progress as first graders! The students are becoming more independent and are able to do many things for themselves.

We have finished most initial assessments and have been able to begin reading groups. Students work somewhat independently on a variety of literacy-related projects while the reading groups meet. In whole class literacy, we have been focusing on vowel sounds. We are close to being ready to focus on long vowel sounds in short words that end with "e" (such as "cane" or "mine") and in short words with two vowels together within the word (such as "rain" or "boat").For some students, the phonetic focus will be on learning to read the words while some other students may already recognize the words and will now be working towards being able to spell the words correctly in their own writing. Students develop as readers at different rates, and some students are working on slowing down and reading for meaning while others are working to increase their reading fluency.

In Math we have worked on a broad variety of topics as the students familiarize themselves with first grade math routines. The students are learning about place value. They are understanding that a number such as 28 can be thought of as two groups of ten and eight ones. This lays the foundation for much of the math they will be doing throughout their elementary years. We have worked with grouping items, such as buttons, by attriubutes. The students have sorted the buttons into groups based on size, color, number of holes, shapes, etc. This is a simple and fun activity for the students, and is very worthwhile because it helps provide a foundation for understanding scientific classifications of rocks or animals in the later grades. The students can all tell time to the hour, and we're learning about time to the half hour. We're beginning to learn about story problems. We're mainly working with addition story problems at the moment.

A major long term first grade goal is to memorize all the addition facts to ten. It is even more important to understand the facts than to have them memorized. We've spent time exploring the combinations of numbers that add up to 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10. We're also focusing on memorizing the "doubles" up through ten; 2 + 2, 3 + 3, etc. We'll soon begin to focus on equations (also called number sentences in first grade math vocabulary) that are "doubles plus one", such as "If I know that 4 + 4 = 8, then I know that 4 + 5 = 9." Through out the year, we'll continually revisit the understanding and memorization of the basic math facts.

In Science we are studying spiders. The first graders explore a unit on spiders in the fall and then learn about insects in the spring. It's an interesting way to begin exploring nonfiction subjects and beginning to do very basic research. They find three or more facts about spiders and then write the facts as sentences. We do this in class. The first graders learn about habitats in the context of spiders; that all animals need a source of food and some type of shelter. Students who are especially interested in spiders are very enthusiastic about this unit!  

We're having a great time in first grade, and I'm really enjoying spending the days with your children.