Last Week of September 2020 Updates

 Welcome to our last week of September, and for those of you counting, our 7th week of Flexible Remote Learning. Yes, our students are headed into their 7th week of learning online. Still mind blowing to me. We have learned, all of us. We have grown and students have made growth. We have done hard things together. I am so appreciative of all you are doing to make this happen on your side of the screen. I see your hard work, I know it is hard and the many reasons why it is so. Still you are doing it! All for our first graders. I wanted to recognize you and what you have put in for 7 weeks. Thank you! We are not done, take a deep breath and let's keep going. Here is what we have on the table for this week:

Math: We have been cruising along nicely in math during FRL. We will finish up with Topic D, Strategies for Counting on this week, followed by an assessment. After that we will begin Topic E, understanding the equal sign and the commutative property of addition. We will be creating true number sentences with equal expressions (3+2=4+1) and recognizing and correcting untrue number sentences (3+2 does not equal 4+2 so students will learn how to change just one addend to make it a true sentence). These lessons can often take more than one day in the classroom, so I will not be posting a full weeks of math in our calendar. I will post one day at a time, please do not work ahead. If I need an extra day for teaching I will make sure to send an email letting you know there will be no math practice for that day, we will save it after we do more teaching and learning of the concept the following day. Thank you for your understanding and working with me to ensure your child's understanding of these math concepts.

ELA:  We are headed into our second unit of our NatGeo reading curriculum. The theme for unit 2 is Plants. Be on the look out for how I plan on incorporating this into some science and how this will work with another material distribution soon. In the meantime, our spelling sound of the week will be short u sounds. Parents, do not forget when your children go to Independent ELA Reading time this is when they can be doing the following (side note we are working on RazzKids should be coming soon):

Work Due: Please make sure to use the Google Calendar to also look for work due. I have assigned a social studies assignment on types of homes families live in that is due, and I will repost a grammar assignment on Common and Proper nouns that was in the Calendar. Remember, we may be in FRL but things that are assigned are still being graded and put into report cards. We will review report cards at parent teacher conferences which will be held Monday Oct. 12 - Wednesday Oct. 14. I will have more details in next weeks blog.

Food Service:  I posted about FUSD's awesome food service program in last weeks blog, which you can access here Food Service Info Blog.  I want to add to this info that you can now also pick up meals on Friday for Saturday and Sunday at Cromer, Killip, Kinsey, Leupp and Thomas elementary schools from 7:30 am to 9:00 am and 10:30am to 1:00 pm. Again, if your family is in need of meals for your children ages up to 18, I encourage you to click on the link for more information and take advantage of this amazing program.

Pledge of Allegiance:  If your child would like to lead the school in the pledge you can videotape them saying the pledge and send it to Principal Reasor at jreasor@fusd1.org. She will make their video a part of the morning announcements for the school to see. 

Show and Tell:  I cannot tell you how much I am enjoying show and tell. This has been amazing for the students to get to know each other and for their speaking skills. My favorite part is how kind they are to each other during this time. They other day one friend shared a cool homemade show and tell and on their own they started giving it thumbs up, heart, and confetti emoji's. It was such a genuine show of love and support and our friend who was showing had the biggest smile on his face. Next week's theme is something blue.

Hope everyone has had a restful weekend. 💛-Ms. Shaw

FRL Week 6 September 21-25

 Welcome to week 6 of FRL. I cannot believe how fast online learning is flying by. Just so you know, the district will be making a decision on back to school for quarter 2 this Tuesday night. You may watch via Venmeo on the district home or live on Facebook. I will email you on Wednesday with their decision so you will be up to date immediately. If we are back in FRL, things will continue as they are. If we are in any kind of hybrid model I will send information with what this means. For now let's talk what we are learning next week:

Math:   We will finish Topic C - adddition word problems on Monday. This will be followed by our Topic C assessment on Tuesday. Then we will begin our unit for strategies for counting on. Please remember, in our math curriculum we teach many strategies for problem solving. The reason for this is not just so that your child may learn many methods, but also so that they may learn how to pick the strategies that work for them, and even discover the ones that do not. If one way seems to frustrate them, encourage them to use a strategy for solving that does. 

ELA:  We are finishing the first of our 4 week units in ELA, this one being families. We will be working on words with the short e sound and in grammar we will continue learning common and proper nouns. This was a difficult concept last week, so I want to continue it for another lesson. I want to point out that it is also more of an introductory concept for first grade, so although I will teach it another day I do not expect mastery of this concept in first grade. They will be exposed to common and proper nouns in subsequent years.

Suzuki Violin:  Suzuki starts on Monday. For those of you who choose to participate and picked up a violin (or have one at home already) please make sure to join this special on Monday's from 1:10-1:40. Link will be in the Google Classroom.

RTI:  RTI will also begin on Wednesday of this week. RTI will be every week, Monday-Thursday from 10:50-11:20 from this point on. Your child will click on their teachers link to attend their RTI class. If your child is in SEI, they will continue with Ms. Waltner. I will put the links in the stream of the Google Classroom, not the calendar. This is because there are 8 groups and they will not fit in the classroom. I will list the groups below. If your child is not on the list it is because they will not need to attend RTI while we are in FRL at this time. Please keep in mind, students from the other 2 first classes will also be in these groups. 

Ms. Waltner - Jake, Jocelyn, Damiana

Ms. Voorhees - Violet, Vaerick

Mrs. Hanno - Rayland, Guner

Mrs. Anderson - Elizabeth, Nino

Mrs. Stamer - Marcus

Mrs. Schepper - Cohen, Dakota, Riley

Mr. Kasch - Victoria, Aria, Isaac, Juniper

Mrs. Burgoon - Sofia

FUSD Food Services:  It's back! FUSD's Grab and Go Food Service Program has returned. Here's what I love, the program is available to all children under the age of 18 in the community, and children do not have to be enrolled in an FUSD school to use the free meal service. Meals can be picked up by parents for their child. Each meal will include breakfast and lunch for the day. Meals will be provided from 7:30 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. at Cromer Elementary, Killip Elementary, Kinsey Elementary, Leupp Elementary, and Thomas Elementary. Additionally, meals will also be available via bus distribution at the following times and locations:

• 8:30 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. - Mountainaire Store

• 8:30 a.m. to 8:45 a.m. - 6885 Lumberjack Blvd.

• 8:30 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. - 1001 N. Fourth St.

• 8:40 a.m. to 8:45 a.m. - Grey Mountain at East Side of 89

• 8:51 a.m. to 9:01 a.m. - E. Rustler Rd. and Leupp Rd.

• 9:05 a.m. to 9:35 a.m. - 2701 E. Industrial Dr.

• 9:10 a.m. to 9:40 a.m. - Kachina Trail at Raymond Park

• 9:14 a.m. to 9:24 a.m. - S. Horn Rd. at Leupp Rd.

• 9:25 a.m. to 9:40 a.m. - STAR School

• 9:45 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. - Bird Springs Housing MP 27.5

• 9:55 a.m. to 10:20 a.m. - 37 W. Pinewood Blvd.

• 10:45 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. - Tolani Lake at Three Way Stop

I think this is such an amazing service provided by the district and highly encourage anyone who needs it to please take advantage of this meal service.

A very full week ahead. If you have any questions feel free to reach out. Look for updates midweek. -Ms. Shaw

Labor Day Week

 Happy Labor Day. I hope everyone had a relaxing 3 day weekend. Can you believe we are headed into week four of FRL? I would like for us to gather on Wednesday night to discuss where we stand at this point, more of that below. First, as always, let me share what we will be doing in class.

Math:  We will finish Topic B on Tuesday and Wednesday. This covers counting on from embedded numbers up to totals of 8-10. On Thursday I will review the math test with them, and then they may take the test after that on Nearpod. They may not take the test before that, or they will not have been taught the lessons covered on the test. Next week we will get into Topic C, addition word problems.

ELA:  We are moving into week 2 of our ELA unit of families. This also means our second week of spelling, which is short i words. Please remember that when your child goes to independent ELA the first thing they should be doing is their spelling words, and then they can be doing one of the Daily 5 options they have learned with me, along with watching the link to the video I have provided for them in the independent work section. This will always be a short, fun video that goes with the spelling sounds we are working on. 

Suzuki:  We are hoping to add Suzuki violin to our FRL schedule. This would be on Monday's from 1:10-1:40. We need to know who is interested in having a violin at home for their child to participate in this special. Please take the time to fill out this attached survey either way to help us plan accordingly.  Suzuki Survey  Thank you.

Parent Information Check In Night:  Ok, I tried coming up with a cute name for this, but it is 6:30 on Monday evening. If you have a cute name, let me know. The important part is I would like to host a parent check in night this Wednesday from 6:00-6:30 just to go over some important information that might make life on your end a little easier and answer any questions you might still have on your end. We will make it easy and just use the same link we use for class. I really hope to see everyone there.

Show and Tell:  I have decided to bring back show and tell, something we have not had time for in first grade for the last several years. Every week I will let the students know the theme for the upcoming week, and put it here in the blog. This weeks theme is - something with wheels. On your child's assigned day they may share something they have that has wheels. They are to tell us as much information they can about their item, where they got it, why they like it, etc.. Then they will be able to call on three friends who can ask a question or make a statement about your child's show and tell. The assigned days are in our Google Classroom calendar, but I will post here as well. If we ever have a closure on Monday (or any other day of the week) those kiddos will go on Friday. Friday will also be reserved for make ups. This week was no school Monday, so Monday kiddos will be going this Friday. I told them the good news is that they will get to go two times in a row. Here is our show and tell schedule.

Monday's - Aria, Cohen, Cypress, Dakota (This group will go on Friday this week).

Tuesday's - Elizabeth, Guner, Isaac, Jake, Jocelyn 

Wednesday's - Juniper, Marcus, Nino, Paloma, Rayland

Thursday's - Reese, Riley, Sofia, Vaerick, Victoria, Violet

Reading Groups: I will begin meeting with your kiddos in reading groups next week, starting Monday September 21st. This week we will finish district wide testing that is used to help form these groups. I will be doing a combination of group meetings and one on one sight word meetings to build their sight word skills. Being that I am trying to accomplish both types of meeting, I will be doing some of the groups during independent work times. This means your child will have to complete their independent work at other times of the day. Please make sure that days independent work is completed. Here is the schedule as it is at this time:

Monday's -

Group 1 @ 9:30: Jake, Vaerick, Violet

Monday's 1:1's -
12:20-12:40 Cypress
12:40-12:50 Reese
12:50-1:00 Damiana
1:00-1:10 Paloma
1:40-1:50 Cohen
1:50-2:00 Juniper

Tuesday's - 

Group 2 @ 9:30: Jocelyn, Guner, Elizabeth, Rayland

Group 3 @ 12:20: Dakota, Nino, Isaac, Riley, Marcus

Wednesday's - 

Group 4 @ 9:30: Aria, Cohen, Victoria, Sofia

Group 5 @ 12:20: Juniper, Cypress, Damiana

Wednesday's  1:1's -

2:00-2:10 Jake

2:10-2:20 Violet

2:20-2:40 Nino

2:40-2:50 Vaerick

Thursday's -

Group 6 @ 9:30: Reese and Paloma

Thursday's 1:1's -
12:20-12:40 Rayland
12:40-12:50 Guner
12:50-1:00 Elizabeth
1:00-1:10 Jocelyn

2:00-2:10 Dakota

2:10-2:20 Isaac

2:20-2:40 Riley

2:40-2:50 Marcus

Friday's 1:1's -

11:20-11:30 Aria

11:30-11:40 Sofia

11:40-11:50 Paloma

11:50-12:00 Victoria

I believe I have everyone covered. Unless there is a major scheduling issue, let's see how this goes before we try and switch any times around. Of course, if there is a huge and immediate conflict please let me know.

Once again, I think that is enough information for tonight. I look forward to seeing everyone on Wednesday at 6:00. Week 4, let's go! -Ms. Shaw