Room #7 boys and girls have been busy bees these past two weeks. Read on to find out some highlights!
We started a new unit in Math this week. During this unit, students are focusing on shapes – learning their names, understanding their attributes, and describing the differences among them. Students are also finding out about teen numbers as well as exploring the concepts of addition and subtraction.
- Build a Staircase (to 9!) - This week, this fan favorite got even trickier!! Not only did the kiddos use number dice to increase their number recognition but also had to build the staircase to 9! They had to choose which dice to use (1-6 or 4-9) dependent on what they needed in their staircase. Working with a partner, the boys and girls of Room #7 took turns rolling a die. They then stacked cubes together to represent that number. Once the partners finished building their staircases (1-9), they took turns rolling the die to disassemble them!!
- Pattern Block Puzzles – At this station, the students had the opportunity to explore relationships among shapes and determine how many ways the shapes could be arranged in a specific space. Using pattern blocks, the children filled in a particular puzzle shape in different ways and recorded the number of blocks used each time! Everyone became very creative with this station – definitely a fan favorite!
- Give the Next Number – We are beginning to talk about one more and one less. At this center, I laid down a number card. Students then had to think what number comes next! It was a great way to go over teen numbers as well as one more!
- Teen Puzzles – The kiddos concentrated on putting
- Grow and Shrink with Ten Frames – This activity appears to be just a simple counting game, but it is one that allows children to begin to see relationships between numbers. Using our 10 frame manipulatives, the cherubs represented a number and then had to choose to either “grow” or “shrink” their manipulatives to represent the new number. This station was even trickier this week because the numbers are getting greater! The kiddos are really developing their number sense with this station!
- Mix It Up! – This fun game could be played either with a partner or independently! Given a deck of number cards from 10-20, the students mixed up the cards and put them back in number order. It was really cool to watch them problem solve to make certain the numbers were in the correct positions. Additionally, the cherubs often sang parts of our teen number song to assist in this tricky work!
We are finishing up our unit on narrative writing! This week, the writers in Room #7 worked on publishing their favorite piece. In order to do this, they each received an “editing” checklist where they went through their piece to decide if they could read their writing: Did they stretch out the words? Did they use finger spaces between words? This is hard work! The students are committed to it, though, and determined to make their writing the best it can be! Up next? Pattern books after the Thanksgiving break!
We revisited rhymes this week as I noticed that many of our cherubs were having a difficult time identifying and naming rhyming words. They love to play with rhyming words. Together in our classroom, we listened to and identified words that rhyme, or sound alike. I made sure to emphasize that the words sound the same at the end. Many kiddos were confusing rhyming with words with the same beginning sounds. After clarifying, we did some rhyming matching games! You’ll notice that your child has brought home a sheet of rhyming pictures to cut apart and match by rhyme. Also, you may want to play other rhyming games with your child. There are several quick ones to play:
• Say two words out loud and invite your child to repeat them.
• Say a series of rhyming words such as dog, frog, log, fog. The child sits when she hears one in the series that does not rhyme: dog, frog, log, fog, hot.
Playing over and over again can lead your child to hearing and connecting words that rhyme, which will help them solve words when they read. Additionally, any rhyming books are good rhyming books! Have your cherubs identify any rhyming words that they hear! So fun!
Enjoy the weekend, everyone!