“See you Later” not “Goodbye”

Today was my last day in Mrs. Ambrosino’s first grade class. It was a bittersweet day as we celebrated the time we spent together. Thank you for sharing your child with me and helping me grow as an educator. I look forwarding to taking the lessons I have learned this year  along with the memoires of a wonderful year in 1^st grade. Today in their backpacks, folders, or pockets you will find a small card like the one below. I gave each child 3 sunflower seeds to plant and take care of this summer. Sunflowers are extremely easy to take care of and so much fun to watch grown during the summer months! I also told the class that this is a see you later not a goodbye as Mrs. Ambrosino has already invited me back to come be a guest teacher a few times before the school year ends. I look forward to coming back to Ann Arbor to spend some quality time at Burns Park.

The Bad Beginning

Being that Friday is my last day the class has been suggesting every extra moment we have as a time that they could listen to me read. I love how attached to the story they have become, and highly suggest you take up the rest of the series at home. I can’t wait to finish the book with the class on Friday and talk about how they felt about the book. Below I have attached the list of the entire series for you and your families if you are looking for some good reads.

 

The Bad Beginning
The Reptile Room
The Wide Window
The Miserable Mill
The Austere Academy
The Ersatz Elevator
The Vile Village
The Hostile Hospital
The Carnivorous Carnival
The Slippery Slope
The Grim Grotto
The Penultimate Peril
The End

 

Transitions

Today marks the end of my time as lead teacher.  Mrs. Ambrosino and I have decided to slowly transition back to her being in charge of the class to make it easier for the class. It is refreshing and also sad to not have the responsibilities of teaching the entire day. I continued today teaching social studies as I have been the past few weeks. We are studying families and writing all about books to tell why our families are special. Today one of our first grade friends suggest these books become presents for a special day coming up in May. Since we deemed these books as presents that kids have been feverishly working on them in order to show you their best work!

A7 Poetry Café

I was so happy with the amazing turn out we had tonight for our poetry open house. Thank you to all the parents who came and listened to our poetry. It was a nice surprise to have students who wanted to share more than one of their poems. I hope this means they enjoyed the unit. I took a fun panorama of the whole experience for those of you who missed it.

 

Next week we will be starting All About… books. On Monday in Social Studies we began studying families, and we will write our first All About… book about our families.

Sneak Peak

Here is a small sneak peak for our open house tomorrow. Watching this video makes me so proud, and I know you will feel an even bigger rush of pride when you see your child up on stage tomorrow. From 6-6:15 will have the stage closed for mingling about the classroom. Your child will be allowed to show you all their poetry and anything else in our room. At 6:15 we will be starting our performances. Your child will sign up for a slot when you walk in if they feel like sharing.

 6 Word Memoir Video
(For privacy reasons, this is an unlisted video. Only people with the link can see it.)

In other news…

We have been working away on money and counting change in math. On Friday we will have our Unit 8 assessment and pick up next week on Unit 9.

Thursday this week will be participating in Washtenaw Community College’s Math Carnival in the afternoon. The kids love all the activities they bring, so make sure to ask them about it when they get home!

Friday will be the 5^th grade Market Day. Our class will be visiting the market after art in the afternoon. I’ve never experienced a Burns Park Market Day, but from what I hear it is incredible. Students will actually get the opportunity to purchase items from the market! I will make sure to take photos to share.

 

 

Setting the Stage

All week the class has enjoyed creating new and powerful six word memoirs. Today they all chose one memoir and recorded their voice reading it. This weekend I will put together the video in preparation for our open house. In addition we wanted to decorate our room for the open house. I hung a plastic table cloth as a curtain and each student created a light for our stage. We have already begun using our stage to practice presenting out poetry.

 

 

Dissecting Fruit

As we continue our study of living things, we dissected fruit today in order to find the stem, skin, and seeds. Everyone loved getting some hands on experience with the fruit and their scientific drawings turned out great!