Context Clues, Peas and Carrots, and Much Much More

A new common core standard for first grade is context clues.  I had never taught context clue directly before and was excited to create a new unit!  I read an article our reading coach gave us on context clues and suggested the book Henry P. Baloney to teach children context clues.  It was perfect and hilarious at the same time.  THE KIDS LOVED IT!!  It was presented to the children over a five day period.  I did 3 days and Ms. Toledo did the last two days which was fun to teach and observe this new skill.  We began the unit by asking what the children thought context clues were and then we introduced the anchor chart. 

Henry uses alien language through out his book and the students had to use the illustrations and the words to guess/predict the meaning of the unknown word.  Here are the words their meanings and what context clues we used to determine them.

 

We began each day with reading the section of the book we were going to cover that day.  Then we passed out clip boards with a half sheet for each student. The left column had the alien word and the right column was blank so they could tap to spell their prediction of the words meaning.  We read the story again and then we went around and shared our predictions and added it to the chart along with the context clues used. 

On Thursday we had a BIG day….      

did they tell you we got

20 CHARMS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Mrs. Lewis came with the big dice and she told the students the six prize options.  Then she called on the student to assign the different prizes to a number which I then write on the board.  Mrs. Lewis then offer the dice to Ms. Toledo or I to roll or we could pick a student who has been a a great role model by following the ABC’s.  We picked a special someone and she rolled that big dice.  It laded on six.  WE WON A PIZZA PARTY!  It was just a huge celebration in our class.   I will be setting a day next week for our pizza party and will let all the families know as to plan accordingly for lunch.

We learned a new SUMS game and practice an oldie but a goodie!  On Friday students refreshed their memory on how to play 3 towers of 10.  They did a great job working together and recording their data!

Our new game is called 7 peas and carrots.  My “special” spoon only scoops up 7 vegetables…some being carrots and some being peas. the students have to come up with all the combinations of 7 and they take turns recording on their sticky note!

Our math curriculum is called Math Connects.  We begin our math block with calendar on our interactive board, then do math journal most days, and then a mini lesson using Math Connects before we go into math centers.  Instead of ripping apart each page and taking the time to pass each page out everyday we decided to keep the chapter together like a book this year.  We stapled it so that it stays together and we put their name sticky on the front.  This cuts out so much wasted math time.  They get their book when they put their math journal away and turn to the page and begin.  We don’t even need to write our name.  We take classwork grades from this and their math mid chapter check test and final chapter tests are all in the packet. When you get these packets home like you did on Friday please go through it and see how your child is doing. 

The last 2 weeks we have been learning about nouns. We have been finding them in sentences and this week the students will begin using nouns in their sentences. when they free write.  This week we will introduce plural nouns. 

Each day during our read aloud we have continued to discuss a stories main idea and details.  This week the students will take an assessment on main idea and details.

We will begin our unit on motion- push and pull.  We got the students excited by doing an activity with a boat and water on Thursday.  The student recorded all the ways they got the boat to move. 

On Friday at recess Ms. Toledo got the students all excited!  She was “IT” and all the students were chasing her around. I am so glad I brought my camera out to capture these sweet moments!