Ms.Soulas' Classroom

It was a short and wonky week! We are continuing to build our number sense and starting to add/subtract with bigger and unfriendly numbers. Here is an activity you can do at home to help support your kiddo's number sense! Guess My Number  (use a hundreds chart or a number line) –To play, ask one player to choose a number within a set and comfortable (based on age) range such as 1-100. This number remains secret until someone guesses it. To start have one participant at a time take turns narrowing the range until one is able to guess the number. Questions might include: Is it greater than fifty? Is it an even number? Is it less than eighty? Is it more than twenty? The range of numbers should narrow each time until someone guesses the actual number. The week ended with an amazing performance by the Jefferson dancers! It is exciting to see how hard work and practice pay off. Finally, thank you to all of the parents who helped make the Stephenson Auction such a success! A HU

Here are some highlights from the week... On Monday morning we started the week with some yoga! A HUGE thank you to Lynea (Anna's grandma) & Tai (Isaac's mom) who will be coming every Monday morning to teach us yoga! The first graders had a successful first yoga session where the practiced their deep breathing and different poses. We are so lucky to have the amazing yoga teachers start our weeks off strong! We have s tarted our new reading unit! We are going to be focusing on reading, decoding and comprehending non-fiction text. In this unit we get to soar through space, swim in the sea, travel around the world and study lots of different topics - here we go!  On Wednesday,  we had our Valentine exchange! In Room 112 we celebrate friendship everyday; however, the kiddos were very excited about all of the love (and treats) that they got! Thursday (2/15) was the 100th day of school...wow does time fly! We celebrated by creating 100 year old portr aits. By the look

Here are some highlights from the week... Our geologists did a final experiment that was quite tasty! They took 3 starburst and pressed them together to represent how sedimentary rocks are formed. After they had their sedimentary starburst, they applied heat (breath) and pressure (pushing) to turn it into a metamorphic rock! On Tuesday, we created a classroom kindness web. As we continue to build friendships and problem solving skills, we took some time out of our day to compliment each other and spread kindness. We discussed that when you choose kindness, it spreads. We also talked about how "you get what you give" and when you give respect, you get respect! Here's an online resource to check out different ways to support kindness at home: https://www.parents.com/parenting/better-parenting/advice/14-little-ways-to-encourage-kindness/ We had our second Art Literacy lesson! A HUGE shout out to the parents who were able to help out and support the first grade artis

Tuesday was moving day! Our desk arrangement is set up a little different and the first graders are in new seats. The first grade writers have been making their opinion writing stronger by talking directly to their reader, asking questions, stating their opinion, providing reasons and including a conclusion. A great way to support this writing and structure at home is to encourage them to write an opinion piece if they are asking for a particular toy, or food or movie! On Wednesday, Mrs. McGrady was in Room 112 while I was reading with students. The district has adopted a new reading assessment tool and I was able to take the day to use it and learn more about each reader! At home activity to support reading and writing: Make a nonsense book! Materials:  Ten or more index cards A small notebook Pencils, crayons, colored pencils, or markers Divide the cards into two sets. On each of the cards in the first set, have your first grader write a sentence subject like  Dad, Just