This week we continued our work with story elements. In this activity, I read The Vanishing Pumpkin and we discussed the characters, setting, character traits, and important events. The children recorded the answers on a graphic organizer.
We started working on abc order using Fall words. The children also had a matching sheet to practice on their own. I will be incorporating abc order in their literacy stations and we will expand on it throughout the year.
The field trip to Meadow Farm was a big success! The children were able to experience what life was like in the past. This trip was an introductory lesson to our future social studies unit on past and present. One student said "Mrs. Stearns, I have never time traveled before!" :)
We started our unit on addition and subtraction this week. In the beginning we work with decomposing numbers. We started with number four and using counters came up with all the different ways to make four and the children illustrated the possibilities.
Later in the week we worked with the number 5, but did not draw pictures. The children are beginning to use math language such as "3 and 2 is 5". Next week we will expand the numbers and begin using plus, minus, and equals.
In Science we started our unit on earth and sun relationships. We sang a song and discussed the three things the sun heats (land, air, and water). The children made posters to illustrate what was learned.