First Grade News May Spring has arrived but no spring fever in first grade!  We’re continuing to learn and also doing some reviewing of all that we have learned in first grade. Reading We have finished adding words to our word wall and are reviewing the words now to make sure we can read them all.  Sometimes Mrs. Schlawin chooses the words to review and sometimes we pick words that we want to review. We are also reviewing the strategies we learned to figure out an unknown word.  We’ll continue to use those strategies when we read this summer and again next year in second grade.  We are nearly done with our chunk books.  What a help they have been when figuring out a new word! Most of us are reading chapter books now, such as Henry and Mudge, Junie B. Jones, and The Magic Tree House Mysteries.   We have comprehension strategies to help us understand what we are reading. Math We’re working hard to see that we all pass the addition and subtraction timed tests using numbers to 12.   We’re also working on place value.  Little did we know that Mrs. Schlawin had been teaching this all year when we did the calendar each morning.  Now we’re ready to learn two-digit addition.  We’ve also been reviewing how to count money and doing some measuring. Science Our field trip to the Brookfield Zoo was a lot of fun.  We’re still talking about the animals we saw.  Now, each of us has chosen an animal to write about.  Mrs. Schlawin helped us find books with facts about our animals.  We are reading them and looking for the answers to 10 questions.  (That’s one of those comprehension strategies we learned when reading.)  When we have found all the answers, we will write our reports.  We have studied mammals, reptiles and birds.  We will be discussing fish and amphibians before the year ends. Field Trip We have one more field trip in first grade.  We will visit the Midwest Museum of Natural History here in Sycamore on May 31.  It is close enough that we can walk when we go.  We’ll go in the morning and be back at West in time to eat lunch.  I’d like to have a couple of parents walk with us.  Please let me know if you are available. Dates for parents to remember: May 31 – field trip to the Midwest Museum of Natural History June 1  -  field day at West School (wear shoes for running and comfortable clothes) June 2  -  awards program in the morning June 5  -  pick up report cards