A Week with Kevin Henkes

Kevin Henkes is one of our favorite first grade authors!  This week, we read many of his books, but we especially enjoyed reading Chrysanthemum!  With our current Animal Fantasy genre study underway, we talked all about how the mouse character, Chrysanthemum, thinks and acts like a human. Then we added our ideas to this poster:

Next, we read Wemberly Worried.  Wemberly is also a mouse and she worries about EVERYTHING! She worries about the trees, noises in her house, her doll Petal, but she ESPECIALLY worries about school.  After reading, we made text-to-self connections by writing some things that we worry about too.

To learn more about Kevin Henkes and his books, visit his website and explore from home! Click below:

Common Core State Standards: 

RL.1.7.: Use illustrations and details in a story to describe its characters, setting, or events.

Animal Fantasy with Pete the Cat

Last week during Readers' Workshop we started our genre study of Animal Fantasy.  What better way to kick it off than with my favorite character, Pete the Cat?  We began our study of animal fantasy by first exploring many animal fantasy books with reading partners and discussing all of the ways the animal characters were acting like people.

 Next, we took a closer look at all of our favorite Pete the Cat books to determine how Pete and his friends were acting like humans.

Ask your child all about our study of Animal Fantasy.  Stay tuned next week as we continue to explore animal fantasy with Kevin Henkes and his characters!    Common Core Standards:  RL.1.3: Describe characters, settings, and major events in a story, using key details. RL.1.7: Use illustrations and details in a story to describe its characters, setting, or events.

Heart Maps

Writing Workshop is part of every day in first grade.  This is a time when first graders draw and write about the things that they know and love.  This week, we talked about how writers often choose to write about the things they know and love the most.  

Next, the first graders created "heart maps" to keep as a resource in their writing folders. Now, each time they sit down to write, they can refer to their map for a little inspiration!  Check out our 1-Thomson heart maps below:

A Fantastic First Week

I always love the first week of school! It's so fun getting to know each other and hearing all about summer adventures.  I can tell that this is going to be a great year filled with lots of fun and learning.  This week, we were busy establishing our routine and learning rules and expectations.  We were able to do this with a little help from our friend, David.  After Reading David Goes to School by David Shannon, we brainstormed a whole list of things we should and shouldn't do at school.  The first graders know their stuff when it comes to expected behavior!

Next, we wrote our class promise together...

We are looking forward to a great year ahead!