IMPORTANT INFORMATION School starts at 8:40. We will always enter and leave the building at the first grade doors!
Spring Break is next week! School will resume on April 8th. We hope you all have a wonderful break! Spring fever is in full force! We are noticing that behavior is “off” in both classrooms, so we have reset student Dojo points to try to incentive positive behaviors from students. Every time the class reaches their Dojo point goal, they earn a behavior reward. The behavior reward can range from tiger prides, a game, 2 minutes extra of recess, a small treat, etc. Since we reset the points on Dojo, we have noticed that students are more excited to earn points and are trying to think more about their behavior. As we increase the desired behaviors, we will increase our goal! The students are enjoying the new incentive and their teachers are thankful for the hard work they are doing to improve their behavior! Volunteering: If you would like to come staple and sort math pages in Ms. Mack's room, please send her an email or a message on Dojo! LUNCH CHOICES Monday: Breakfast Burrito, Mini Corn Dogs, or Chef Salad Tuesday: Mini Pepperoni Calzones, Hamburger, or Grilled Cheese Sandwich Wednesday: Crispy Chicken Drumstick, Cheesy Nachos, or Tuna Sandwich Thursday: Orange Chicken, Chicken Nuggets, or Taco Salad Friday: Pizza, Bean and Cheese Burrito, or Turkey Sandwich Monday (April 8th): Walking Taco, Hamburger, or Grilled Cheese Sandwich Tuesday: Pork Chop Mini Corn Dogs, Chef Salad *** We have seen GREAT IMPROVEMENT in both the green and purple classes with speaking Chinese only when in Ms. Mack's room, but some students are still needing multiple reminders each day to stay in the target language. In addition to our Dojo points goal, both classes have charts they are trying to fill to earn incentives that we brainstormed together (pajama party, pizza party, extra recess, etc.). The class can earn stickers for the chart when everyone uses Chinese to communicate. At the beginning of this year, students could earn stickers for smaller chunks of time where they spoke only Chinese. Now that we are at the end of March, we are stepping it up! At this point in the year, students should not be using any English whatsoever to communicate with each other or Ms. Mack when in Chinese class. This is not only great preparation for second grade and beyond in the dual immersion program, but the only way we can achieve the ideal language learning environment at school. Thank you for reinforcing the "Chinese only" policy at home and encouraging your child to speak as much Chinese as possible when they are in Ms. Mack's class. You can look on Dojo to monitor your child's progress. Students are continuing to excel and expand their language skills--it is incredible to witness! WHAT WE ARE LEARNING: ELA: We are reading a story called "A Southern Ranch." Our phonics focus is /ie/ and /igh/. We will also be learning about /kn/ and /wr/. Students are continuing to learn and practice their adjectives! We will be working on recognizing facts and details of a story! We are making great strides in Lexia and both classes are doing extremely well on meeting their minutes! Great job, First Graders! :) Our goal is to have each first grader on or above level 9 by the end of first grade. Thank you for all your support in helping your student make their lexia minutes. Our Spelling Words: lie, tie, high, might, right, night, bright, light, pie, tight, above** and laugh** Challenge Words: brighten, daylight, delight, highlight, tonight and untied. Only 5 of the words are listed but as we continue to expand and make connections regarding our spelling patterns, it's always a great idea to incorporate other words that follow that pattern. Dictation Sentences: Once again, I made a mistake. So here are both sentences: The moon was full last night. The second sentence is "The bus turned right at the corner." Please keep having your student read aloud to you each night. The goal is to have them read at least 10 minutes a night! They will be asked to read 20 minutes a night starting 2nd grade so you can help them start increasing their stamina now so that adjustment isn't as difficult! Chinese: Students are continuing to practice the new characters from unit 10 (几 how many, 年 year, 星期 week), and are also reviewing of units 5-9 in Mandarin Matrix. We will practice reading, writing, and utilizing the following characters that we have been working on for several months:来 come, 去 go, 走 walk, 田 field, 今 today, 昨 yesterday, 明 tomorrow, 是 is (to be), 日 day/sun, 月 month/moon, 天 day/sky, 生 life, 男 boy, 女 girl, 土 dirt, 雨 rain, 马 horse, 牛 cow, 羊 sheep, 鸟 bird, 虫 insect. Math: This week, students will continue to learn strategies to subtract tens. Science and Social Studies: This week students will be learning about locations in our school. We will be creating maps of school our school and will even be taking a tour of our own building. Chinese Summer Camp: The University of Utah’s Confucius Institute is hosting an intensive, week-long Chinese summer camp in July at several locations, including Ridgecrest! Students will participate in a two hour language class in the morning, and receive a cultural lesson in the afternoon with guest teachers from China. (Please excuse this random insert! This week's secret word is: spring! Students may tell Ms. Mack or Ms. Terry the secret word to earn a prize--thank you for reading our blog!) Dual immersion students who will be in 2nd through 6th grade this coming school year are welcome to enroll! Please visit the following link for more information: https://continue.utah.edu/youth/chinese-immersion
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IMPORTANT INFORMATION School starts at 8:40. We will always enter and leave the building at the first grade doors!
Bring your folder daily to school! Show and Tell is always on Thursday, unless stated otherwise. If your student is in Ms. Mack’s room on show and tell day, please remind them that they need to only speak Chinese about their item. Tiger Pride on Friday’s! Wearing a tiger pride shirt, a solid blue or orange shirt are the colors of what we look for and what we count! Ms. Terry is piloting a gradebook for our school district. There will be more information to come towards the end of March/after spring break but she has been adding grades to the program already! The district will be seeking your feedback regarding the program. Spring Break is the first week of April. Many students are letting us know that they are going to be leaving for a trip before spring break, please make sure that vacation forms and the office is notified! On a separate note: We are having many students who are missing multiple days of school or are late each day. Please to the best of your ability help your student be to school each day and on time. We know that fevers, needing to be on antibiotics for 24 hours and throwing up are causes to stay home (and we appreciate you for keeping sick kids home). As we have been watching our students and their development, we have learned of some statistics that reinforce how important it is to be at school each day. Absenteeism in the first month of school can predict poor attendance throughout the school year. Half the students who miss 2-4 days in September go on to miss nearly a month of school.. Research shows that missing 10 percent of the school, or about 18 days in most school districts, negatively affects a student’s academic performance. That’s just two days a month and that’s known as chronic absence. This week's secret word is: rainbow (kids should know how to say this one in Chinese!). Students may tell the secret word to a teacher to earn a prize! LUNCH CHOICES Monday: Soft Pretzel, Hamburger, Grilled Cheese Sandwich Tuesday: Personal BBQ Chicken Pizza, Mini Corn Dogs, Chef Salad Wednesday: Country Fried Steak, Cheesy Nachos, or WowButter and Jelly Sandwich Thursday: Spaghetti, Crispy Chicken Sandwich (spicy and regular), or Taco Salad Friday: Pizza Rippers, Burrito, Turkey Sandwich Monday: Baked Potato, Hamburger, Grilled Cheese Sandwich Tuesday: Breakfast Burrito, Mini Corn Dogs, Chef Salad *** REMINDER: As of January 15th, students are no longer allowed to speak English in the Chinese classroom! We have seen GREAT IMPROVEMENT in both the green and purple classes, but some students still need many reminders to only speak Chinese. Please reinforce the "Chinese only" policy at home and encourage your child to speak as much Chinese as possible when they are in Ms. Mack's class. You can look on Dojo to monitor your child's progress. Students are continuing to excel and expand their language skills--it is incredible to witness! Thank you for your continued support! WHAT WE ARE LEARNING: ELA: We are reading a story called "A Trip to Washington, D.C." It is an expository text and we are going to be learning about our nation’s capital. Our phonics focus is /oa/ and /ou/. Students are also continuing to work on three letter consonant blends and adjectives. We are making great strides in Lexia and both classes are doing extremely well on meeting their minutes! Great job, First Graders! :) PLEASE NOTE: There is a spelling error on this week's dictation sentence. The sentence should read: "Please don't cut the loaf of bread." CHINESE: We are starting unit 10 this week and will be reading, writing, and using the following characters in oral language practice: 几 how many, 年 year, 星期 week. We will continue to review the following characters from previous units: 来 come, 去 go, 走 walk, 田 field, 今today, 昨 yesterday, 明 tomorrow, 是 is (to be), 日 sun/day, 月 moon/month, 天 sky, 生 life/to be born, 男 boy, 女 girl, 土 dirt, 雨 rain, 马 horse, 牛 cow, 鸟 bird, 羊 sheep, 虫 insect. MATH: Students have finished unit 10 and started unit 11! In unit 11 we will practice using models and strategies to subtract tens. SCIENCE AND SOCIAL STUDIES: Students have been reviewing people in our school and community, weather/water, and we are starting to learn about a map of our school! IMPORTANT INFORMATION School starts at 8:40. We will always enter and leave the building at the first grade doors!
Chinese Book Orders: Ms. Mack handed out bright green fliers at parent teacher conferences with information about how to order Chinese books for your students to read and practice with at home. Placing any order by Friday, March 15th using the code RIG01 will earn FREE BOOKS for our Chinese classroom! Purchases of $30 or more will receive free shipping. Please see the attachments in the email for book recommendations by Ms. Mack for first graders, as well as some information about different types of books and readers from Phoenix Tree. Some of the books that have been translated from English have the English text printed in the book along with the Chinese characters. This could be helpful for your student as we only learn about 66 characters in first grade. Another good activity to help students practice oral language fluency is for them to look at the pictures in the book and describe what they see, what they think will happen next, who the characters are, etc. Visit the following website to check out the Chinese books available to your family: www.phoenixtree.com/mylittlephoenixtree . The secret word from now until next Wednesday is: lucky. Students may tell either teacher the secret word to get a prize, but should not share the secret word with other students! :) LUNCH CHOICES Monday: Quesadilla, Hamburger, Grilled Cheese Sandwich Tuesday: Chicken Alfredo, Mini Corn Dogs, Chef Salad Wednesday: Hot Ham and Cheese Sandwich, Cheesy Nachos, Tuna Sandwich Thursday: Dutch Waffle, Chicken Nuggets, or Taco Salad Friday: Pizza Rippers, Burrito, Turkey Sandwich Monday: Soft Grain Pretzel, Hamburger, Grilled Cheese Sandwich Tuesday: Chicken Enchiladas, Mini Corn Dogs, Chef Salad Thank you for continuing to encourage your student to speak 100% Chinese in Ms. Mack's class. We hope to continue to see students strive towards this goal! WHAT WE ARE LEARNING: ELA: This week, we are starting unit 4! Unit 4 is all about treasures. This week, in particular, we are talking about how a surprise can be a treasure. We have been talking about how we cherish certain things—Ms. Terry has mentioned how she cherishes a model car because it reminds her working on corvettes with her dad. Our story is a realistic fiction story titled “Mama’s Birthday Present.” We are learning about the digraphs ai and ay. We’ve learned that ai comes in between consonants t-r-AI-n and ay comes at the end of the word- r-AY! We are also diving in and working on learning about adjectives and what adjectives to use when describing a noun. Next week, we are on Unit 4 Week 2. The story will be Cinderella! We are focusing on recognizing the theme of the story as well as learning about fairy tales. We will be focusing on the diagraph /ea/ in words like beach and ease. We will also be talking about how a story can be a treasure. This weekly question is going to be a fun one as we are working on our class books! We will continue to talk about adjectives. We are making great strides in Lexia and both classes are doing extremely well on meeting their minutes! Great job, First Graders! :) CHINESE: For the next two weeks, we will be focusing on unit 10 in Mandarin Matrix, studying the stories: "On the Way Home," "Scarecrow," and "Naughty Hamster." Our focus characters for this unit are: field/田, come/来, go/去, walk/走. We will also be practicing the following language features: "...likes to be in/at....", "...comes....", "...goes...", "walking here and there", "searching here and there." MATH: We are continuing to work on unit 10 this week which focuses on "Using Models and Strategies to Add Tens and Ones". Next week we will move on to unit 11: "Use Models and Strategies to Subtract Tens." You can support and challenge your students by asking them to explain their thinking, or to tell you how to solve problems in Chinese on the homework packet, or on the math worksheets students bring home from practicing at school. SCIENCE AND SOCIAL STUDIES: The topics for science and social studies the next two weeks are “People at Work in My Neighborhood”, and “Making Choices with Money”, and "Earth's Water". |
TeachersMs. Terry and Ms. Mack are so excited for this year! In Ms. Terry's class, students will speak, read, and write in English. In Ms. Mack's class, students will be speak, listen, read, and write in Chinese. Archives
April 2020
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