Happy New Year!

We had a wonderful first day back, easing into it with Wilderness Wednesday! It was still pretty chilly even though the sun was beautiful. We spent our regular morning outside, had play time inside between Music and Lunch (which we plan to continue until after February break) and then some great station time after lunch. Students did a measurement lesson on the big hill with Mr. Deyo, sorting sticks that were longer than, shorter than, or the same as. Ms. Gordon did another social thinking lesson about each person being special and unique, and Ms. Read and I did a lesson about snowflakes and how they form. Here is a picture of us doing a sun salutation, how we start each Wednesday:

As we settle back into the classroom routines, we are revisiting our reading super powers (pointer power, picture power, partner power, and soon to be more!). Today I unveiled our "just right" texts and students filled their reading bins with books that felt just right to them to read. We did a writing prompt today, drawing and writing about something that feels important to them, as a kick off to a unit around more inventive spelling (listening for and recording sounds they hear, building independence) called "Show and Tell" writing. We will begin a new round of reading groups and literacy swap activities for the New Year (based on the data from December literacy assessments). We also got new reading buddies today, and students loved getting back to some partner reading! 

In math we counted by 1's and 10's, created our new January calendar, built a number line (reinforcing words like before/after) and revisited stations from before the break! This month we will focus on building stamina for oral counting, written number lines, addition and subtraction story problems, and measuring.

It is great to have them back! They all seem so mature, comfortable, and confident!