1st Grade: Specials Spotlight
Second Quarter 2016-2017
PE
Wow, how is the school year already halfway over?! I can’t believe it! Second quarter in P.E. was packed full of great stuff. The first graders continued practicing their throwing and catching skills, as well as cooperative skills, kicking and ball control skills, and used scooters to maneuver around. Some of the first graders favorite activities were Perfect Pass, Mat Ball, Cone Flip Tag, dribbling/trapping/kicking, and so much more! Second quarter was also filled with a few holidays which called for some super fun themed activities such as Pumpkin Patch (a Riverview favorite), trick or treat, Thanksgiving relay, Elf Express, and Feed the Reindeer. The words for this quarter were nutrition, courtesy, goals, humility, helpfulness, and grateful. I am looking forward to the rest of the school year! Here’s to 2017!
Counselor
We have been so busy and second quarter has flown by. In guidance lessons we have become masters at starting class with a zones of regulation check in. The students start by saying “I feel _______________, I’m in the ____________ zone. This allows the students to identify how they are feeling and if they are focused and ready to learn. This process allows students who are not feeling ready to learn the opportunity to use strategies to help them regain their focus and regulate their emotions. We also spent several weeks learning to have growth mindset. A growth mindset is understanding our brain and how it works. Having a growth mindset helps us to realize we can learn anything with effort, hard work, time and a positive attitude. We also just started our Too Good for Drugs curriculum.
We will continue working with this program through third quarter. Each grade level has its own standards. First graders meet Carmen the Cool Cat as they work together to make healthy choices, develop friendships and learn that they are too good for drugs. Carmen and her new friend Wagner learn to appreciate their differences and become fast friends. Through these interactive lessons, children learn the concepts of setting and reaching goals, listening and making positive choices. Students also learn the harmful effects of alcohol and tobacco and the safe and healthy way for children to use medications as they begin to develop their ability to predict outcomes and consequences.
Technology
Music
During the second quarter, 1st Graders have been busy in Music class! Students worked with high/low sounds, listening, moving, same/different parts of a song, rhythm reading and writing, and we even started playing barred instruments (xylophones). Halloween/Fall is always a fun time in Music class! We used some fun Fall songs to learn about rhythm, play and create movement. Students spent time reading, counting, and playing quarter notes ("beat"), eighth notes ("beat-and") and rests. We also began preparations for our Music Program, "S is for Sunflower"! Students are so excited to be on the Riverview stage for the first time on January 26th! To finish off this quarter, we spent some time learning Winter Holiday songs for the school-wide sing-a-long! I hope everyone had a wonderful Holiday Break! I’m looking forward to some fabulous music making in 2017!
Art
Library
In our library classes this quarter students were very excited to get to visit the Fiction and Nonfiction sections of our library to select books for checkout. Students in first grade check out an Everyone book weekly. Everyone books are ones that have lots of pictures – we call it the artists’ or illustrators’ section of the library. Their other book choice can be a “read to me” book. If your child ever brings home a book that you feel is inappropriate either for content or reading difficulty, have them return it to the library to make another selection. We talked about the roles of the author, illustrator, and publisher. We read the story, Olivia by Ian Falconer and recalled details from the story to write and illustrate a sentence. We read If You Take a Mouse to the Movies by Laura Numeroff. This book is a circle story – it ends where the story began. We had fun creating a circle story as a class, “If You Take a Mouse to the North Pole.”
