Mr. Madden's Class - Harmony Team

We continue to work on collaboration and learning together. The above contract encapsulates student's thoughts on how to have a strong learning environment/classroom team.  We are reading books like crazy this week!  We are up to sustaining 20 minutes of independent silent reading and growing this practice each day.  I hope everyone was able to get students signed up for the electronic resources noted in last week's post (find below). Reading the just right books and working through Lexia will support students growth and independence as readers. We are starting an engineering project based on a Mystery Science activity. Important stuff: Please sign up for a Family Conference Picture day is 10/13 at 8:40am Please send earbuds or headphones if you have any extras at home - to use with digital reading. PTO information Flynn Theater field trip on Monday, October 2nd 8:45-11:00.  The play My Father's Dragon is a book series that we will use to explore writi...

Dear First Grade Parents, I have purchased a subscription to Raz-Kids for our students. This website offers hundreds of leveled books for your child to read. They can listen to the story first, but then should read it independently to build fluency. Students may read these books a couple nights a week as part of their nightly reading and add them to their reading log. It is still important for them to also be reading actual books with you as a read aloud. We have signed up all of the students in our classroom with their current reading levels. All you need to do is go to the website and log in. Then they can choose the assignment which will give them several books at their level to choose from. There is also a Book Room that contains books slightly below and above their level. There is often a comprehension quiz that follows each story. Parent support is encouraged with this program: ask questions about the text, encourage re-reading and practicing the strategies we work on in s...

This week in our classroom we are going to focus on teamwork and how to collaborate effectively.  Here is the list students generated to answer "What makes a good teammate?": Listen to others Help everyone be successful Be nice = respectful + responsible Be a good sport If you can talk with your children about collaboration this week that would support our focus in the classroom. Here is a link from the resources page of this blog regarding what we are doing in math this month - just check out "Unit 1 Parent Letter". These kids are working hard and showing progress already on some of the important skills in the Responsible and Involved Citizenship leaf of our district's mission:

Good afternoon Harmony parents.  We had a productive four day week in Mr. Madden's class. Photos or our new 4th grade book buddies were uploaded into our shared folder .  We continue to work on letter formation, reading for longer periods of time while building good habits (take a sneak peek, check your sneak peak, do SOMETHING after you read). We continue to learn and grow teamwork and communication skills while developing number sense in math. During snack times we have been working to understand a new work and concept for all: empathy. Curriculum night is next Tuesday, September 12th from 5:30-6:30pm.  This is an hour presentation on what we do her all day with you children. Hope everyone has a great weekend!

This is a new blog that will inform you of class activities going forward. It has links to our shared photos & videos, helpful curriculum information and a link to the Harmony Team website. You will receive an email soon asking if you would like to join this blog - please accept this invitation to keep up with weekly notes, etc. Thanks, John