Week 20- First Grade

Week 20 First Grade

Definitely, Positively, Absolutely NO! (Non-fiction, Level I, Stage 2) by Joy Cowley

Place Value (Non-fiction, Level I, Stage 2) by Katy Pike

Letters for Mr. James (Fiction, Level I, Stage 2) by Joy Cowley

Animals at Risk (Non-fiction, Level I, Stage 2) by Meredith Costain

Our favorite book this week was Letters for Mr. James, mostly because both my husband and I remembered it from several years ago when our oldest son used the AlphaSkills curriculum in first grade. We love watching our little Malachi read some of the very same things Elijah did, and Malachi loves being just like his big brother when it comes to reading. This story was especially memorable for us because it features a lonely older man who always complains that he never gets letters in the mail and a group of sweet kids who come to his rescue. After completing the book and activities we were even able to talk about someone in our lives who might be lonely and could use a few friendly letters, and we talked about the last time we sent letters to them.

The activity I want to feature this week is Step 6 in the Read With Sarah Guided Lesson: Comprehension of Silent Reading. Over the past 20 weeks of first grade with AlphaSkills it has been so fun seeing Malachi’s skills progress in this area, and this week’s questions allowed him to grow even more. He loves being able to read the book silently so that he knows everything before the rest of us, and answering the questions in Step 6 allows him to tell the story his way while working on his comprehension and thinking. This week’s questions, What question did Mr. James ask the mail carrier? What was her answer? How did he feel? How did the shopkeeper feel? The banker? The teacher? The children? allowed Malachi to work on retelling the story, and he was so proud to be telling us something only he knew.

I am really looking forward to seeing the growth continue over the next 15 weeks of first grade, through the summer and beyond. For more information about the AlphaSkills Read with Sarah curriculum and our family, see the AlphaSkills Blog Introduction.