First Grade
Overview
Welcome to First Grade! At Mars we view first grade as a year full of growth and development. You'll be amazed at the leaps your child makes from September to June. Reading, writing, and math are our core focus. In reading we do phonics work with word families incorporating the use of long and short vowels. We also work to increase a child's number of known sight words. While we want students to be able to sound out unfamiliar words, we also stress the importance of remembering what is read. Comprehension is a big component of our reading instruction in first grade. In writing we work on units including personal narratives, persuasive writing, and informative writing as well. We encourage students to add details to make their writing more interesting and work to improve their use of proper capitalization and punctuation. In math we cover units involving adding/subtracting using various strategies to solve those problems. We also have units with shapes, place value, and a unit with penguins to practice math facts. To see a more detailed description of the Common Core State Standards that your child needs to master please click here.
Schedule
The first grade schedule may vary from day to day and from classroom to classroom, but generally follows a structure similar to this:
8:40-8:55 Arrival (tardy after 8:45)
9:00-12:00 Language Arts Block
-Reading
-Writing
-Word Work/Spelling
12:05-12:45 Recess & Lunch
12:55-1:55 Math
2:00-2:20 Recess
2:30-3:30 Continued Language Arts Block
3:42 Dismissal
**Specials times vary from teacher to teacher this year. Teachers have specials from 8:55-9:35 most days except for the following exceptions:
Wednesdays - Mrs. Underwood & Miss Kunselman go from 9:40-10:20
Thursdays - Mrs. Tom & Miss Kunselman go from 9:40-10:20
Events & Field Trips
We take part in many fun events at school and go on field trips to learn outside of school as well. Here are some of the highlights for first grade.
For specific dates and times for these and other events please check our Mars Calendar here.
Teachers
Miss Kunselman
Miss Ponegalek
Mrs. Southwood
Mrs. Tom
Mrs. Underwood
Welcome to First Grade! At Mars we view first grade as a year full of growth and development. You'll be amazed at the leaps your child makes from September to June. Reading, writing, and math are our core focus. In reading we do phonics work with word families incorporating the use of long and short vowels. We also work to increase a child's number of known sight words. While we want students to be able to sound out unfamiliar words, we also stress the importance of remembering what is read. Comprehension is a big component of our reading instruction in first grade. In writing we work on units including personal narratives, persuasive writing, and informative writing as well. We encourage students to add details to make their writing more interesting and work to improve their use of proper capitalization and punctuation. In math we cover units involving adding/subtracting using various strategies to solve those problems. We also have units with shapes, place value, and a unit with penguins to practice math facts. To see a more detailed description of the Common Core State Standards that your child needs to master please click here.
Schedule
The first grade schedule may vary from day to day and from classroom to classroom, but generally follows a structure similar to this:
8:40-8:55 Arrival (tardy after 8:45)
9:00-12:00 Language Arts Block
-Reading
-Writing
-Word Work/Spelling
12:05-12:45 Recess & Lunch
12:55-1:55 Math
2:00-2:20 Recess
2:30-3:30 Continued Language Arts Block
3:42 Dismissal
**Specials times vary from teacher to teacher this year. Teachers have specials from 8:55-9:35 most days except for the following exceptions:
Wednesdays - Mrs. Underwood & Miss Kunselman go from 9:40-10:20
Thursdays - Mrs. Tom & Miss Kunselman go from 9:40-10:20
Events & Field Trips
We take part in many fun events at school and go on field trips to learn outside of school as well. Here are some of the highlights for first grade.
- Spring/Fall trip to Love Creek Nature Center
- Picnic lunch at the park
- Visit to the local log cabin
- Thanksgiving Feast
- Attend a play
- Classroom holiday parties (Halloween, Christmas, Valentine's Day)
- Curious Kids
- Spring music program
- Reading Month Activities
- Mars Field Day
For specific dates and times for these and other events please check our Mars Calendar here.
Teachers
Miss Kunselman
Miss Ponegalek
Mrs. Southwood
Mrs. Tom
Mrs. Underwood
