The Power Of Persuasion!

Winter Concert Reminder!
The 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Grade concert is on Friday, December 18th at 9:00am. Students should wear a dressy outfit!

Winter Wonderland
A big thank you to our room parents, volunteers, and those of you who have donated(are donating) items for our winter wonderland event. I know there is so much going on this month and I truly appreciate the help during this busy time!

Persuasive Writing!
First graders learned all about the power of persuasion this week! We started off with an outdoor activity. All first graders had to choose whether they thought cats or dogs made a better pet. They lined up with their groups and tried to persuade the others to take a step in their direction with some REALLY important reasons that supported their choice.

Dog Lovers vs. Cat Fanatics!

Then we came back inside and read a few examples of persuasive writing, including some persuasive books written by first graders! Next, we talked about features of persuasive writing. We learned persuasive writing has a topic sentence that supports your opinion, facts and examples to support your opinion, and a closing statement.

First graders were then given their persuasive topic - lunch seats! Students had to choose whether they wanted to be able to choose their own spots or if they liked sitting in assigned seats. We brainstormed reasons for both sides of the argument, and decided which reasons were fair and which reasons were very strong. First graders worked hard on writing a topic sentence, gave many strong, supporting reasons, and a closing sentence to support their opinion. We will work on publishing these pieces next week!!

Hour of Code
We were very fortunate to have Mrs. Ardizzoni, our technology specialist, assist us in participating in the Hour of Code. We learned how to code using a symbols based interactive iPad app. By listing a series of steps in the correct order, we were able to make our robot characters move. We had a blast learning to code!