About Ms. Caminiti
Ms. Caminiti is excited to be teaching 1st grade at St. Ann this year! She is originally from River Forest, Illinois, a near-west suburb of Chicago. She attended the University of Notre Dame and graduated with a degree in Finance and a minor in a program called Education, Schooling, and Society. She also earned her master’s degree in Education from Loyola University Chicago. Before teaching at St. Ann, she spent three years teaching 2nd grade.
1st Grade Summer Sight Word Challenge
About 1st Grade
This year will be an exciting time for your 1st grader! They will learn many new academic and social skills, and together we will build a foundation for a lifetime of learning. Students will also explore the Catholic faith and continue to learn how to be children of Christ! I am looking forward to building relationships with students and families in order to have a fun and successful year!
Morning Meeting:
Each morning, students will begin the day together with a Morning Meeting. Through Morning Meeting, students build community. Everyday, students will great each other and will learn more about each other by sharing personal stories, interests, or special items with the class. Students will become confident presenters and listeners and will learn important social skills. Morning Meeting provides and wonderful transition to the day by beginning with a connection to the day’s lessons! Morning Meeting will also include special prayers, math, and sight word warm-ups.
Reading and Writing:
At the beginning of the year, students will review the letters and sounds learned in Kindergarten and will begin working toward the goal of independent reading and writing! Students will participate in a balanced literacy program focusing on the core skills of reading, writing, speaking, and listening.
Each day, students will learn phonics skills and will practice sight words. They will also meet in small groups with the teacher to read books at their instructional reading level and strengthen their decoding, fluency, and comprehension. Shared Reading of fiction and non-fiction read alouds will help students read for understanding, acquire vocabulary, and gather meaning from a text. Students will also participate in Buddy Reading and Independent Reading throughout the day.
Here is a list of the reading strategies covered this year and reinforced in every grade:
- Choosing Good Books
- Connecting
- Predicting
- Questioning
- Evaluating
- Inferring
- Summarizing
- Visualizing
- Monitoring & Clarifying
We will focus on all aspects of the writing process this year: prewriting (gathering ideas), drafting, revising, editing, publishing, and celebrating! Writing instruction will incorporate skill development in letter formation, grammar, punctuation, and spelling. Students will learn how to organize their ideas and illustrations in order to write in several genres: Narrative Writing – Small Moments; Informational Writing – Non-Fiction Chapter Books; Opinion Writing – Reviews. We will end each unit with a writing celebration!
Math:
In first grade, students will work toward mastering many mathematical concepts. Daily practice will help students become confident in their skills and will help them to eventually solve complex problems and explain their mathematical thinking!
Here is a list of many of the concepts we will cover this year:
- Skip Counting (2s, 5s, 10s, 100s,)
- Patterns
- Grouping Objects
- Calendar
- Adding One-Digit and Two-Digit Numbers
- Subtracting One-Digit and Two Digit Numbers
- Place Value
- Telling Time
- Adding Coins
- Bar Graphs and Pictographs
- Basic Fractions
- Basic Geometry: 2D Shapes, 3D Shapes, Lines of Symmetry
- Measurement: Centimeters, Inches, Feet + Weight and Volume
- Estimating
Learning at Home: Websites and Apps
Reading Apps:
- Sight Word Bingo
- Kids Learn Sight Words
- Fluency
- Letter Reflex
- Phonics Genius
- Phonics Tic-Tac-Toe
- Word Wizard
- Hungry Monster Build Word
- Storia
- Word Magic Lite
- Reading Magic 2
- ABC Phonics
Reading Websites:
Writing Apps:
- Book Creator
- Sentence Builder