Sleep is Important

Sleep or more specifically, the lack of sleep can have a significant impact on your child. Research is showing that lack of sleep impacts more than just mood and alertness. It can also impact brain development, cognition, behavior (mimicking symptoms of ADHD), weight and more. I have a linked to a few articles about these impacts for you below. I pulled out a few important quotes from each article for you.

The 7 Reasons Your Child Needs Sleep

2. Sleep helps the heart.
Experts are learning more about how sleep protects kids from vascular damage due to circulating stress hormones and arterial wall -- damaging cholesterol. "Children with sleep disorders have excessive brain arousal during sleep, which can trigger the fight-or-flight response hundreds of times each night," says Jeffrey Durmer, M.D., Ph.D., a sleep specialist and researcher in Atlanta. "Their blood glucose and cortisol remain elevated at night. Both are linked to higher levels of diabetes, obesity, and even heart disease."

6. Sleep increases kids' attention span.
Children who consistently sleep fewer than ten hours a night before age 3 are three times more likely to have hyperactivity and impulsivity problems by age 6. "But the symptoms of sleep-deprivation and ADHD, including impulsivity and distractibility, mirror each other almost exactly," explains Dr. Owens. In other words, tired kids can be impulsive and distracted even though they don't have ADHD. No one knows how many kids are misdiagnosed with the condition, but ruling out sleep issues is an important part of the diagnosis, she says. For school-age kids, research has shown that adding as little as 27 minutes of extra sleep per night makes it easier for them to manage their moods and impulses so they can focus on schoolwork.

Lack of Sleep Linked to Behavior Problems in Kids

“Children who aren’t getting the recommended amount of sleep have more difficulties with attention, with emotional control, with reasoning, with problem-solving, and also have behavioral problems,” lead author Dr. Elsie Taveras told Reuters Health. 

The bedtime routine should involve a winding down period with relaxing activities such as reading a bedtime story, Beebe added. “It seems old fashioned but it's very calming, it's very connecting. It can be very soothing, and it's very predictable,” he said.


7 Ways Sleep Affects the Brain (And What Happens If It Doesn't Get Enough)

If you have kids, you know that without sleep, they can be a tad difficult. Sleep deprivation in children has lots of short-term ramifications, and over the long term, it may even affect brain development. Sleep is especially important for the growing brain, which is why babies, kids and teens sleep so much.

Some studies have reported that kids who are sleep-deprived because of nighttime breathing problems are significantly more likely to have ADHD symptoms than kids who sleep well. Others have found that a little extra sleep can make a significant difference in school performance: Just 18 more minutes per night was linked to better grades in math and English in elementary school kids.

Spring Voyage

We had a fantastic day of hiking and climbing in Castlewood Canyon. Ask your child to tell you all about it as you look through the photos below and the photos in the photo album at the link below.

Voyage to Castlewood Canyon Photo Album 

Vocabulary and Reading

Once a child begins to read, two things happen: their vocabulary expands very quickly and they need to pay attention to new vocabulary as it comes up in their reading. This seems contradictory but it simply boils down to the fact that vocabulary is important. As an example, in some of our reading groups, we have had to spend some time talking about the many ways authors say "said" as in the phrase - said Jill or Jill said. This week we talked about this as a whole crew. It can be confusing for new readers to understand all of the very subtle shades of meaning in these various words. Just take a look at the list below of a some of the words that authors use to say "said" that we have found in our reading.

Words We Have Found Used in Books to Mean "Said":
replied
asked
cried
shouted
yelled
whispered
whimpered
laughed
joked
mumbled
murmured
scolded
shrieked
wailed
exclaimed
suggested
answered
asked
retorted
demanded
begged
announced
commented
added
continued
observed
reported
insisted
bellowed
moaned
tattled
declared

These are just some of the ways we have found in our reading. There are so many more. This is just one small example of why reading is such a complicated skill and why even after a child knows how to read, there are still so many things to learn about reading.

Learning is Messy (Again)

Now that I have shared several posts (here, here and here) on skills and standards that are part of the first grade curriculum, I want to go back and revisit an idea I shared with you a long time ago in an earlier blog post: Learning is messy! In that post I said:

Learning is messy! I don't necessarily mean a physical mess although it can be that. I mean that everything your child learns is connected to every other thing that he or she learns. Learning really can't be completely compartmentalized into math, reading, writing, etc. It is easy to see how reading and writing are related and how learning something about writing can improve your reading and vice versa. Other contents seem to separate more easily but are actually all connected, too. That is one of the basic tenets of Expeditionary Learning - we embrace the fact that learning is messy and all tangled up and not neatly segmented into discrete areas.

So while we have these long lists of skills and standards, we don't just march through each list and check things off as we go. We don't do this because learning is messy. Kids learn things at different rates and at different times. Skills and concepts are connected and overlapping and learning isn't sequential and orderly. It is messy.

So we embrace the mess and dig in and mess around with new ideas and new learning all day, every day. We make connections between things we are learning. We have complicated, passionate, messy discussions about the things we are learning - yes, even in first grade.

We learn to learn and be learners. We really focus on noticing, wondering, figuring things out and putting things together for ourselves. Once kids get a taste of doing this, it becomes an addiction. They can't stop noticing, wondering and learning all the time and on their own. This is not to say that parents and teachers aren't necessary - they are. But once kids learn that they can learn on their own, they begin to soar.

Our crew loves to notice and wonder. They love to share their learning. They are becoming very good at discussing things and figuring things out. Most of them are not afraid to make a mistake in front of the crew and then work on figuring out what went "wrong" in their thinking process. They are all willing to talk in front of the crew and share their idea. Wendy and I are constantly making eye contact with each other to share our happiness at all of this growth.

So remember, while we do have lists of standards and content that we teach, there is also so much more to the learning process. There are so many, many other things to learn that aren't on those lists. There are so many different time tables that each child is on and learning is simply a path that meanders rather than a well-established road that isn't flexible. Embrace the mess and dive in with your child. It won't be easy but it will be worth it and it will be fun!

Another Good Read Aloud Series

If you are looking for a good book to read aloud to your child, you should take a look at the Gooney Bird Greene series by Lois Lowry. I recently read the first book, Gooney Bird Greene, to the crew. They loved it. Gooney Bird is a quirky little girl who teaches her second grade class how to tell good stories.  The books in the series are funny and the chapters are just the right length for a good bedtime (or anytime) read aloud. Gooney Bird teaches other concepts in the other books in the series - things like poetry, vocabulary, geography, fables, etc. She teaches all of this while the reader is laughing and doesn't even notice that they are learning. This series is written at the end of 3rd grade or beginning of 4th grade level so it would not really be appropriate as a "on my own" book for anyone in our crew yet. Children are developmentally ready and able to listen to books that are about 2 grade levels above their current reading level so this series is just perfect for reading aloud to students in our crew.  Ask your child about Gooney Bird Greene.

Important Dates
Library - Tuesdays are check out only days for small groups and Fridays are whole crew library time. Be sure to bring back any books that you have finished with by those days if you would like to check out new books.

4/19 Spring Voyage to Castlewood Canyon
4/20 No School
4/28 Outdoor Learning Environment (OLE) Work Day
5/9 Renaissance Art Museum Walk 4:00 pm
5/16 - 5/17 Student-Led Conferences for First Grade
5/23 Third Grade Showcase Portfolios 1:15 pm 3rd Grade Showcase Panel Member Sign Up
5/28 No School
5/30 Sixth Grade Showcase Portfolios 1:15 pm 6th Grade Showcase Panel Member Sign Up
6/5 Sixth Grade Closing Circle 6:30 pm
6/6 Last Day of School - All School Drum Circle at 9:00 am

Thank You!

Links to Other Content Standards for First Grade

I thought that after reading the standards for math for first grade, you might be interested in looking at the standards for other content areas as well. Below are the links to these other standards including versions for parents. The links to the standards for parents are condensed and quick and easy to read.

Reading, Writing and Communicating Standards
Reading, Writing and Communicating Standards for Parents

Social Studies Standards
Social Studies Standards for Parents

Science Standards
Science Standards for Parents

Other Standards for Parents (Art, Drama, Music, PE, etc.)

Below are a few photos of the new rock wall/bouldering on our playground. The kids really like it!