Thanks for visiting to stay informed! Check out below to read about our week...
Phonics/Grammar: We learned the spelling rule for nouns that end in -y, change the -y to an -i, then add -es when making it plural. We also reviewed common and proper nouns and discussed using capital letters for every proper noun.
Reading: We read to chapter 8 in The White Giraffe. We discussed using text evidence to prove what character traits describe each character. We completed a close reading on challenging words to help us understand the story in more depth. We read the first five chapters in our new book club selections and we met with our groups on Friday to discuss specific topics in the book. (Book clubs are going AMAZING!) I'm so proud of the motivation I'm seeing from the students to stay up to speed with the reading so they can contribute to these book club discussions. In small groups, we worked on ways to improve our fluency both when reading aloud and silently. Fluency greatly impacts comprehension and we'll continue to work on this at all reading levels.
Writing: We looked at several mentor authors, like Karen Hesse and Jane Yolen, and studied how they closed their stories. We discussed several ways to close a narrative, then we went back and revised an old ending to a better version. We wrote everyday and applied "showing not telling", "hooking the reader", and "stretching out the heart" in our stories.
Math: We finished up our targeted unit on multi-step problem solving involving addition and subtraction, but that doesn't mean we won't be working on this every day in math. Problem solving is application of the skills we are learning. We will continue this throughout all of our other units this year. We took our Touchstone assessment and we began learning about multiplication and its relationship to addition. We used manipulatives to model multiplication problems.
Social Studies: We learned about the Arctic, Southwest, Northwest, Plains, and Northeast American Indians (over the last two weeks). We made an anchor chart together, comparing their homes, food, region, climate, and way of life. We learned that the resources available to these people groups directly influenced everything from their homes to their art. This week, we even learned a game that the Northwest American Indians played and we played it with our classmates.
Dinner Conversation Starters...
*ask your child which American Indian group was their favorite and why
*ask your child to tell you how to play the game that the indians played after dinner (we used cups and a gem rather than antlers and a rock!)
*ask your child what our class meeting was about this week and if "struggling" with work in school is good thing or a bad thing...also ask your child what "grit" is and how he/she can show that in the classroom setting
*ask your child what he/she chose from our prize box this Friday
Class News...
The CoGat begins this Wednesday. There is no need to prepare your child for this test. The directions are very clear and I will be going over what the questions will be like the day before each section. The Iowa Test of Basic Skills will start next Monday. Again, I will prepare your child for the types of questions we will see on the test. Please make sure your child gets to school on time each day of testing. Tardy students will not be allowed down to the classroom once testing begins and he/she will have to take the make-up tests.
Thank you Mrs. Newlin and Mrs. George for making our class directory! It's so cute!
Remember to practice math facts with your child in addition to any assigned homework if this area is a challenge. The most common errors I've been seeing in math is simple computation mistakes. The students need to master single digit addition and subtraction before we begin memorizing multiplication facts.
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