It's the second half of the year! Your child will be bringing home their math books this week to KEEP at home. They'll receive the second half of their math book this week which we'll work from for the rest of the year!
The science fair is this Thursday. Everyone is welcome to attend and check out the cool exhibits. For our Valentine party each child may bring in a shoebox decorated for Valentine's day to collect valentines in. A class list will come home in February to help your child address valentines if they wish to do so. Word Study - New lists, Tests on Friday Writing - Students are publishing their essays in preparation for our writing celebration. They're working on convincing their readers of their opinions and persuading them to do something. Math - The Unit 4 math test is tomorrow! We will begin Unit 5 - Measurement later this week. In the measurement unit students will learn both metric and customary units of measuring length, capacity and weight. Students will also review measuring time. It will be important for students to review at home metric prefixes (milli, centi, deci, kilo, for example) and customary conversions (inches to feet, ounces to pounds). Reading - The class is off to a great start researching a person or animal that they are interested in. They are determining what is important to take notes on and they're organizing their notes into sub topics. Science - This week we'll compare features of the sun, moon and earth and also review how seasons occur. Social Studies - We're touring the Northeast, focusing on the big cities, industries and history of the region. Along the way students are keeping a scrapbook of their 'memories' from our tour of the northeast, documenting important information we've learned.
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Good afternoon! What a beautiful snowy day. The kids were so excited it was outdoor recess!
The science fair is January 29th, the deadline to enter is January 23rd. Word Study - New units this week. Tests on Friday Writing - The class is working on typing their personal or persuasive essay this week. Then they'll learn a little about editing typed work before publishing their finished piece. Math - On Thursday students will take the Quarter 2 assessment which covers division (chapter 3) and problem solving (most of chapter 4). We're also working on factors and multiples this week which wraps up Chapter 4 in our math books. Students will receive a chapter 4 study guide on Thursday, which will be due on Tuesday. The chapter 4 test will be on Wednesday, January 28. Reading - Students are narrowing down a research topic to research during reading time. They'll eventually come up with a short presentation/report on their topic. Students are choosing either a person or an animal to research. Some kids have a plan to bring books from home or the library to help them do research at school. This mini-research project will help kids determine what is important about a topic, they'll practice note-taking skills and they'll organize information as it's gathered. Social Studies - We're starting the tour of our first region of the United States! This week we'll "travel" to the Northeast region to find out about their history, culture, industry and other important destinations. Along the way students will keep a scrapbook of our travels to the northeast. (The World Map test is tomorrow, in which students will identify the 7 continents and 4 oceans) Science - We're continuing the Sun, Moon and Earth unit this week. We will compare the three based on size, composition, temperature and other important features. Good afternoon!
The deadline to register for Discovery Night (Science Fair) has been extended to next Friday. If your child would like to participate in the science fair you can register here. There is no school next Monday (1/19) or the Monday after that (1/26). The 2nd quarter ends January 23. We have an Oakland University student coming to observe on Tuesdays. Ms. Sorensen will be with us Tuesday mornings for the next several weeks as part of her requirements to become a teacher. The class and I are excited to meet her tomorrow! Word Study - New lists this week - test on Friday Writing - the class shifted from personal essays to persuasive essays today. We had a great discussion about times and ways they've tried to convince their parents about something. That brought up a great discussion about what types of persuasion work and what does not work and how you need to keep in mind who your audience is when trying to persuade. Later, each child will choose one of their essays to publish, either their personal essay or their persuasive essay. Math - Today the class began working with multi-step word problems. Thinking algabraically, students shifted from doing two separate steps (2+3=5, 5x3=15) to putting the equation together as one whole ((2+3)x3=15). We'll continue working with multistep problems this week. A math study guide will come home Thursday this week and will be due next Tuesday. The Quarter 2 math test will be next Thursday, January 22 and will cover math units 3 and 4. Unit 3 was about division and Unit 4 is about problem solving. Reading - the class is finishing up their study of how to read nonfiction in preparation for a mini-research project they'll complete about a person. They will use biographies and other resources to find information about their chosen person. The class also began doing research about a person in Media today and may use that same person for our mini-research project. Check out our videos about how nonfiction text features help readers! Science - We're in the midst of learning about the sun, moon and earth. The class found out that the sun is our closest star and allows us to see the moon. We'll continue this unit with learning how we have different seasons on earth. Social Studies - The class will begin working on a flip-flap book to show how and why different groups first came to America. Part of finding out about how different groups came to America is finding out where they came from. We will study a world map labeled with the continents and oceans which the class will be tested on next Thursday, January 22. It will be a blank world map with a word bank and they'll have to label the map correctly. A study guide will come home Thursday. We're back! Everyone looks so much taller and older! We had a great first day back and we're getting back into the swing of school routines. Remember to please pack warm recess clothes! The students will go outside if the temperature and wind chill are above 0 degrees. I do anticipate several indoor recess days, so if your child would like to bring a small game from home to play during indoor recess they may. The game can be kept in their locker until recess. Or if your family has any gently used games you'd like to donate to the class, we'd appreciate that as well! Today volunteer calendars came home to sign up for dates, please return those by Friday. I'll send home final volunteer calendars on Friday with your child. Word Study - New lists this week, tests on Friday Writing - The class is finishing up their personal essays by writing introductions and conclusions. Then they will begin to revise and edit their entire essay before publishing and sharing. *Your child may have brought home their writer's notebook today to finish up their introduction or conclusion as homework. Math - We started the new unit in math involving equations and problem solving. Today students were reminded of variables, expressions, equations and parenthesis. Reading - We're continuing our study of nonfiction by learning how to share and teach others all the wonderful information we learn about when reading nonfiction. Students will learn about organizing the information in a way to retell or summarize to another person. Science - Our next unit is the Sun, Moon and Earth. Today students shared what they think they know about the Sun, Moon and Earth and what they are still curious about the Sun, Moon and Earth. The class is very interested/concerned with if/when the sun will explode. Social Studies - The class is learning about 5 different groups of people that came to America, and the effect they've had on our culture. We discussed how America is like a "melting pot." |
AuthorCindy Kaump Archives
June 2017
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