- The children completed both their Reading and Math MAP tests this week. I was so pleased to see that the children took this assessment seriously and did their best.
- Many were proud to have increased their scores! Great job!
Reading
In order to build our oral vocabularies, the children listened to the story of “The Emperor’s New Clothes.” The new vocabulary words we learned were: vain, exquisite, display, deceive, and applause. Challenge your children to use these words over the weekend!
Our theme this week was “Putting on a Performance.” The children read a nonfiction piece about the students at the Alvin Ailey Dance School in New York City. They were preparing for their spring performance. We practiced summarizing the story. To do this, we identified three key ideas we read about, and then put them all together to recreate what the story was mainly about. . Our new vocabulary words of the week were mood, perform, effort, proud, remember, and students. The children also learned about the literary elements of alliteration! After listening to a silly story about The Worrywarts, the children were quickly able to see that alliteration is the repetition of the initial sounds of words in a text. The Worrywarts were a group of wombats and weasels who ate watermelon and wafers and worried about warthogs! We also read the lyrics of a song together, highlighting repeated phrases and alliteration as
Grammar
We worked on the past tense of the word “have.” The children practiced substituting ‘has’ and ‘had’ for this word in a variety of sentences. We also identified book titles in sentences, making sure to capitalize the important words as well as underline them for emphasis!
Math
Thank you for sending in so many interesting objects for our shapes museum! After learning about each shape in class, it was such an powerful authentic application of these skills! The children learned the differences/similarities between the: pyramid, rectangular prism, cylinder, sphere, and cone. Using “Magneatos,” the children worked in small groups to build a variety of different pyramids. We noticed that the name of the pyramid was based on the shape of its base (ex: triangular pyramid, square pyramid, hexagonal pyramid, etc.) The students learned about the apex (point on top), vertices, edges and faces. They were eager to point out each of these terms on the shapes they created! Science
Our in-depth study of the rainforest has begun! The children put on their "Rainforest Explorer" badges every time our science lessons begin! Each of the children has received a graphic organizer on which to take notes as we study this amazing habitat. We are going to be looking at the definition, climate, location, plants, animals, human impact, destruction and other interesting facts! The children are already showing signs of interest and concern about this fascinating, yet rapidly disappearing, habitat.
Handwriting
The children took a handwriting test today! We were checking to make sure that everyone is fully capable of printing neatly before beginning our cursive lessons next week. PLEASE do not teach your child cursive ahead of time! It can be very confusing if they are shown different ways to make the same letter, and its very difficult to "unteach" something they have already begun practicing at home. I appreciate your help with that!!
Have a wonderful, long weekend!
See you on Tuesday!
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