Is March 1st already next week? Hopefully we'll see it come in like a lion and out like a lamb! Spring has got to be around the corner...
- The children enjoyed watching the movie "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" today during our lunch hour. They made so many connections to the book, as we watched the story we shared together come to life in the "older" version of the movie! It was fun having lunch together in the classroom as well! There have already been suggestions of future "lunch-ins!"
- Thank you for encouraging your child to participate in the "Design the Rain Barrel" contest! We had 7 students design a drawing that would look great on our new Dryden rain barrel. The children voted, and Peter's drawing won! His picture will now be entered into the school-wide drawing, and he will be asked to help decorate the barrel with the school's winning design!
- I've added the link to the SUMMER U Brochure and a link to "Camp Invention" to the sidebar on the right. There are reinforcement as well as enrichment classes that will help keep your child thinking over the summer! Take a peak!
- The District's Cultural Arts Fair is coming up on April 6th at Thomas Middle School. (A link with more information has also been added to the sidebar on the right.) The children have a fun opportunity to create a project for the fair that tells their family story! It can be a story, a song, a poem, pictorial, interview, or any other creative/multimedia representation that you can think of that tells about your family heritage. The projects are due to the office here at school on March 18th. Click the link for more information!
- I received a bundle of fun books from the Scholastic book fair! Thank you for thinking of me- and our class- while you were at the book fair! I cannot wait to share these stories with the children. We've already read "Sloppy Joe" and "Library Mouse" this week at school, thanks to Lucas and Brooke! We are enjoying the new stories very much!
Spelling
The children practiced words with the /oo/ sound, spelled ‘ui,’ ‘u,’ and ‘ue.’ Next week, we will work on words with the /aw/ sound, spelled ‘aw’ and ‘au!’
Reading
Our theme this week was severe weather! Our main selection was called, “Super Storms.” Did you know that hail can be the size of a marble or a baseball? Or that a thunderstorm can drop millions of gallons of water in just one minute? The children learned many fascinating facts like these this week. Vocabulary words we focused on in our reading this week include: beware, destroy, grasslands, prevent, uprooted, and violent. We worked on the comprehension strategy of making and checking predictions while reading. Additional skills we covered over the course of the week were: compound words and identifying repetition and mood in poetry!
Grammar
The children continued to work on irregular verbs. They reviewed that irregular verbs are action words that do NOT end in ‘ed’ in the past tense! (ex: come/came, do/did, have/had)
Math
Over the course of the week, the children worked to find halves of even numbers. They solved “What’s My Rule?” problems involving doubling and halving. We practiced reading numbers on a scale. The children learned that there are 16 ounces in a pound and practiced estimating weights of different objects. Next week the children will have a “Data Day,” during which they will break into small groups and take turns taking standing jumps. We will be working on range, finding the median, and graphing data!
Next week the children will continue ordering and comparing numbers. They will work with frequency tables, and practice reading line plots and bar graphs! The end of Unit 7 is near!
Science
Our unit on Motion has begun! We kicked off the unit with a "Search for Motion." With their notebooks and clipboards, the children became motion detectives as we searched, identified, and described various examples of motion by watching a PE class in the gym! The children noticed jumping, rolling, scooting, running, even falling! We observed a garbage can roll across the floor and watched how two different types of doors required force to open (one was a push, the other was a pull.) The children are already building their knowledge as they think about the amount of force it takes to make something move, as well as how air, friction with another object, gravity, or even a collision with another obstacle can affect the outcome of the motion.
LMC
In honor of George Washington's birthday this week, and the recently celebrated Presidents' Day, the children chose to either watch a Brain Pop video on George Washington or Abraham Lincoln. With their pencil, paper, and clip boards, the children watched their little video and would press PAUSE when they heard an interesting fact they wanted to remember using bullet points. It was great review of the notetaking skills we learned during our habitat research! Once the children recorded their facts, we word processed them into a document under the picture of the president they studied. Finally, the children took a photo of themselves using the camera on their computers, and edited the photo using the drawing tools to make themselves look like their president! I will put these into a class book for you to view at conferences. I'll bet you won't be able to recognize your child underneath all of those powdered wigs and top hats!
Have a wonderful weekend!
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