It's been a wild one! Let me first start off by apologizing for not updating the newsletter last week. The concussion really did a number on me. I still feel a little of the symptoms but I am battling through. Last week is a little fuzzy so I will do my best in discussing what we've done!
Math: It looks like I was a chapter ahead of myself. We are still talking about multiplication, but we are focussing on different numbers as factors, and learning properties to help us explain equations. The distributive property took us by surprise but in the end we came out on top. A lot of them find it very fun to do. We have about 3-4 more lessons in chapter 3, before we take our math test. We will take a math quiz on this upcoming Friday. I did something new this time, by letting them students create their own questions. I will pick 1-2 questions from each of them and put together a quiz. They were really excited to do this, so I am looking forward to making the test. Once this chapter is over, then we move into divison. Reading: We finished our literature circle books, and are preparing our group projects. These will be done in class. There is nothing that they HAVE to do at home, but some of them have asked to do small things at home. I did give them permission, ONLY IF it was alright with parents. We also did a little more opinion writing, and these pieces were much better. I was able to see that they understood the formatting of paragraphs, and how to state their opinion with evidence. This week, we are learning about folktales, themes, how to make predictions, antonyms and nouns. We still confuse theme with main idea, so we will spend a little more time on that topic as the weeks move on. Earlier in the month we started our major writing project, and we are slowly making our way through it. We are writing our own fictional story. Some are writing spooky Christmas stories, while others are writing funny spooky stories. The topics range, and I cannot wait to read them all. From the things that I've heard and paragraphs I've read, they are good! They are all so excited and I love to see them happy to write. Social Studies: As stated in a previous newsletter, we are covering holidays and traditions. I took us out of our books, and found articles on Newsela.com on different holidays and traditions from around the world. We've covered 10! Some of them we already knew, but we learned new things about them. They were introduced to many new holidays and were shocked by some of the information that we learned. We are going to create a study guide in class, that they will be able to use on the chapter test. The test will be either Friday or Monday. It all depends on how much of the study guide we get through on Thursday. Hopefully they've talked about some of them at home. If not, maybe ask them what were some of the holidays that they learned, or ask them which was their favorite to hear about. Science: We learned that there are many types of technologies in our world that we would not consider technology. Learning about these technologies, led us to the discussion on how life would be different without them. This week we are learning why having a design, or some kind of sketch/plan is important not only in science, but in other areas as well. I believe we will finish out the chapter by Friday, which is perfect because I planned for our field trip to the Museum of Science and Industry for November 6. I have not told them where we are going just yet, as I am planning to tell them next week. I will send home a notice with them, and a corresponding email, Monday or Tuesday of next week! Religion: We did not focus on a certain chapter this go around. We learned about our Bible Concordance and how it can help us find a verse if we are not sure. We also learned some history of the Bible. We learned how many books each section has, the language it was originally written in, what each section was about, and who it was written for. We created a ring of important verses, such as, 1 Corinthians 12:4-7 and Psalm 100. All 10 represent something that we should remember, and hold deep in our hearts. Tomorrow, we will finish out our chapter buy learning about why it is important to stay in God's word. Important Dates:
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Walkathon was a great success! The kids and I enjoyed ourselves the week leading up to Friday and the big day itself. We were a little bummed that it rained but the rain plan was just as fun! They were a little bummed that they did not win any of the classroom prizes, however they were able to shop at the dojo store :)
Math: We took our math test today. So, for now were are closing our multiplication chapter. We will dive deeper into divison, and we will learn the short divison method. Some of them are already familiar with it, but for most it will be completely new. We are still play kaboom, and we are getting ready to start our new weekly math center rotations. Hopefully the stations are ones that they will love. Reading: For reading, we continued with out topic from last time. So, we are stilling learning about landmarks and how they help tell our countries story. On Tuesday, we read about Mount Rushmore, and the importance that it has for our country. We took a break from our stories, to practice writing opinion pieces. We learned the oreo method, which a lot of them already knew. Very exciting! I cannot wait to read their essays, especially since their topic is if school should be 3 or 5 days. We also did some practice with simple and compound sentences. Social Studies: We are starting a new unit, which is on different celebrations, traditions, and holidays. As of right now, we are reading the pages in our books, and discussing the different things that we are learning. However, I am considering doing a in class research/study project on celebrations, traditions, and holidays. Science: They have made a request to make parachutes again, using stronger material. So, we will start that before week ends. We learned that there are many types of technologies in our world that we would not consider technology. One thing we learned was considered a technology were contact lens. We then discussed the many things around us that are considered technology, and how life would be different if we did not have them. This chapter and these discussions that we are having, are helping to make our first field trip. My goal is to take it during the first week of November! Important Dates:
Map testing is over so things are finally getting back to normal! However, this week is still crazy cause its a short week for us in the classroom due to walkathon.
Math: We are going to wrap up our second unit this week. It is fairly easy due to us using 0,1,2,5,9,and 10 to solve and write multiplication equations. They are all excited that they've learned the 9's trick and look forward to me asking them questions involving multiples of 9. Since we are wrapping up our unit, we will spend a couple days reviewing before we take our test. The test will be a little challenging because they sometimes forget to explain their answers and show their work. I talked to them about this, so hopefully they remember. Reading: This week in reading we are learning about landmarks and how they can help tell the story of our country. So far, we've learned about the Grand Canyon, the history of the Grand Canyon, and the piece of American history that it tells. We also started our new writing project. We are going to write our own fictional stories. They are responsible for creating the setting, the problem/plot, the characters, solution, and giving the story a title. They are all excited and they were really excited to know that we will be typing them. I am not sure if they have access to computers at home, but it would be pretty cool if they can work on the paper at home as well. However, they ave access to laptops here at school. Let me know what you think about that. Each of the lit circle groups are coming to the last few chapters of their books. The goal is to have them finish the books before parent teacher conferences, so we can start the projects. However, that may not be the case. I will keep you in the loop! Social Studies: I tried something new as I stated in previous newsletters. I first allowed the students to become the teachers and teach the other students the lesson they were assigned. I then went behind them and gathered all the things that they missed or did not cover. I had them use their notebooks to take notes. So, not only did we learn some important facts about history, we learned about some important people, and learned how to take notes. The test that we took today was open note, so they were able to use their notebooks. However, it was brought to my attention that some of them chose to not write things down, which made it hard to answer some questions. So, we shall see how things go. :) Science: We are starting our new chapter. The chapter is on technology and the design process. We opened the chapter by discussing how to design a parachute. We used only wax paper, tape, and string. We tested them outside, and recorded our findings in the classroom. We then talked about ways that we can make our parachutes stronger, and they all listed a number of materials that they could use to make them stronger. They seemed to really enjoy the parachutes, and I am looking forward to creating many more things with this chapter. I am also considering taking this chapter and using it to guide our first field trip of the year! Hopefully I am able to pull it off but I am excited about what I have so far. :) Important Dates:
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