December 6 Update...

Dear Parents,

We've had a very busy first week of December! Please check out below to find out what we've been learning!  Next week, we will be having special activities to collect caring coins for our Kemp family.  I've added the activities to our calendar over to the right of this page.  We will begin our stocking stuffer activity on Monday as well. If you haven't donated your 24 items, please do by then.  The kids LOVE seeing their special surprises every day and it is a great behavior motivator. 

Phonics/Grammar: We learned our long and short vowel patterns for the week and we also memorized five more tricky contractions.  We completed a Words Their Way sort, we wrote our words and highlighted the vowel pattern, we played several rounds of SPARKLE with oddball words.

Reading: We began our new chapter book, The Chocolate Touch.  We are modeling how a "book club" works and what our expectations are for this type of reading activity so we can begin our book clubs after Christmas. We read the book Snowflake Bentley and talked about how this farmer/scientist taught the world about the intricacies of snowflakes.  We worked in small groups to improve our reading fluency and comprehension, working with nonfiction passages.  We also learned a strategy called UNRAAVEL to help us become better at making sure our answers to comprehension questions are correct.

Math:  We reviewed all three methods for adding and subtracting using our place value knowledge (base ten blocks, expanded form, and open number line). We talked about when we need to decompose or compose a ten when computing.  We also learned how every problem has an inverse problem that can be used to "check" our work.  Please make sure you are reviewing the math papers that come home and providing that extra support if needed. 

Writing:  We began a new unit of study this week; Writing Lab Reports.  We began by creating an experiment to determine whether a car would travel farther off a ramp onto the carpet or onto the tile floor.  The children went through the process of how real scientist use writing.  We also conducted an experiment to see if Joe prefers his food or his hay more.  The students thought of a question, wrote a hypothesis, planned the steps for the experiment, created a data table, and then wrote their conclusion.  AWESOME!

Social Studies: We took the final assessment on all three historical figures that we learned about this quarter.  We began our economics unit on Wants/Needs and Producers/Consumers.  We worked on the smartboard and played several games to learn about this topic.  We watched several videos and we read a great nonfiction book about economics.

Class News and Announcements...

Please keep the Abrams family in your thoughts and prayers this week, as they are grieving from a death in the family.

Mark your calendars for our Holiday Party!  It will be on Thursday, December 19th at 10:00.  All are welcome to come and have fun with us.  Mrs. Newlin will be asking for volunteers who are willing to be in charge of an activity.

The end of the quarter is quickly approaching!  Make sure your child is on track for meeting his/her AR goal as well as completing all the STUDY ISLAND assignments!