Nov. 28 - Dec. 2

Reminders:

Student-Parent-Teacher Conferences – 12/8 & 12/9

Return conference reminder – 12/1

Return Homework for Parents – 12/2

 This week we’ll read How to Babysit and Orangutan.  In this non-fiction story, Camp Leakey, the island of Borneo, provides a home for orphaned baby orangutans.  Human caretakers raise the young orangs, teach them survival skills and eventually return them to the forest.

                This week’s topics:

·         Writing – write a letter to a Marine in deployed in Afghanistan

·         Café  –  expand vocabulary – use dictionaries and thesaurus in reading and writing

·         Vocabulary – displeasure, jealous, endangered, smuggled, facial, coordination

·         Spelling – /ou/ as in frown and bounce

·         Grammar – complex sentences

 This week we’ll continue learning basic algebra.  We’ve read stories that helped explain variables or “mystery numbers”.  Please continue to work on addition, subtraction, multiplication and division facts as they are needed to find variables.   We’ll depend a lot on fact families to find solutions mentally.  This is so much easier when facts are memorized.

                This week’s topics:

·         Identify, describe and extend patters  ( numbers and symbols)

·         Function Tables  (finding rules and operations – addition or subtraction)

·         Multiplication and division expressions – using variables and fact families to find mystery numbers

·         Function Tables  (finding rules and operations – multiplication and division)

This week we’ll learn about the Algonquian language group.  We’ll focus on their tribes, natural resources and roles.  It is important to see the Iroquois and Algonquians as separate tribes, but also realize they have many things in common.  I’ll be sending home a study packet during the week and asking students to review definitions, names and facts about our entire study.  Please help your student by looking through the packet each night.    The test will be Friday 12/2.

Nov. 21 - Nov. 23

Reminders:

11/23 – Cotton Ball Jar Party

11/24 & 11/25 – No School Thanksgiving

12/8 & 12/9 – Student, Parent, Teacher Conferences

This short week we’ll finish up writing our friendly letters.  Make sure to send in a stamped envelope by 11/22 so all letters can go out in time.  We’ll also be reading many stories and non-fiction texts about Thanksgiving. 

 This week we’ll begin chapter 5 focusing on algebraic expressions.  It’s important that students understand the idea of variables standing for a value.  Make sure to help students at home while they are practicing homework.

This week’s topic:

·         Addition and subtraction equations

·         Learning definitions of equation, variable and solved equations

Our tribal sign projects are finished and look great!  Your students also got a chance to work closely with rubrics and being responsible for their own work.  I asked each student to grade him/her self before I will grade their work.  The effort was noted and all did a great job working on their first small group project.  This week we’ll learn about the Algonquin Tribes.  There will be homework over the break in social studies!!

Our Student, Parent, Teacher conferences are coming up quick!  Please make sure to review the time you have signed up for or asked to come.  Let me know if there are any conflicts and I’ll do what it takes to meet with every parent.  The students are really looking forward to being reflective and showing off their hard work!!  Keep an eye out for your parent homework in preparation for the conference. 

** We have filled up our cotton ball jar of good behavior!  Students may bring in ONE small blanket or towel Wednesday for our tent party!

Newsletter for November 14th

 We listened to The Garden of Happiness.  The main character, Marisol, pants a sunflower seed in a new neighborhood garden. When autumn comes and her flower dies, Marisol gets discouraged. Her happiness returns, however, when she discovers that a group of teenagers has painted a mural of sunflowers on a brick wall nearby.

                This week’s topics:

·         Writing – Review friendly letter – Send in a stamped envelope!!!!

·         Fluency – discuss the rates of fluency that are applied to different stories for different reasons

·         Vocabulary –inhaled, lavender, mural, skidded, haze

·         Spelling – /ur/ as in turtle and learn

This week we’ll continue practicing the 6 steps of multiplication.  The sequence has been glued onto our math journals.  We’ll also review factors and multiples.

                This week’s topics:

·         Estimate products of two-digit numbers

·         Multiply two-digit numbers

·         Review factors vs. multiples

·         Review and test (Friday)

We have begun our Tribal Sign Project!  Each student was randomly placed in one on the five Iroquois nations.  The teams have assigned roles within their groups.  They’ll be researching for information on clans, alternate names, food, map, and gustoweh (arrangement of eagle feathers on hat).   Each group will create a poster that highlights the new information learned in each area (independently) and group poster that showcases their tribe.  They are very excited!

Pumpkin Jack Decay Project

Last week we read a story called Pumpkin Jack.  The main character has a jack-o-lantern named Jack which begins to rot.  His mother makes him put Jack in the compost heap. The pumpkin begins to decay but not without leaving behind some seeds.  These seeds are replanted and the life cycle continues!  We were so inspired we began our own experiment. Today we created a control to watch the process of decay in once living things.  We created a lab report, documented the experiment with photos and took notes in our science journal.  This should be so fun!



November 7 - November 10

We’ll listen to Nights of the Pufflings.  This text  will let us dive deeper into how to read non-fiction.  On Heimaey Island, near Iceland, a community works together to help young birds called pufflings return safely to sea.

                This week’s topics:

·         Writing – Write a satisfying paragraph about the most serious problem our town is facing (character education – citizenship)

·         Comprehension – re-tell the story using a re-tell rope

·         Vocabulary –uninhabited, burrows, stranded, venture, instinctively, nestles

·         Spelling – /ar/ as in cared, airplane, everywhere

 I was very impressed with the math scores for chapter 4.  Our students are doing much better on word problems and it’s clear many have been practicing their facts!  Chapter 6 will focus on how to apply those new strategies and concepts about multiplying.  We’ll apply each concept to word problems to make the math relevant to us.  

                This week’s topics:

·         Rounding to estimate products  using mental math

·         Multiply two digit numbers

This week we’ll relate upcoming Election Day (Nov. 8^th) with democracy in the Native American culture.  Our nation’s confederacy was based loosely on those cultural traditions of the Native Americans. We will also begin a Tribal Sign Project which will be completed in small groups at school.  Each group will focus closely on one particular tribe and share out the interesting information learned.

Thank you!

Thank you parents for your help and support with our first project!  ALL students handed in their book project and are extremely proud of their effort.  We'll be presenting our work in the library Monday morning.  Look for pictures!

Fin Friday

Where green tomorrow for Fin Friday - Support Shen!!