* Max is our MVP!
* Conferences are coming--please turn in your conference form by TUESDAY, if you haven't already. The teachers will be meeting Wednesday morning to set up their schedules.
* Halloween is Monday! We will have a regular academic schedule Monday morning. If students are staying at school for lunch, they will have time to change into their costumes at that time. Lunch will be from 12:15-1:15 and all students will meet outside on the blacktop at 1:15. We will come into the classroom, take attendance and get ourselves ready for the parade. The parade will begin at 1:30. Once we parade around the neighborhood, we will return to the classroom for our party. Thank you to our room reps for all the planning for our first party of the year! The kids are really looking forward to it!
* Our spelling list this week contains words with /ar/ and /or/. We will take our pretest on Monday and the kids will work with Spelling City throughout the week for practice.
* We will work with irregular plural nouns in grammar. The kids will be asked to identify and use the correct plural noun in sentences.
* In reading we will spend time going over our next genre for the months of November and December. Since we have breaks in both months, we will have the kids work with only one genre during this time. We will take a look at historical fiction -- what makes a book historical fiction? What role does the setting play? The kids will continue to use their questioning strategies when working with their guided reading novels and we will start a unit on inferring near the end of the week.
* We will spend time finishing up our last lesson in Unit 3 for math on Monday. The kids will take a practice test in class on Tuesday (which can be used as a study guide, along with any study links). We will review in class on Wednesday and the kids will take their final test over the unit on Thursday. A parent letter explaining Unit 4 will come home by the end of the week. Part of your child's homework is now using the ixl.com website. This website is an excellent resource for practicing many skills we cover with University of Chicago Math. Our classroom has a free trial of the website until Thanksgiving Break. Please encourage your child to practice his/her skills with this resource 3-4 times per week.
* The kids chose a journal entry that they wanted to develop into a full personal narrative. We will keep revising this piece throughout the week and incorporate a catchy introduction, takeaway ending, and sizzling word choice. We will begin our final copy near the end of this week.
* In social studies, we will work through Chapter 1 of our History Alive book. The kids will work with geographic terms (ie: gulf, bay, tributary, peninsula) and physical features of the United States (ie: Rio Grande, Sierra Nevada, Rocky and Appalachian Mountains). The kids will also begin their UbD project (Understanding by Design). This is a research project that challenges the students to use problems solving skills to answer essential questions about the topic. Our UbD topic is the Native Americans. The kids will research to find the answer to the question of, "How do people need to adapt to their surroundings?" The teachers are excited to start the project with the kids.
* I hope you all have a Happy Halloween and a safe week. Enjoy the first few days of November!
