March

Well...we sure have been busy with TCAP testing, area/perimeter in math, and learning about Great Americans.  It is exciting and exhausting all at the same time.  Just think, next week we will be done with our first ever TCAP testing experience!  After that we should be able to have some pictures to show off all of our hard work on our Great Americans.  Be on the look-out for that!

We're Back!

We've been working so hard and preparing for TCAP that we fell off the blog radar for a while!  Hopefully we can keep this more up-to-date for the rest of the year!  Back in January I had the privilege of going to a Thinking Maps training.  Thinking Maps are meant to organize kiddo's thoughts and get them to be more critical thinkers.  The really cool thing about Thinking Maps is that they can be used for everything!!  We've been using the maps in math, writing, and reading so far.  Often times I hear, "Are we going to learn a new Thinking Map?"  That is so exciting because I know the kiddos like them and find the value in them!  Here are some examples of Thinking Maps:

Circle Map about Non-Fiction Texts

Tree Map detailing learning about LINES and ANGLES.

Double Bubble Thinking Map comparing/contrasting perpendicular and parallel lines.

Circle Map as a plan to describe their favorite fairy tale character.

Tree Map plan to describe and explain a favorite winter activity.

Multi-Flow Map (cause & effect)

Close up of a Multi-Flow Map (cause & effect) - causes on the left, effects on the right.

Junior Achievement

It's week 3 of Junior Achievement and we are learning all about a city.  This week we are talking about what it takes to start up and run a restaurant.  Last week we learned about the layout of a city and where to put houses, town homes, a library, city hall, an airport, etc.  Here are the pictures of our city in progress and after it was completed!

Our city in progress!

 Our finished city!

Grandparent Tea 9/9/11

Weeks 5 & 6

Important!
Fundraisers are due tomorrow along with homework and library books!  Grandparent's Tea is Friday from 9:05 - 10:00.


We will finish CogAT testing tomorrow. It has been getting more difficult, but it's fun!  It is harder than MAP testing.

We went outside to observe nature with our five senses and saw a hairy wolf spider!  EEK!  When we came back inside, we had to write about our observations.  Then we wrote about what we would do if we were invisible and could fly!  Now we are working on writing a story with a partner.  Our stories are from our imagination.  Some of us have a king, a horse, a pegasus, a dragon frog, friends, and an evil wizard as our characters.  Our stories take place in a forest, angel world, a misty castle, a race track, and a desert.  The evil characters are trying to take over, some characters are getting stuck in mazes, and evil characters destroy villages in our stories.  Writing with a partner is fun!

In reading some groups started reading new books.  We are writing about what we read and making connections.  In Daybook we finished connections and now we are starting the new comprehension strategy - asking questions.  We are also continuing our work in Seeing R.E.D and working on our cursive handwriting.

For math we are doing number bonds to solve addition and subtraction problems.  They help us do mental math.  Number bonds are just another strategy for adding and subtracting which eliminate any regrouping.  Yesterday we started rounding numbers to the nearest 10 and 100.  Practice rounding at home!

Next week is spirit week which we are beyond excited for!
Spirit Week September 12th - 16th
Monday - pajama day
Tuesday - twin day (dress alike)
Wednesday - hat day
Thursday - inside out / backward day (wear your clothes just wrong)
Friday - spirit wear day


    

Weeks 3 & 4

IMPORTANT!!!  The shuttle bus for parent pick-up and drop-off students ONLY starts Monday.  If you are going to participate in the FREE shuttle bus, please let me know either through an email or a note to me on Monday.  Remember the drop-off time is 8:45 and the pick-up time is 4:10 at Sierra Middle School.  

Weeks 3 and 4 were fun and we learned a lot.  In cursive handwriting, we learned how to form the letters t, p, l, e, and f.  We wrote about how we could make the world a more beautiful place, our hopes/dreams, a memory with our sister/brother, our likes/dislikes/passions, and our connections.  Each student wrote a letter to a grandparent(s) because we want to get to know our grandparents better.  We invited them to "Grandparent Tea" on Friday, September 9th from 9:05 - 10:00.  Hope to see you there!  This week we started Seeing R.E.D (Revising and Editing Daily).  Our goal is to capitalize the beginning of sentences and make sure every sentence has ending punctuation. 

 

We read Grandfather's Journey which is about Allen Say's grandfather's journey to the United States.  Our class is in guided reading groups and we are practicing making connections.  We have Mrs. Zamora in our room to help us read too.  From Daybook, we have been making connections with people, hopes/dreams, and images.  Our parent volunteers are reading with us and helping us make connections too. 

We have been continuing our place value work in math.  Number patterns in math have been a bit tricky for us especially if we are counting by 10's or 100's and we make a new 100 or 1000 (i.e. 5, 892 and the pattern is to add 10, the next number in the pattern would be 5.902).  On Monday, we took a test on Chapter 1.  Mrs. Deba will correct the test over the weekend.  Now we are learning number bonds and how to make a 10 to help us add/subtract 2-digit numbers mentally.

We did reading and language MAP (Measures of Academic Progress) testing on the computer.  Math MAP testing will take place next week.  We began Fast ForWord last week.  It is a reading program on the computer that has reading games at a variety of levels.  We practice every day and have fun doing it! 

We started our ABC Catalog fundraiser yesterday.  Fundraiser order forms are due by September 8th.  Sell, sell, sell!!!  :)  BYE
 

Week 2

We had a fun second week of school!  Our class is learning to count money and make specific amounts in a variety of ways.  For example if the amount was $0.40, one student may put up 4 dimes and another student may use a quarter, dime, and nickel. 

 We have been learning how to write in cursive.  Last week we learned how to write the cursive c, a, d, g, and h. 

 

Daybook is teaching us reading comprehension strategies such as:  making connections, asking questions, determining importance, visualizing, making inferences, and synthesizing.  We are focusing on making connections while we read. 

 

In writing, we drew self-portraits and we wrote about ourselves.  This form of writing is called descriptive writing.

We have been learning place value.  We have gone into the thousands place.  On Friday, we learned the difference between a number and a digit.  For example a number is 2,548 and 2 is a digit within that number.  With base-ten blocks we can represent a number and we can find the value of each digit.  Like the value of the digit 2 in 2,548 is worth 2,000.  We can write numbers in standard form, word form, and expanded form.  

 

You are able to buy books from Scholastic online at www.scholastic.com/bookclubs.  If you are not already registered, please do so and use our class code GQQWY.  I have the Lucky and Arrow catalogs open until August 28th.  If you need more time, just let me know and I'll open them for a longer period of time.  Every time a parent places an order, I get a $3 coupon to buy more books for the classroom!