Unit 4 Week 5 Preview

We will explore animals working in teams. Insects in colonies, cleaner fish, and the protective nature of herds are a few examples. We continue to work on narratives using a flow map to brainstorm beginning, middle, and ends to our creative response to literature stories. Our oral vocabulary words are: behavior, group, plead, soar, and vivid. In phonics we will continue work with long-vowel 'e' and use its spellings 'y' (sunny) and 'ey' (monkey). Our high frequency focus words are: also, because, blue, or, other, and until. We will analyze text structure in order to hone our retelling comprehension skill.

In spite of the fact we are still working on the weather unit in science, it will be necessary to overlap our 3rd unit and immediately begin our growing plants and animals-life-cycle unit.

In Social Studies our work with relative direction came in quite handy when we were left a map of sorts to a hidden stash before our break. We will continue work with maps intermittently in the coming weeks.

We will continue our study of coins and counting money in math as this concept will be covered in our next and final District Quarterly Math Exam which comes up in less than two weeks' time. The test appears rigorous yet fairly straightforward. We will soon be taking timed math tests as well to show our ability to apply math strategies learned this quarter.

Some of Room 11's work is currently being displayed in the main office for the month of April.

Unit 3 Week 1 Preview

In our next unit we will be exploring fun and laughter. Over the course of this unit, students will be collecting funny stories, riddles, and anecdotes to make into a book. Please assist children over the winter break to write notes about family members' favorite funny stories, riddles, and jokes.

We will begin our study of long-vowel spellings beginning with the spelling pattern long-vowel 'a' spelled 'a_e' (eg., rate, cage). We will learn the first stanza of our vowel poem which students may later memorize for a star on the Star Chart. Our vocabulary words of the week are: amuse, humorous, delighted, mood, and ridiculous. We will review sight words: all, put, show, together, under, and want in addition to introducing away, school, today, way, and why. In grammar we will be taking another look at verbs. We will discuss again, respect and good sportsmanship. As we did last week, we will use a Flow Chart to independently retell a story.

Unit 2 Week 5 Preview

For the next 5 instructional days we will ask what neighbors do together for fun. Our focus vocabulary words will be: audience, entertain, brilliant, enjoy, and perform. Our sight words will be: all, put, show, together, under, and want. In phonics we will be introduced to the digraphs 'sh,' and 'th'. We will again generate retells and summaries of our selections using visualization and Flow Maps

Forty-Second Day

We compared the the past and the present in a nonfiction selection today called Around Town, Then and Now. We started a Flow Map to write a report about the city of Carson. Our vocabulary words for the week include: frequently, service, variety, useful, and amazed.

We took Topic 7 math test today.

Fortieth Day

Sixteen students have completed seminar and 8 students have completed their Unit Projects. We began our own Flow Map to provide instruction for a family chore after completing a practice map to retell the events of The Little Red Hen. The best of these maps may be saved to be displayed in the office for Room 11's turn at the bulletin board.

We will likely take our Topic 7 math test on Monday. That makes for a busy test week in math.

Unit 2 Week 2 Preview

This week we will be discussing helping and cooperation in connection with our larger theme Family and Neighbors. We will discuss how we are able to contribute to tasks which need to be accomplished. We will read and listen to several versions of The Little Red Hen for comparison. We will focus on the order of events to retell (R 1.2.7). We will use our fourth thinking map (Flow Map) to write a retelling. We will then learn to write ordered instructions for completing a task.

Our focus in phonics will be the short-vowel 'e'. We will focus on high-frequency words: eat, no, of, some, and who. We will discuss and practice plural nouns with an emphasis on those which require '-es'. Our robust vocabulary words are: appreciate, cooperate, partner, responsibility, and scrumptious.

In social studies we will observe how the environment/weather of three different climates affects lifestyle. We will also examine the division of labor in and the process of raw material to final product.

In science we will work further with solid forms of matter.

Third Day

Today we reviewed short vowel 'a'. We began our first thinking map: Flow Map, used for sequencing. The use of the Flow Map will help us to organize our thoughts about a problem we've encountered in our lives.

In PE we reviewed/learned various forms of locomotion.

In math we continued with number sense for 9-12 expressing those numbers relative to a ten. I sent home a dice game for the children to play with another person.

Yesterday I sent home the children's first of 9 reading logs for the year. There is space to record at least 10 titles of additional reading each month. The log should be turned back in (signed by a parent/guardian) on the last day of the month. Three reading logs are required each reporting period in order to received a 3 on the progress report homework grade.

Congratulation's to the students of table 3 for meeting the behavioral standard for the first week of school.