December 17th-21st

ANNOUNCEMENTS AND REMINDERS:

Homework will look a little different this week.  I know everyone has been super busy with the holidays coming up and I'm sure you won't have time to slow down during our Winter Vacation either.  Instead of sending home our normal homework packet, I've sent home a list of fun suggestions for you and your child to do to keep their brains growing even if we don't have school.  This packet is optional and you do not need to return anything to me.  If your child wants to bring in what they did to share with the rest of the class, they can definitely do that!  I will post the entire "Holiday Homework Extravaganza" in a separate post.  This way, you will always have access to it even if that pesky little paper gets lost!  As always, if you have any questions about it let me know!

This Friday, December 21st, our class will be boarding the Polar Express and be heading to the North Pole!  Students will be invited to wear their pajamas to school.  I am also planning on serving hot chocolate to the class.  If this is something that you do not want your child to have, you are more than welcome to send an alternative to school.  Please just give me a heads up either by written note or by email.  I will also send home a paper reminder tomorrow.

This week in...

Language Arts:  This week, we are going about a rather unusual schedule.  There is so much holiday excitement in the air so rather than fight it, we're going to embrace it!  I decided to let the team have a little more time for craftivities so this week, we are tackling some of our language arts standards with some holiday read alouds to go along with it.

The Polar Express:  After listening to the polar express, students were challenged to write the beginning, middle, and end of the story (a HUGE comprehensions strategy).  They wrote each part of the story on a piece of a train.  Then they connected these parts together to make their very own Polar Express.  On Friday, after watching the movie, we'll have a chance to compare and contrast the book to the movie using a venn diagram.

Imogene's Antlers:  After reading the story, we'll get the chance to design and describe our very own antlers!  Using really descriptive words and trying to "show not tell" can be really tricky!  But with so many creative minds in the room, I know we'll be able to do it!

Olive the Other Reindeer:  We will read the story of Olive, the Other Reindeer and then tackle our persuasive writing skills by filling out a job application to be one of Santa's Reindeer.  

Math:  In math this week, we will continue to play our place value math games!  Here are some of the things that our games our helping us practice:

-adding numbers

-subtracting numbers

-coin recognition (value and name)

-counting money

-telling time

-skip counting

-place value of a number (hundreds, tens, and ones)

-bundles of numbers (bundles of hundreds, tens and ones)

-using a hundreds chart

-using a number line

-drawing pictures as a strategy

-adding number strings

-adding numbers mentally

-adding and subtracting numbers within 20 mentally

-subtracting two digit numbers

-using a calculator

And so much more!

These games and the skills that they let us practice are incredibly important when we start unpacking our next few standards!

I think that's it!  I hope you all have a wonderful week!