October 21-October 25

ANNOUNCEMENTS AND REMINDERS:

Homework packets are due on Thursday!  Please remind your child to put them in their folders on Wednesday night!  Homework must be turned in by Friday morning in order to have Free Choice Friday.

This Wednesday, October 23, is an early release day!  Please plan accordingly!

Thanks so much to all who have responded to our Harvest Party requests!  We are still looking for someone to donate some pumpkins, a few more butternut squashes, some plain popcorn (we won’t be eating any of it), and some canning rings.  If you would like to donate any of those materials, just send a note or email my way!  It would be greatly appreciated!

Conferences begin on Thursday this week!  Next week, there are conferences on Tuesday and Wednesday.  If you are unsure of what time and day your conference is, please contact me!  I would be happy to remind you of our meeting time.  I’m looking forward to seeing all of you again and talking about Team Blowey’s progress!  Remember, these are Parent, Teacher, STUDENT conferences so please plan on bringing your child to the conference!  Also, if you have any questions that you would like answered at the conference, please send them to me ahead of time so I can make sure I have the appropriate resources to answer you question fully and appropriately.  Thank you!

Mrs. Thibodeau will be coming to visit our classroom again this week!  We’ll continue talking about using Kelso’s choices to help us solve our small problems!

THIS WEEK IN...

Phonics:  This week we will be reviewing the sounds we have been working with in Unit 1.  We’ve practiced 50 words so far!  We’ve practiced all of the short vowel sounds and we’ve also practiced the long /i/, long /o/, and long /a/ sounds.  We’ll work on sorting some of the words we worked with and practice reading and writing them.

Vocabulary:  We are reviewing several words from Unit 1.  We’ll review:  groan, whisper, delighted, share, safe, forest, deaf, cultures, patient, and settled.  We’ll talk about what these words mean and give examples of how we might use them in a sentence or how we connect to the words to remember them better.

Comprehension:  This week, we’ll be working together to take a sample Unit assessment.  These assessments focus on being able to read a passage and answer questions about it.  Together, we’ll read about Tigers and Kim’s Good Idea.  In this practice assessment, we’ll also practice using some of our reading strategies like using pictures to answer questions.

Grammar:  We will be reviewing all of the skills we have practiced so far!  We’ll review the different type of sentences like statements, questions, commands and exclamations.  We’ll review the parts of a sentence (subject and predicate) and we’ll also review how to combine sentences if they have the same subject or the same predicate.  

Writing:  This week we will focus on revising, editing, and publishing our personal narratives!  Today, student’s worked with a partner to try and figure out what they could add to their story to make it more interesting!  Team Blowey will take those changes and create a second draft.  Then, they will conference with me for the editing process.  We’ll be making sure that every sentence starts with a capital letter and has correct ending punctuation.  We’ll be making sure that most of our words are spelled correctly and 
that our story flows, meaning that it is easy to read.  Then, Team Blowey will use their very best handwriting to publish their personal narratives!

Math:  We are getting so close to making it to the top of Mount Geometry!  Our whole group lessons this week will focus on reviewing each step on our checklist.  Here is what Team Blowey will need to show in order to make it to the top of Mount Geometry!

Identify a triangle, quadrilateral (any shape that has four sides and four angles), pentagon, hexagon, and cube.  Students should also be able to identify a rhombus, trapezoid, square, rectangle, and circle.

Be able to count the number of sides (the lines that make up the shape) and angles (the corners) that make up a 2D shape.

Identify a 3D shape.

Count the number of faces (the flat surfaces) of a 3D shape.  

Draw a 2D shape given specified attributes (like a given number of sides and/or angles) and draw a 3D shape.

We’ll also be doing some fun projects to help us review some of these things!  We’ll be reading The Shape of Things by Dayle Ann Dodds and then creating a very similar classroom book.  We’ll follow this format:  A _______________ is just a _________________ until you add __________________.  Then it’s a _____________________.  For example, a square is just a square until you add a roof and some windows, then it’s a house!  We’ll also be making some geometrical Jack-O-Lanterns!  Students will use geometric shapes to decorate pumpkins and then they will have to tell me how many of each shape they used.

Social Studies:  Our classroom store will open this week!  Students will have the chance to spend the “B” that they have earned however they would like!  Some might choose to spend it all, some might choose to save it all and try and save up to buy something more expensive!  

Science:  Since we didn’t have a chance to play our “Plant Needs” game last week, my goal is to try and play it sometime this week!  Students will become plants themselves and have to find the four things a plant needs in order to stay alive in the game!  They will be collecting sunlight, soil, water, and air.

Have a wonderful week!