May 5-9

ANNOUNCEMENTS AND REMINDERS:

Please remember to send your child to school with a jacket or sweatshirt!  Morning recess and even afternoon recess have been somewhat chilly recently.  Like I say to the team... better to have more of what you need than not enough!  

Remember that homework packets are due on Thursday!  Please remind your child to put their homework packet into their backpacks on Wednesday evening.  No homework packet = no free choice Friday!

From now on, you can expect for Team Blowey to have P.E. outside. Please remember to send your child to school with appropriate footwear on Mondays!

This week in...

Phonics:  This week we are working with silent letters!  We will be practicing words with silent k, g, w, and b.  Here are our focus words:  knee, knife, knot, gnaw, sign, wrist, wren, thumb, lamb, and debt.

Vocabulary:  Here are our new words:  blooming, prickly, muscles, aroma, scent, and trade.  We will define these words and build connection to them.  Then, we’ll search for them in the short story called City Garden by Roberta Salazar.

Comprehension:  This week we will be working on identifying the sequence of events.  We will use the words first, then, next, and last to help us show the sequence of the story.  We’ll practice this skill while we read the story called The Ugly Vegetables by Grace Lin.

Grammar:  This week, we will be focusing on pronoun-verb agreement.  A present-tense verb must agree with the pronoun in the subject part of the sentence.  If the pronouns he, she, and it are in the subject part of the sentence, we would add -s to most action verbs to form the present tense.

For example:

She weeds the garden.  (weed-weeds)
He brings the hose.  (bring-brings)

Writing:  Team Blowey will start collecting information for their animal research projects.  Today, we chose the animal we wanted to study.  Tomorrow, we will begin reading for information about what our animal looks like, where it lives, what it eats, and some interesting facts.  

Math:  We are continuing our flexible groups for adding and subtracting within 100 with a focus on word problems.  On the days where we are not doing flexible groups, we will be working on time, money, and math facts.  At the end of the week, we will also continue to explore the world of measurement.  We’ll be reviewing what tools we use when we measure things and how to use the tools appropriately.  

Animal Research:  To help model the animal research project, Team Blowey will be studying Penguins as a whole group.  First, we will read a book about penguins identifying some important penguin vocabulary such as waddle or colony.  Next, we will read the same book again searching for information about what penguins look like, what they eat, where they live, and some interesting facts.  Then, we will talk about the different types of penguins we read about.  From there, the team will be divided into groups who will find out more information about the specific types of penguins we read about.  They will find out where their kind of penguin lives, what it eats, its size, and an interesting fact.  Using the information they were able to gather, they will create a life-size drawing of that kind of penguin to be displayed out in the hallway along with the facts they were able to find.  

Severe Weather Alert:  To enhance our weather unit, Team Blowey will be studying types of severe weather in small groups.  We will be studying floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, volcanoes, earthquakes, and thunderstorms.  With their small group, Team Blowey will find information about the kind of severe weather they are studying.  From there, they will use that information to develop a poster that can be used to teacher others about that kind of weather.  At the end of the week, we will present these posters to each other.  During the presentations, we will be developing a list of safety tips that we should know when it comes to dealing with severe weather.  My hope is that we will soon be able to share these posters with some other classrooms as well.