January 11 - 22

So the Jazz/Usborne reading contest is among us! You should have received a note on this. There are several in-class rewards offered as well as schoolwide rewards. It's time to read, read, read! On Friday, the school offered a PJs, Pillows, and Pancake reading party to help students get excited about the contest. Below is a picture of a few of our many students that attended the after school party. It was a lot of fun!

This week also marked the end of the second term. I am working on and almost finished with grades. A few parents should be expecting a phone call early this week to get the at-home reading minutes for the term. I am still missing several of the calendars, so to finish report cards, I plan on just calling home and speaking with a parent. The reports will given out at Parent Teacher Conferences, which are February 3 and 4. A conference schedule has gone home. If you did not get your copy of it, or need to work out a different time, feel free to contact me.

This coming week is going to be about as normal as weeks get, except for one fairly intensive activity I have planned. Our story is going to be, "Girls Think of Everything". This is a story that takes the kids through several inventions that were invented by women. We finished our Heat, Light and Sound unit in Science. This week we will be starting into the Space portion of our Science Core which will take a good part of the rest of the year. After we finish this unit, we will be done learning new material and will begin reviewing for the end of level. Science Fair also begins this week so be looking for a packet with a parent letter in it coming home on Tuesday.

I'm sure most of you know about the Earthquake in Haiti and the efforts that are going on to help aid the Haitian people. I'm going to be taking a few of my language arts periods this week on this subject. The first one, we're going to introduce the Geography and Science of it, so that I know the kids know where Haiti is in the world as well as how earthquakes happen. After that I plan on showing them some images of what Haiti used to look like compared to what devastation this earthquake has done. On the second day, I am going to show a Haiti Tribute video, only about 5 minutes long, to get their minds moving, and then I'm going to ask them to write a poem. They will have two choices: 1.) Write a poem expressing their feelings as if they were one of these Haitian children, or 2.) To write a poem around the theme Sending Hope to Haiti. We have a really talented and emotional bunch when they want to be. I'm excited to see what they will produce on the topic. At any rate, it has the potential to be a fairly emotional lesson, so if the kids come wanting to talk, that is why.

With that, I'd just like to say my prayers and thoughts go out to the Haitian community. It's times like these that the world really needs to ban together to help out their fellow man. I have done my part in donating, and whether it be time, money, or just passing along the message, I encourage you all to do the same.

"What we have done for ourselves alone dies with us; what we have done for others and the world remains and is immortal." ~Albert Pike

Welcome Back!! (January 4-8)

Well, we made it through out first week back from the biggest break of the school year. I don't know if it was the same for the students, but that 6 o'clock alarm clock was hard to get used to. It was a very refreshing week though. I'm certainly glad to be back into it. We certainly got a lot accomploished. From multiplying with fractions to learning the basics of sound.

The biggest weight lifted off my shoulders will also be our picture of the week. It was certainly a lesson I got to be taught by my first class. I had decided, considering the Solar System becomes big in our science studies third and fourth terms, and we're learning area and diameter of circles in math, I wanted to combine the two and make mobiles that contained the planets in order with their radius, diameter, circumference and area of their circle. I slated 2 hours for this project before the holiday break thinking we could more than finish it in that time. After another hour before the break and three more hours this week, we've finally completed them. A total of six hours on project I originally hoped to finish in two and they turned out fantastic and are currently hanging above our desks in the room! Here is an example of one of or students' work:
There's one other picture I'd like to include this week just because it shows the class in action. One of the ways I informally assess the students is through whiteboard participation. Every kid has a whiteboard that they do the work and write their answer on, and then all hold it up. This shows me that each student is participating. It also shows me how well all the students are understanding the content. Here is our class in action:
As for the coming week, the students have quite a bit of studying to look forward to. At the end of the week, we will be taking our term two assessment in Math. We will also be finishing up our unit on sound and then reviewing the term: heat, light, and sound, which we will test on the following week. Language arts this week will be normal. Our story this week is called "Fall Secrets". Keep in mind though, that our term 2 assessment for language will be the following week as well.

With all these tests coming up, I guess I'll send out the reminder as well that term two will be ending on January 21. Current progress reports were sent home to be signed on Monday, so if you didn't see it, talk to your student. :) Book orders were also sent home this week. They will be due back by January 15 if you wish to order anything. My final reminder is that book reports are this week. Your student should have their assigned date. There will be five presented a day.

And with that, I will bid my adieu for this week. I hope you all have a fantastic weekend!!!

"We will open the book. Its pages are blank. We are going to put words on them ourselves. The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year's Day.” -Edith Lovejoy Pierce