December was a busy month. The students worked so hard despite several interruptions due to Covid.
MATH
We've just about finished our unit on area. The students first learned that the area of a shape is the amount of space it covers, and it can be measured by the number of square units that cover it without gaps or overlaps. Students explored this idea by tiling shapes.
Next, the children related the area of rectangles to multiplication. They noticed that rectangles can be tiled with squares in equal-size rows (or columns), so if the rectangle is 6 units by 4 units, there are 6 groups of 4 or 4 groups of 6. The number of square units is then 6×4 or 4×6.
Finally, students learned to use the area formula for rectangles: Area = Length x Width. They used this formula to find the area of rectangles and also irregular shapes that could be split up into rectangles. Below I've shared an example to give you an idea of what we've been working on.
Our next unit in math will be on addition and subtraction with 3-digit numbers. We'll also learn about rounding and estimating.
We have continued to work on building our reading stamina daily. We've wrapped up our unit on characters and have been focusing on CENTRAL MESSAGE. Central message is the author's message to the reader. It's a life lesson that goes beyond just the details in the story. Sometimes, in fables, the central message is referred to as the moral of the story. So far, we've read and discussed the central message in holiday stories and realistic fiction. Next, we'll read several fables and folktales. At home, you can support this comprehension concept by discussing the life lessons in books, tv shows, and even songs.
The children finished up their small moment stories. They were very enthusiastic about crafting their narratives. They learned and applied a variety of techniques to make their stories engaging. In addition, they used excellent effort when revising and editing as well. The students were expected to include the following in their stories:
- An entertaining beginning
- A detailed description of a setting, character, or object
- A s-t-r-e-t-c-h-e-d out main event that incorporated characters' thoughts, feelings, dialogue, and detailed play-by-play action
- An ending that wraps up the story in a satisfying way
CONTENT AREA
We finished up our weather unit and have recently started to learn about Native Americans of the Eastern Woodlands. During our unit we'll be exploring the following questions:
- What are the histories of the towns, landmarks, and geographical features that are names after indigenous peoples in Connecticut?
- How have indigenous peoples affected the history and culture of Connecticut?
- How are indigenous peoples in Connecticut similar to indigenous peoples in surrounding regions? How are they similar?
We will be doing our second round of NWEA testing next week. I'll share results once we've completed the assessments.
Thank you for stopping by! I appreciate you.