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During our math block, we've been focusing heavily on multiplication and division and how the operations are related. We've also been working on solving multistep math word problems using addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. Fact practice will continue to be important. Any practice your child can do at home with multiplication and division facts would be extremely beneficial. Our next unit will be fractions. We've been doing lots of reading as always, and we've spent a lot of time working on comparing and contrasting texts. We've worked with all types of texts, including menu descriptions! In the photo above, partners are carefully reading descriptions of two different chicken meals. Then, they discussed how the meals were alike and different. Students also read a biography of Rosa Parks and The Sneetches by Dr. Suess. These books seem vastly different at first glance, but there are surprising similarities! Currently in reading, we're focusing on author's purpose and nonfiction text features. We've read a fictional story called Turtle Bay. We'll be immersing ourselves in nonfiction texts about turtles over the next few weeks. We've wrapped up our unit on narrative writing. We've just started an informational writing unit. Students will be writing their own question and answer books on research topics they'll choose. Our class is participating in a valentine exchange with 22 other classes around the country. We've already received valentines from California and Maine! We created valentines with the Connecticut state symbols and composed a letter about our state, town, and school. Soon, classrooms around the country will be getting our messages in the mail.
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So far in math this year, we've covered place value, rounding, addition and subtraction with regrouping, estimating, and time. Right now, we're working on multiplication. Last week, students traveled around to stations in the classroom and wrote multiplication stories for different sets of objects. For example: There were 4 packages of bows. Each package contained 9 bows. What was the total number of bows? During our reading block, we spent quite a bit of time learning about point of view and perspective. We started out by reading fairy tales and fractured fairy tales. Then, we moved on to read about more serious topics. We read a biography about Christopher Columbus. We also read excerpts from Christopher Columbus's own journal. Then we read a fictional story which helped us imagine what the Taino tribe who first met Columbus might have felt and thought when he arrived. Currently, we're reading one of my favorite books of all time! It's called The Stories Julian Tells. We'll be using this book and others as we learn about theme (the author's central message). In writing, we've been working on narrative techniques. We've learned about entertaining beginnings. Now we are practicing writing vivid descriptions using our five senses, specific details, and rich vocabulary. These posters were a prewriting activity to help students think of ways to SHOW feelings instead of just stating them. During social studies, we've started to learn about Native Americans of the Northeastern Woodlands and about the Pequot tribe.
Thanks for stopping by! In math, we've finished up our place value and rounding units. We'll be moving on to addition and subtraction with regrouping. We'll continue to practice our rounding skills as we estimate sums and differences. We started the school year by focusing on reading comprehension strategies. We read a balance of fiction and nonfiction texts. Recently, we switched over to mysteries! First, partners read and discussed Nate the Great San Francisco Detective. Now, we've moved on to small mystery book groups. The students keep their books and their case file notebooks in their "TOP SECRET" envelopes. We've also started to work with words having common prefixes. This is valuable for reading multisyllabic words, and it builds vocabulary. The students have been doing LOTS of writing and are really building up their writing stamina. They can write for longer stretches without stopping and are already growing in their ability to add specific details and vivid verbs to their pieces. We recently learned about and practiced writing compound sentences. We've also just started a unit on opinion writing.
Thank you for taking the time to visit the classroom blog! School starts this Wednesday, August 31st! I'm so excited about meeting my new students and getting the school year off to a wonderful start.
I thought I'd share a few photos of the classroom. You'll get a closeup look soon! I'll see you Wednesday! To those families who have just left me, THANK YOU for a wonderful year. I've enjoyed getting to know your children. They've grown and learned so much over the past year.
To next year's families, WELCOME to the classroom blog. Later in the summer, I'll be posting some sneak peeks of the classroom. I'll send you a letter in August with important information. To ALL FAMILIES: Please remember to read and to send back the reading journals! If 80% of the students at LES return their reading journals, Keith (our custodian) and Mr. Gonzalez will have an Olympic-style contest for the students to enjoy! That's something I'm sure we ALL want to see! Have a wonderful summer! Colonial Day was a lot of fun! The students had the opportunity to listen to colonial music, write with real quill pens, make butter while singing a working song, experience colonial crafts, and play colonial games. The students have been working VERY hard during this week of testing. Our schedule has been a bit crazy, but the children have been flexible and positive.
In addition to Smarter Balanced Testing, the students have also been working hard to prepare for their Rainbow Fish performance! The daytime show for the school is at 1:30. The evening performance will be exciting for all, and I look forward to seeing you there! Important Dates Tuesday, May 17th -- Last day of Smarter Balanced testing (not including make-ups) Wednesday, May 18th -- Mayfest (art show at the high school) Thursday, May 19th -- Rainbow Fish performance Friday, May 20th -- STEM Day Monday, May 23 through Thursday, May 26 -- NWEA Testing Wednesday, May 25th from 2-3 p.m. -- VIP Day Friday, May 27th -- Old Sturbridge Village Field Trip Monday, May 30th -- Memorial Day, No school Wednesday, June 1st -- Field Day (Rain date, June 7th) Thursday and Friday, June 9th and 10th -- Early dismissals June 10th -- Last day of school Thanks for stopping by! We've been busy! In math, we've wrapped up our fraction unit and have started geometry. The students have been learning vocabulary and classifying triangles by the size of their angles and the length of their sides. Next, we'll be working on classifying quadrilaterals, perimeter, and area. During writing, we watched brief video clips of dogs at doggy daycare. We read an online news article about DogTV and got to see a brief sample of the programming! You can check out the article and some brief video clips at Dogo News. The article is called Cable TV Goes to the Dogs. No, really! The students also had the chance to read more about doggy daycares and invisible, electric fencing. They talked with peers about the pros and cons of each approach to dog care. Shortly, they'll be finishing up their opinion pieces about how best to meet a dog's needs when it can't be with its owner. We just finished the book Stone Fox by John Reynolds Gardiner. We used Literature Circles as we enjoyed the book. Literature Circles groups are like book clubs for kids. Each member has a job, and the jobs rotate when a new chapter is assigned. Students are required to read the assigned material, prepare by doing their job, and then come to the Literature Circles meeting ready to share. After vacation, we'll be doing a unit on illustrations. Then, we'll start to study fables. I intend to use Literature Circles again as part of our fables unit. During our social studies block, we've been learning about the Legend of the Charter Oak. To show what they learned, students chose projects. They could work collaboratively to write and present a skit, they could create a comic strip with pictures and text to retell the legend, or they could complete a poster that told the story with illustrations and text. All of the students worked so hard to demonstrate what they had learned. May 2-6 Smarter Balanced Testing
May 13 Colonial Day May 20 STEM DAY May 23- 26 NWEA Testing May 27 - Old Sturbridge Village Trip June 1 - Field Day This is not a complete list of all school events, so don't forget to check Friday folders for news! Thanks for visiting. We've started our fraction unit during math. We'll also be continuing to practice our multiplication and division facts in class. Fluency with math facts is extremely important, so any practice opportunities you can provide at home would be valuable. We've started a dog-themed unit during reading. We've continued to focus on main idea. We started with the book Rosie: A Visiting Dog's Story by Stephanie Calmenson. Next, we'll read about different types of working dogs. We'll be using the text to ask and answer questions, make inferences, and practice our close reading skills. We've also been working on our reading fluency using repeated readings of words with common prefixes and phonetic "chunks". During writing, we've started working on a new genre. The students have already finished their first opinion pieces. The opinions they could choose to support were:
The students have finished up their severe weather reports in science, and we've started a social studies unit about Colonial Connecticut. The students enjoyed examining a modern day map of Connecticut and a colonial map of Connecticut. We'll be focusing on this topic for the next few weeks.
During our science block the children have been researching severe weather in small groups. Their choices for topics were tornadoes, hurricanes, floods, thunder and lightning storms, and blizzards. The children are just about finished with their informational posters and will be presenting them to their classmates. I recently found a great website created for kids by meteorologist Crystal Wicker. There's a lot of information if you want to explore further with your child at home. The link is http://www.weatherwizkids.com. The children recently finished up NWEA testing. They were excited to use the laptops. I was proud of their effort. Several of the kids excitedly expressed that they had learned a lot since August. We are working on division during math. We'll be spending a lot of time practicing with hands on materials and illustrations. We'll also be exploring the connection between multiplication and division.
During our reading block we've been reading about turtles. We started with the story Turtle Bay by Saviour Pirotta and learned about author's purpose. Next, we started reading nonfiction text about sea turtles. Over the next couple of weeks, we'll be exploring features of nonfiction text, learning more about author's purpose, and continuing to read about turtles and tortoises. Before vacation the children finished up their magic carpet stories and had a chance to complete a quick craft. Currently, the class is working on narratives about Ancient Egypt. The class read a two-page nonfiction article. The children are expected to add specific details from the article (nonfiction source material) to their stories. The students spent time this week learning about multiplying one-digit numbers by multiples of ten. Some examples are 40 x 5, 60 x 7, and 3 x 80. The children practiced with hands-on materials then solved problems which were posted around the classroom. We'll continue to review this concept. Next week, we'll be focusing on more multiplication concepts and will be starting timed multiplication quizzes. Please practice as frequently as possible at home. Quick recall of multiplication facts is a foundation all students need as they move forward in math.
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AuthorWelcome! My name is Mrs. Gervais. I'm so thankful that I get to be your child's teacher. Archives
August 2023
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