Such a Character!

In Reader's Workshop, we moving along in our study of character traits. This week we continued to focus on character change and character traits.  Our emphasis is on finding specific text based evidence to show what a character says or does that demonstrates his/her character traits.  To that end, every student chose a favorite character from one of the shared readings we did in class or from one of their independent reading books. First, the filled out a graphic organizer to help them structure their thoughts and list character traits and evidence from the text to support those treats.  Then, students designed rough drafts of a final poster highlighting their work.  They are having a blast designing the most creative and unique posters. I told them that all I required was that they write three character traits and support those traits with evidence from the text. The rest I am leaving up to the kids' imaginations, and boy, they are not disappointing.  Once the projects are done, I will post pictures here.  You're going to love them!  Here's some of the children's work in progress; you can see how truly unique each and every one of them is turning out to be:

Everyone is also hard at work learning what real writers do in Writer's Workshop. This week we learned how to write dynamic leads and to write fast and furious to get all our great stories down on paper.  We rehearsed and rehearsed our stories orally with our writing partners trying on new leads, adding details, and exploring new endings that would really grab the attention of our listeners and readers.  At this point, nearly everyone has added lots of wonderful details, edited, revised, and rehearsed their stories, and are ready to publish them! What an exciting day! I am amazed at how far your children have come and how they have grown as writers in such a short period of time.

As our science unit on rocks and minerals continues, we focused on igneous rocks, doing several experiments comparing extrusive and intrusive igneous rocks like scoria, granite, obsidian, and pumice. 

In math we took the mid-module quiz as the halfway mark in Unit One.  I am keeping all tests in student's cumulative files.  I will share grades with you during conferences.  If, however, you would like to know your child's grade now, please let me know.  If I feel your child is struggling with the concepts in this unit, I will alert you and will ensure that Mrs. Pope, who is with us two days a week for math, works with your child in small group.  Students began learning the associative and distributive properties using arrays, pictures, tape diagrams, and number bonds to help them. 

We are just about finished reading The Witches as our shared read aloud. Next we will be moving on to my all time favorite book by my all time favorite author in the world, Kate DiCamillo, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane. Again, I would ask that while we read this book aloud, you not read it to your child or let your child take it out from the library. We will be doing a lot of predicting in this story, and I'd like to keep the ending, in particular, a surprise for our students.

Best of all, the children were rewarded after filling up their classroom bucket!  They got to spend time on the Chrome books playing games, going on Razz Kids, and having fun!

On Friday, the kids all got together and sang Happy Birthday to my daughter, Becky, who turned 22.  We we sent it to her in a text. 

Spelling test is postponed until Monday due to the Rosh Hashanah holiday this week.

Enjoy what is supposed to be a gorgeous weekend!

What a Blast!

It was wonderful to meet all of you in our classroom for Open house this week. Hopefully, I was able to give you some insights into our schedule, our curriculum, and the general daily goings on in Room 29.  As I said at Open House, if you ever have any questions about ANYTHING related to our classroom, please feel free to contact me by phone or email.  I will get back to you right away.

We were so busy this week that it seemed to just fly by! Here are some highlights of the goings on in our classroom this week...

I'm fortunate to get to teach the rocks and minerals unit of study in science; this is a big hit with all the kids. I think it you were to ask them their favorite part of school, most of them would say science. And this week, we really had a blast! Literally!

As we began to explore the three types of rocks, we first created a volcano out of vinegar, baking soda, and some red food die and watched it explode as we learned how igneous rocks are formed. We discussed the implications of volcanic activity to the environment, the weather, and to the communities that lie in the path of a volcano's destruction force. Specifically, we talked about the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 A.D., and saw some picture of the uncovered cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum online. We explored some real igneous rocks, too: granite, scoria, pumice, basalt, obsidian.

During Reader's Workshop, we continued to talk about character traits, what motivates character, and how they change throughout stories. We read The Honest to Goodness Truth, Enemy Pie, and The Raft. Students also have been writing about main characters in their independent reading and how those characters change within the text.  I continued to collect and grade Reader's Workshop notebooks, and was impressed with how neat and well organized they were and how well students are doing using text dependent evidence to support their responses.

In Writer's Workshop, students worked with their writing partners to edit and revise their writing and create more elaborative, descriptive pieces.  We also learned what to do if we run out of gas as writers!

We are half way through our first math module and are gearing up for our mid-module assessment on Tuesday. Please have your child use their math notebook to study. The test will cover multiplication and division strategies (arrays, number bonds, count-bys) and the commutative and distributive properties.

Reminders:

We only have about 15 minutes for snack each day. Please make sure your child has a snack he/she can eat in 15 minutes (one item should suffice). Some children are bringing in too many snacks, and I fear food is being wasted.

Week Three Update

We are all so glad to finally see some fall weather and feel not quite so sticky in our classroom. We had a wonderfully, FULL, exciting week this past week full of lots of great learning experiences.

In language arts, students are learning about how to recognize, record supporting evidence, and identify motivating events that change characters in text. Each day we read a new story with a strong character and discussed and wrote about how the character changed in the story and what motivating factor caused them to change. Among the wonderful literature we read were the following titles:  Julius, Baby of the World, Chyrsanthemum, Wemberly Worried, The Library Dragon, and Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

In Writer's Workshop, we continued to work on our personal narratives, adding details and working on editing and revising our stories.  Students learned how to elaborate and edit as they go along.  While working with their writing partners, students are gaining valuable feedback that is helping to strengthen their work as authors!

The kids are having a blast in science learning about rocks and minerals. We went on a field study on the Stepney Walking trail to discover the rocks that are located around our school. Each student got to take a rock from the field and bring it back to school to explore. We also talked about the three different types of rocks: sedimentary, metamorphic, and igneous and how they are formed, and did an experiment to discover which minerals were visible in two types of granite.

In math we have been learning about how to represent multiplication and division through a variety of strategies. Students were introduced to the commutative property and learned how to represent their thinking through arrays, bonds, count-bys (and other terms many moms and dads may not have heard of!). The students love doing our "Sprints" every day where they have to solve number sentences (addition, subtraction, repeated addition, multiplication, and division) as fast as they can. They are enjoying the challenge and thrill of seeing how they can improve their speed and accuracy each time they practice the facts over and over again.

To this end, I would encourage you to make sure your child goes on the web-based program Moby Math at least a few times a week. The information on how to log on was sent home in the Step Up Day packet, two weeks ago, and again this week. This program is invaluable for helping students build up their stamina and math fact fluency. The link for Moby Max can also be found on the "links" section of this blog above.

Ending this weeks blog with a great video that shares my philosophy that we are all students; we are all teachers! Enjoy...

NOTES:

*Please make sure your child is studying his/her spelling words for the post test on Friday! Students should be bringing home their spelling notebooks daily to help them with their homework and to help them study.

Week 2 In Review

Though we had another abbreviated week of school, everyone is fitting in well in Room 29 and adjusting to our classroom routines. Additionally, we got a ton of work done!

We launched our Reader's Workshop language arts model this week with some great mentor texts like The Best Book to Read, A Quiet Place, and Listen, Buddy! designed to highlight what Reader's Workshop is all about and how students can discover which books are just right for them. Students learned that in the workshop they will never be forced to read a book that doesn't interest them; they will be able to choose stories at their "just right" level in which they can really immerse themselves. Not only that, they can find any comfortable quiet place in our room in which to read.

We began our first spelling unit. Everyone did very well on the test on Friday. A word to parents about spelling tests: Each Monday I give the unit pre-test for the week. If a student scores a 100% on the test, he/she will be given a different set of homework and a different test on Friday. I believe it is important to challenge students and to differentiate instruction for them. It's pointless for a student who already knows the spelling rule and how to spell all the words for the week to spend time on homework reinforcing something he/she already knows. The alternate homework will be spelling/vocabulary related. I will begin this policy in a week or so. For now, I want to get a handle on where everyone is with their spelling and their command of various spelling rules, so everyone will take both the pre and post tests and do the same spelling homework. If you have any questions about this policy, please feel free to contact me.

Writer's Workshop is well underway, too. Students are learning strategies for generating writing, learning to build stamina, and are working with partners to provide peer feedback.

Students are also working hard on some self portraits and poems that will great you when you come to visit Room 29 for Open House next week.

This week, we also got to go to library and computers for the first time. We learned about how to take care of library books and about computer safety. We will have library and computers every Thursday.

In math, we are well underway in our first Module on multiplication. Students are learning about equal groupings, repeated addition, and arrays. Each lesson includes timed practice, an application problem, lesson, problem set, in-class worksheets, and an exit ticket that helps me determine if students have understood the concept on a daily basis. Homework directly correlates to our specific lessons. I'm very pleased at the kids' progress; we're already working on division!

The kids are enjoying me reading The Witches by Roald Dahl to them at snack time. Ask them about this fun story!

Moby Max Math Update

I know several of you had trouble signing your kids onto Moby Math the other day.  I contacted Mrs. Brooker, our math coordinator.  She indicated many of the children had not been transferred over from their second grade classes to this one.  The tech department is working on this.  In the meantime, I would suggest that kids stay off Moby Max until further notice, and I certainly will not assign any homework on the site!