Rocking into 2015

I apologize for not posting in a couple of weeks.  My computer died over the holiday break and was out for repairs for over a week.  I managed to update the Edline site with homework, but typing weekly reviews on the iPad is slightly beyond my skill set.  I'm an old fashioned keyboard kind of girl, I guess.

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday and a happy new year.  I sent home our Anthology of Poetry right before break, and I know you must have enjoyed your children's truly amazing writing.  They thoroughly enjoyed our poetry unit and were sad to see it come to a close.  However, they are excited about our new unit in Writer's Workshop, which focuses on persuasive/opinion writing.  We have a lot of strong ideas and opinions in Room 29!

The last two weeks we have been working very hard on learning about persuasive writing techniques and on how to craft persuasive letters and speeches.  Students have learned how to form a thesis, how to write to a specific audience, how to create topic sentences for paragraphs with supporting details, and how to conclude their writing in ways that will stay with their readers.

We also have read a lot of wonderful persuasive books, most of which are listed in the bookshelf in the right hand sidebar.  The books have served as mentor texts to demonstrate to the children how writers use various techniques like scare tactics, promises, repetition, exaggeration, and tugging at emotions to sway their readers.

Students are currently working on their own persuasive letters using notes they have taken during our lessons.  They are working on becoming more independent writers, too, though I do conference with them often to check their work in progress.

To tie in to our persuasive unit, we also learned about Martin Luther King Jr., whose birthday we celebrated this week.  Students used Chrome books to do independent research.  They will use their notes to craft a persuasive letter about Dr. King later next week.

In math, we are half way done with Module 3.  We took the mid-module assessment mid-week, and everyone did well.  It was our best test yet overall!  Students really seem to be grasping these more complex concept in multiplication and division (associative, commutative, and distributive properties).

This week we also will wrap up our second cycle in science.  Next week, students will move on to learn about pollution and the environment with Ms. Bengston.

Finally, I cannot thank you enough for all the wonderful Christmas gifts.  I have thank you cards ready for all the kids at my house, but have been horribly remiss about bringing them in.  I would throw my 10 year old, who refuses to get out of bed in the morning, under the bus, but...

NOTES

The temperatures have been bitterly cold, so we have not gone outside.  However, as things warm up next week and any day temps are in the 30's, we do go outside for recess.  Please make sure your children are appropriate dressed with outerwear for recess.  Thanks so much!