Saturday, January 26, 2019
Friday, January 25, 2019
Week 21
Dear Parents,
This week has flown by as we had the wonderful long weekend with our families. The children came back ready to learn. In math we continued on with three digit addition. This is a very difficult skill to master and they are acing it. We have learned to be extra careful with our adding and regrouping so that we do not make many mistakes. We will continue this skill one more week and then start subtracting three digit numbers with regrouping. On Friday, the 100thday of school we did many fun math activities with the number 100 including counting coins, coming up with sums that equal 100, flipping a coin 100 times then graphing our results and so much more!
In writing we finished up our friendly letters and delivered them to the people who we were writing to. We decided to thank someone for a gift we received over winter break or for an experience someone took us to. We then learned how to write a persuasive letter telling our point of view about a chosen topic. The students had to support their view with three good reasons and write using the friendly letter form. The rough draft will be used as the middle of year writing sample, but we have begun to revise and edit our letters. On Friday we wrote about what we think we will be doing when we are 100 years old!
In reading we finished our unit on Media Literacy and took our assessment. In guided reading we read our Scholastic News and completed it independently. I have also been having guided writing groups during this time to support the students who need help understanding how to persuade someone by giving good reasons why we believe what we do.. We are conducting Middle of year DRAs to find the exact reading levels of the students who scored tier 2 or tier 3 on their January istation. This will continue next week and then the guided reading books will be coming home again 2-3 times a week.
In Science we have continued our unit on natural and manmade resources. Our vocabulary words are: natural resource, manmade resource, reduce, reuse, recycle, conserve, air, wood, metal, paper, plastic, renewable, and nonrenewable. We have been identifying these resources in and around our school.
I was so proud of my 4 students who volunteered to present at our CRE Cultural Day! They Did a fantastic Job! Unfortunately one of the students was not able to present because she had a fever, but she still wanted to bring her display to school. Shout out to Analise, Veer, Brooklyn, and Nida for being student leaders! Pictures will be on our classroom blog.
Our new leader of the week is Alyshan!
*The CRE Dino-Mite Book Fair will be February 8 – February 15th. Volunteers are needed! Sign up to volunteer through the CRE Voly page at https://goo.gl/KFNbwi. Contact Mrs. Watts with any questions at wattsbm@lisd.net.
* Thank you to the parents who sent in part of our 100 day snack! The children loved making it and eating it! Extra snack bags will be made with the left overs to be left in the room to give to students who forget their snacks.
Sunday, January 20, 2019
Week 20
Dear Parents,
As we dive into the second half of the year we are doing a few middle of year assessments which mark the progress of your children. These assessments will be shared with you at our spring conferences which will be led by your child if you choose to have one. The dates have yet to be determined, but I will keep you updated. I am so proud of the progress each one of my students has made.
In math we took our MOY CBA for math. This is an assessment that every second grader in LISD. We then moved into three digit addition with and without regrouping. They are doing very well with this hard concept thus far!
In writing we learned to write a friendly letter. These letters will be delivered to their recipients. We also learned how to write a persuasion letter. Each child chose his/her own topic to write in the persuasive letter format. We then used a graphic organizer to map out our ideas and reasons. Next week we will take this letter through the writing process. The rough draft will be scored on our LISD expository writing rubric and count as the MOY writing sample.
In reading we continued looking at the different purposes of media. We also looked at the different techniques used to create media messages. We discussed the acronym URL. We also discussed vocabulary words such as email address, menu, pop-up, and video games. We looked at many examples and discussed them. We discussed how graphics, sound effects, and words are all used to create these types of media.
In science we took our unit assessment Monday, then started our new unit on natural and manmade resources. We looked at the objects in and around our school and grouped them by what type of resource they were. On Friday we watched a Brainpop Jr. video on natural resources and took a quiz.
Our social studies focus was on Martin Luther King Jr. as we read about him in our Scholastic News article. We discussed how we all can make a difference like this national hero did!
Friday, January 11, 2019
Week 19
Dear Parents,
It was so good to see your children after the break! Believe it or not, they were happy to get back to work! This showed up on our January istation scores. The report is going home today in your child’s Coyote Folder along with their report card if you have requested a paper copy on Skyward.
In math this week we reviewed for our unit six assessment on number relationships to 999. We then took our assessment on Wednesday. We are reviewing skills learned thus far this year. We will be taking our district CBA next week.
In language we wrote our New Year’s Resolutions and discussed how these were much like our academic and personal goals. We will begin tracking these new goals next week. We also focused on verb tenses and wrote a paper using the past tense about our winter break.
In reading and social studies we began our three week unit on Media Literacy. We are learning about all the types of media and their purposes. In this world today we get information in so many forms, so it is important that we understand what information can be found and how to access it. We also looked at two versions of the story The Mitten and compared them. Our mitten activities were so much fun! Be sure to ask your child about how many kisses fit into the glove or mitten and if their kiss melted!
In science we continued our unit on bodies of water. We learned more through an investigation with fresh and saltwater samples. We used our observational skills to describe them using their physical properties. We played vocabulary games like draw me and stand up and cheer! We finished the week by working on a Cloze procedure paper using our vocabulary from this unit.
*It’s yearbook time! The 2018-2019 edition of our CRE Yearbook is on sale now for $26. The hardbound yearbooks feature student artwork on the cover and are filled with pictures of the friends and events that made this year memorable! Order online at balfour.com by January 25th to guarantee a copy. Yearbooks will delivered to the school in May, after which students will have a yearbook signing party in enrichment class for their grade level. The homeroom with the most yearbook orders by January 25th will win a slime party in art!
*Thank you to all the families who have been participating in our monthly 7 Habits Newsletters!
In your child’s Friday Folder, is the January Newsletter with information on our December Goals and activities for our January habit of the month. Attached to the newsletter is an activity that corresponds with the monthly habit of January, Habit 3: Put First Things First. Please assist your child in completing the activity and sign/return the half sheet to their homeroom teacher by WEDNESDAY January 16th.
January 16th is also Put First Things First Day! We want to see the entire school wear blue for Habit 3 on Wednesday!
We will be tracking grade level participation for returning the habit activity. The grade level with the highest percentage of participation for January will receive a grade level chosen prize!
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