Week 12

Dear Parents,

        It was good to get back to the daily routine! Swim week was fun, but the children are happily back to taking charge of their learning. In math we learned to subtract two digit numbers with and without regrouping. We used base ten blocks, number lines and numbers written up and down in our place value boxes. We also learned how to add to check our answer to the subtraction problem.

       In Social Studies we continued to learn about our state and local governments. During reading we read a Spooky Skeleton Scholastic News , answered comprehension questions and had the choice of making a skeleton using Q-Tips. We finished on Halloween by listening to the story I Need a Monster. We did a directed drawing of a monster and were able to write an imaginative story about our monster. 

       In language we have been learning lessons on how to make our imaginative stories fun and interesting by adding show don’t tell emotions, adding gestures to show character traits, and adding interesting details. We can’t wait to publish and share them next week.

         In Science we began our unit on Energy: Light, Heat, and Sound. We did three investigations, one for each type of energy.

We added heat to butter, then took the heat away. We learned we could change the state of matter from a solid to a liquid, then back to a solid. We went in a closet without windows. We learned that when we make lights dimmer, it is difficult to see color. The color of our paper square became brighter when the light became brighter. Last we saw the vibration made by sound! How did we see the vibrations? Ask your child what we did with a mirror, a pen light a can, and a yardstick.