Classroom Summary for October 16 - 20

Speckle and Freckle

Here's what we did this week...

In math this week we completed our unit on arrays, evens and odds and began our third unit which focuses on adding numbers up to 100. We will be learning different strategies to solve double-digit addition problems. The first strategy we learned was to use a hundred chart to add double-digit addends. We reviewed the skills we learned about rows and columns in arrays and applied them to the giant 100-box array that makes up a one-hundred chart!

We learned that in order to add tens we needed to hop DOWN rows of boxes and in order to add ones we had to hop ACROSS single boxes.

Our next strategy was to use an open number line. We began by reviewing concept that addends can be added any in any order. We discussed how to choose which addend to start with on the number line (use the larger number so that you don't have to make so many hops with the second addend) and then we followed some basic place value rules to make sure we made the correct hops: we drew T-charts over our second addends so that it was much easier to see how many rows we needed to go DOWN and how many boxes we needed to count ACROSS.

T-chart

Lastly, we made sure to label our hops and we put a box around our final answer. We will continue to work on new strategies over the next two weeks.

In Miss Varrell's Fundations class we are reviewing short vowel sounds; digraphs: wh, th, ch, sh, ck; bonus letters (f, l, s); and glued sounds: -ang, -ank, -ing, -ink, -ong, -onk, -ung, -unk, -all, -am, -an. We are paying attention to where these sounds come in the words we read as well as paying attention to using them as we spell words we write.

In Miss Varrell's reading class we began using a Work Board to remind us which literacy centers we go to during the week. This week, our literacy centers focused on independent daily reading (IDR), reading with Miss Varrell, listening to an online text and reading it back using the recording feature (KidsA-Z) and writing in our response journals.

Work Board

Each group practiced making quiet transitions to and from centers as well as using a different reading style that Miss Varrell calls "tap reading." Tap reading allows students to read silently at their own pace in a guided reading group, but as they are "tapped" (with the magic reading wand!) they magically begin to read aloud for the teacher to hear. When they are tapped a second time, they magically return to silent reading! Children continue rereading the passage from the beginning if they finish before the guided reading session ends. Rereading text builds fluency and sight word recognition.

Miss V's magic reading wand!

In Writing Workshop, we began learning how to write a personal narrative. A personal narrative is a type of writing that has a beginning, middle and end and tells about a moment in time in a person's life. We read the book Big Mama's by Donald Crews which told of a time when Donald Crews and his brothers and sisters visited his Grandmother out in the country. We looked at the different parts of text  and identified them as the beginning, middle and end of the story. We also discussed and retold some of the details that he included in his narrative--to highlight how he made the book more interesting for his audience to read. Once we had read and discussed the model text, we began writing our own personal narratives. We will continue to craft them over the next few weeks!

In Science, we completed the first part of our Matter and Materials unit on solids and began to learn about another state of matter: liquids. We worked with different liquids provided by Mr. Musselman at the Burlington Science Center. We discussed their properties (using sight and sound only) and compared and contrasted them with each other. We felt like real scientists! We completed several different charts and tables--highlighting the similarities and differences of each liquid--using our observations. By the end of the week we were ready to conduct an experiment based on a hypothesis we made! After a lot of discussion, we hypothesized (made an educated guess) that temperature would change our liquids. Miss Varrell asked us what kind of experiment we could conduct to test our idea. The class decided that perhaps we could freeze our liquids and see what happened. So...we froze the liquids overnight and then observed what happened!

We will finish our unit on Matter and Materials this week.

Parent F.Y.I.

• Ms. Fallon asks that children have a smock in school for next Monday's art class. Thank you!
• Thank you to Mrs. Grant and Mrs. Hurley for volunteering to be our Room Parents for the 2017-2018 year! Be on the lookout for an email from our Room Parents about our upcoming Halloween celebration. It's short and sweet! Literally!
• Thank you, also, to all the families who made a book purchase through Scholastic Book Clubs this month. Because of your October orders, our class was able to buy $25-worth of free books for our classroom AND we earned over 4,000 points toward future book purchases this year! Our next book order will be placed November 3. New book order flyers will go home in a couple of weeks. For more book ordering information including the Scholastic online classroom code, please see elsewhere on this blog.
• Our next Reading Corps slip (evidence of reading at home) is due Thursday, November 2. Please be sure that your child is reading 20 minutes daily and recording it on a reading corps slip. 
• More and more children are using the xtramath.org website for their math fact practice at home. Keep up the good work! Remember, it's only 5 minutes a day! Congratulations to Tash K. in achieving her 100% addition and 100% subtraction certificates!
• Just a quick reminder that the Halloween Dance (sponsored by the PG PTO) is scheduled for this Friday, October 26 at 6 - 8pm. Children are not be left unchaperoned at the dance. Thank you, PTO!