April 7

Pretty much a lot of the same information as last week, but note there are a few date changes so plan accordingly for those as you read on…

 

R  Continue to practice and refine book talks this week and the first part of next week.  Students will be presenting in class April 9, 10, or 11 (see your child’s informational letter.)  The kids should have books home now, or have them traveling back and forth if you prefer.  They will need to create their visual aids and to practice the public speaking portion with you at home.  An example has been given in class, so you should be ready to roll if you haven’t yet started. J

R  We will have the opportunity to have an outreach program come in to Pine Creek from the Omaha Children’s Museum.  This is scheduled for April 11.  They will be doing a unit in conjunction with our next Science chapter on the planets and the solar system. 

R  Spirit Day Friday- wear badger blue!

R  We’re working on paragraph writing for an assessment piece for the kids’ portfolios.  This is a difficult topic area for the kids each year.  When you write with the kids at home, encourage proper use of topic sentences (main ideas), focus on sentence fluency so that all of the sentences don’t start in the same manner, and practice indention and writing to the edge of the paper for the remaining lines. 

R  Reminder to mark your calendars for two “no school” days on April 18 and 21. 

R  Please note a change in past planning: My new HOPE (as in I still cannot guarantee this is yet set in stone) is that our books will be back from the publisher for our class to host its publishing party the afternoon of April 23.  (This is a change from my previous hope to do it on Thursday, April 24.)   I will get you more details to follow when we find out more about the time frame from the publisher, but for right now, pencil April 23 in to your calendars.  It will be the last “parents at school” performance day for you this year with the exclusion of Awards Day and Fun Day, of course.  I’m sorry for the change in schedule.  I will now be attending a conference on April 24-25.

R  April 25 we will have our last field trip.  It will be to Lauritzen Gardens in connection with our Earth Day/Arbor Day holidays study.  (Please note: due to the aforementioned conference, the kids will be attending with Mrs. College, substitute extraordinaire, in my place.) Permission notices will be sent in a few weeks.  Parents will be allowed to either carpool from the school or meet us at the gardens.  We will be arriving to the gardens around noon to eat lunch there and go on a self-guided tour/scavenger hunt.  Parents who wish to attend will be able to mark so on the permission notices when they are sent, and will be responsible for their own payment into the gardens, which I believe is $7 per adult. 

R  We’re in our last quarter for AR and the kids are once again working diligently on their three set goals.  I promised them I’d remind you at home that all students earning 25 points for the year (all quarters combined total of points equaling 25) will earn a pizza party in May.  Students achieving 50 points will attend the pizza party in the pajamas with a stuffed animal friend.  We’re pretty close to having our whole class with 50 points.  Keep reading!

R  While on the subject of rewards, please remember to continue practice with basic facts.  Students who have beat the 5 minute time test goal will earn an additional award at the awards assembly. 

R  April book orders are due April 10.  Please use code H7QMC on the scholastic site to order online.  Start planning ahead for some summer titles your child might enjoy and stock up!

R  It’s game day tomorrow: the kids will be allowed to bring a board or card game for a DWP party.  (No electronic devices, please.)

R  Curricular notifications:

o   We continue to study the solar system in Science.  We practice orbiting around the sun at different speeds based on how close or far from the sun they were.  We’ll study the differences between day and night, and the process of making shadows.

o   In Math we’re moving on to a unit on Fractions.  This can be another great study topic for IXL if the review categories mentioned on the weekly calendar have already been mastered.  It’s a fun unit for the kids and will move pretty quickly.  We’ll test next week already, so a practice test will be online early next week.

o   In Social Studies we’re still moving through our unit on Government and the process of voting and making laws.  We’re busy making national symbols.

o   We continue to work on the proper ways to build paragraphs:  topic sentences, 3-5 solid details, and a conclusion sentence.  For practice at home, have your child take a question you ask (such as “What’s your favorite animal?”) and turn it into a topic sentence that uses the main idea of the question (such as “My favorite animal is a ___ “ or “The ____ is an amazing animal and is my favorite of all the animals.”)  You can also take questions and have the kids practice setting up the paragraph and work with them to add in details that strengthen the content of the paragraph for added emphasis.  It’s a difficult assessment, to be very honest.  This year we’ll try to master getting one paragraph nailed so that next year, the kids will be ready to build into a 5 paragraph report.  This assessment will be later this week.

o   LA- The study of problem/solution in stories will be big the next few weeks.  We’re learning about graphic aides as an important part of nonfiction text, and are practicing past tense verbs.

Finish strong!

Have a great day!  Cheers!