Week of Sept. 7-11

Dear families,

I hope you had a happy and safe Labor Day weekend! Thank you to all those who have generously supported our classroom with donations, plants and time! We are all settling in and rolling along.

This past week, we began art, music, and P.E. In addition, on Friday at 2:15 we met with Ms. Bombaci's first graders who are our reading buddies this year! The kids were really sweet with the first graders. It was a wonderful thing to see. Happiness is a reading buddy.

Back to School Night is Next Wednesday September 16. At 6:30 Ms. M will meet new families in the PAC room and then teachers will give classroom presentations for everyone at 7:00 and again at 7:30. I look forward to greeting everyone and talking about the curriculum and our fabulous year.

This past week we worked on our organizational binders. The blue binder is the math binder which includes the planner, a purple homework pocket for each day's due assignments, and a reading log for parent signatures every night. This binder has three sections: notes; homework and classwork; and tests. This is the only binder that will travel back and forth every day between the classroom and home. Although I will try to post assignments here every afternoon, your child's planner is the best place to see what is assigned and when it is due. We fill in our planners every morning and Shauna, our wonderful aide, will be checking to see that homework, planners, and signatures are complete. This is a system to help your child manage course work and a schedule. We will practice together until everyone has it down. In addition to this binder, there is a red ELA and Social Sciences binder as well as a black science binder. These stay at school. If you have any questions regarding the binders, the planner or the reading log, please let me know. 

Math: we have been reviewing whole numbers and place value up to the millions. We will continue to review math facts and begin to go forward this week with estimation, approximation and rounding. We will, as a general rule, have a test every Friday to assess the week's concepts. In addition, we are working on a POM (problem of the month) and continue to do math story problems each period to reinforce concepts.

Social Sciences: We will continue our study of maps and longitude and latitude as well as landforms and bodies of water. This will build background knowledge for our upcoming writing project Explorers: A Personal Narrative.

Science: we are completing our STEM project on domes and will move into our Foss curriculum on electricity and magnets in the next week.

Read Aloud: Kit Carson. We are mapping his journey through the Sierra Nevada Mountains from California to Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Field Trip: O'Neill Sea Odyssey. October 20 from 8:30-12:00. Drivers needed. Please be sure that you have filled out the necessary paper work with the office. You will find our field trip drivers sign up page on our blog if you are interested in driving and joining us.

Warmly,

Mrs. Young and Shauna