We started the seventh week of school today. At this time in the quarter, we are totally in the thick of things we are learning. In Reading, we had our first vocabulary quiz today. Your child will create a study guide each Monday so he or she can study for the quiz the following Monday. A few minutes each night ought to do it. They have 10 new words to learn for the week. In Writing, the students turned in their first personal narratives. They were really good, a few made me laugh and a few made me a little teary. Very sweet stories from their lives. We are working on elements of narratives, such as sensory details, description, dialogue, and solid beginnings and endings. Of course, spelling and sentence structure matter too, but they really take a back seat to the focus, organization and elaboration of the narrative. We will continue with narrative writing this week, but we are taking time to share in author’s chair, which gives us a chance to really compliment our peers and learn from their work.
In projects, we are planning our weather reports. The students tracked the weather, now they will prepare a weather report from one of the cities they tracked. They will need to make a chart and a graph to share with the class to explain the weather and trends for their climate zone. They will also write a commercial for the design they made last week to reduce the impact of severe weather that might hit their city. It has been fun to see the depth of their thinking as they work on this project.
In other news, we are using Thera-bands on our chairs to keep wiggle feet moving and bodies still to work. Personally, I think they are great. The kids are doing well with this new feature in their seating.
Thanks to all of you for responding to your child in their parent journals, for purchasing supplies for their projects, for studying with your child, and most of all, for sending them here to our classroom happy and ready to learn each day. This is a wonderful place to be, and each child (and family) contributes to that!
