Friday Newsletter 10/23/15

Here's a look at what we did this week:

Math – Unit 2 is officially all wrapped up! Now we are moving on to Unit 3, where we are learning how to use place value to add and subtract. So far, students are breezing through the beginning of our new unit.

Writing – Students are moving all in their personal narratives and many students are starting the publishing stage! We have learned all about the writing process: prewriting, writing, revising, editing and publishing. It is exciting to see students acting like real writers!

*Next week we will also be doing writing about “A Family Hero” for the 11^th Ward Democratic Party essay contest – please brainstorm possible people for your child to write about

Reading – The skill we have been focusing on in reading this week is comparing and contrasting. We read a story about a little girl who builds a sand mountain and compared and contrasted the sand mountain to the real mountain in the story. Students are doing a good job of using this new skill to dig deeper into the comprehension of a story.

Social Studies – Our new unit in social studies is all about how communities change over time. We have learned about the very first communities and students grouped up to present on the Native American city of Cahokia, Powhatan’s Village, the very first settlers from England, and the start of Jamestown. This unit has a lot of information in it and I am excited to dive in!

Science – We continued science this week with learning more about the planets in our solar system and students learned a fun way to remember the order of the planets: My Very Exhausted Mother Just Served Us Nachos – Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune

Religion – Along with learning about women from the Old Testament, we had a special guest come in this week that talked to us all about missions and showed us different nativity scenes from around the world.

A note on trivia night:

Trivia night is coming up on November 14^th. Our classroom basket theme this year will be New Year’s Eve/Day. If you are able, we are asking for $5 or more donations so we can fill our basket with fun treats to celebrate the New Year! Remember, all proceeds from trivia night go back to help the classroom.

Field Trip Information: We are planning another field trip with the fourth grade to the Alder Planetarium on Tuesday, November 3rd. I am very excited about this field trip as it will go along great with our astronomy unit in science! Field trip forms will either be sent home today or on Monday. They are due on Friday, October 30th. We will only need 4 chaperones for this field trip and I will choose at a first come, first serve basis when forms are turned in.

Reminders:

- Parent teacher conference forms are due by October 30^th

- Halloween candy may be brought in next week Friday, but it must be PEANUT FREE and there must be enough for all 24 of our students

- Halloween lunch forms were due today, if your child did not order a lunch, you must send them to school with a packed lunch on the 30^th as their will be no hot lunches served this day

Have a great weekend! Let me know if you have any questions, comments, concerns!

-          Miss Rizzo