Week of January 6th

My first Post of the New Year. Happy New Year everyone! I have everyone had a wonderful break.

In Social Studies we have been learning about maps and sharing our Flat Stanley's as they return to school.  The Flat Stanley's have been all over the country so far.  Some of them visited with relatives in places such as Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Florida, New York City, Massachusetts and California.  They have come back with a wealth of information about these places that students have been able to share with the team.  They are really enjoying learning about other states.

In math we have finished up working with the open number line for now.  Today we are starting a week of lessons learning about two types of penguins, the rockhopper and the emperor.  We will be measuring ourselves, measuring out string to represent how tall these two penguins are and comparing our heights to them.  We will also be talking about Antarctica and what it would be like to visit there.  At the end of next week we will begin a unit 5 which is on Geometry.  In Unit 6 we will revisit penguins again. 

In both Reader's Workshop and Writer's workshop our focus is on non-fiction.  In Reader's Workshop we have been talking about how non-fiction books and resources teach us about things.  We have also begun looking at the different features of non-fiction.  In writing students are becoming teachers and writing books that teach their reader about a topic.  Some of the topics students are writing about are sharks, how to read, different animals, skiing, and how to build puzzles.  This is always a fun unit for students. 

Have a wonderful weekend,
Nancy