Week of November 2nd

I apologize for not posting to this blog the past couple of weeks.  I will try to get back to regular weekly posts.  

This week we are wrapping up our non-fiction writing unit.  We celebrated our hard work and shared our stories on Thursday with our classmates.  Next week we will begin a unit on Opinion pieces.  Check out the pictures from our share.  In December we will invite parents in for our Opinion piece celebration.  Stay tuned for details.

In math we began a new unit this week.  Our New Unit is "Addition & Subtraction Within One Hundered".  This unit focuses on strategies for multi-digit addition and subtraction within the range of 0 to 100.  The first module emphasizes the number line model and encourages students to develop the strategy of using "skip-jumps" based on multiples of 5 and 10.  The second module continues to use the number line as a computational tool through which students add and subtract 2 digit numbers.  the third module focuses on addition and subtraction, but uses the base ten structure (collecting ones and tens).  The fourth module requires students to determine the frequency with which various colored objects appear in a bag and to graph the data.

In readers workshop we continue to work with non-fiction books but our focus is on comparing texts on the same topic.  We have talked about how experts grow knowledge across books by noticing parts that go together and adding to what we already know.

This week we wrapped up our Physical geography unit working on a map journal and talking about the compass rose and the directions; north, south, east and west.  Next week we will begin our first science unit.  We will be looking at various animals and noticing their unique characteristics and how humans have adapted those characteristics to help solve problems that we have.

Have a wonderful weekend,
Nancy

October Hands on Nature

It was great seeing everyone at conferences this week!!

This week we had Hands on Nature.  We learned about erosion and the agents that contribute to it; water, wind, gravity and glaciers.  We had a puppet show that taught us this information.  We did several experiments to see how  like shaking a container to mimic a rolling river see what happens to rocks compared to a still stream. We tested what kinds of water will have the biggest impact breaking soil down.  We did this using a dropper, baby bottle and sprayer and testing it to see what breaks down a pile of flour the most.  We did the same kind of experiment with wind.  Ask your child about what they learned.  I'd like to thank Janet and Amy for coming in to teach the class!!!

Have a wonderful weekend,
Nancy

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Mentors Needed!

EVERYBODY WINS MENTORING PROGRAM NEEDS MENTORS!

The Everybody Wins mentoring program pairs adults with students grades 1st - 5th. As a mentor you will spend one hour a week reading and playing games with a student. You provide the inspiration to help a child develop a love of reading that will last a lifetime, Everybody Wins provides the books and support to all mentors!

At SCS our pairs meet on Wednesday's during a student's lunch/recess time. We currently have more students than mentors and I hope to have all students who want to participate in this program matched up as soon as possible.

Interested in finding out more? Check out the EW website: http://www.everybodywinsvermont.org/index.html

And/or contact the Site Coordinator for the school, Randy Sweeney (shelburne@everybodywinsvermont.org)

Thanks for considering being a part of this rewarding program!

Week of October 12th

I hope everyone had a nice long break last weekend! 

This week in math we have worked on measuring with unifix.  Our measuring theme was based on the book, "Jack and the Beanstalk" so we measured giant size beans (receipt tapes cut to different sizes).  We also talked about what perimeter is and measure the perimeter of different size garden beds cut out of paper.  Next week we will work on using a number line to help us add together 2 digit numbers.

In Reader's Workshop and Writer's Workshop, we are now talking about informational text (non-fiction books).  In Reader's workshop we have looked at informational text and talked about how we grow knowledge when we read these types of books.  We he book practiced looking through a book and thinking about what would teach us about.  In Writer's Workshop, we are now writing books that teach the reader about something.  We have some books being written about how to take care of pets, how to ride a bike, how to play minecraft, and books on different types of animals. 

In Social studies, most of us got on to google maps and looked at where our houses are located on a map.  Some of the students had some difficulty getting signed in and will check this out next week.  On Friday we were fortunate to have our Technology Integrationist come in and show us how to use Google Earth on the ipads. 

I look foward to seeing everyone next week for conferences.

Have a wonderful weekend,
Nancy

Writing Celebration and Dav Pilkey Visit!

Oops, just realized that I never posted this last week.

Today was a very busy day.  Students have worked hard this week preparing a piece of writing to share with their classmates.  I mixed tables up some today so that students could share with a different group than they did with our first share.  Each child had the chance to read the story they wrote and revised.  They also had a snack to eat as they listened.  I would like to thank Sara Hughes for sending in our extra snack.  The students really enjoyed it as well as listening to their friends stories.  Some students came dressed as a favorite character in a book that they have read.  As one student said, "We are all dressed as a character because we all wrote about ourselves in our books."  So in actuality, we were all dressed as characters:) Photos from our event will be posted soon to this blog.  Next week we will start our new unit of writing informational books.

Today we also had a special guest visit the school.  We had the opportunity to go down to the cafeteria and listen to Dav Pilkey, author of the "Captain Underpants" books.  He spoke about his difficulties in school growing up and this lead to what he does today.  Each student also received a special cape and wore it during the assembly to show their support for what Dav does.  The class was really excited to see him!  Photos from this event will be uploaded soon as well:)

I hope everyone is able to enjoy our long weekend!

Nancy

Here are the photos:)

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Unified Arts Curriculum Night

Please join the Art, Music, Physical Ed., and World Language teachers for our Unified Arts Night. It will be on Tuesday, October 20th, from 6:30-7:30 pm.  Please meet in the cafeteria at 6:30 pm for a brief introduction. Students are encouraged to attend this event with you, and share some of the great things they are learning in their UA classes.

Week of Sept. 28th

Hello Everyone,

We had a very productive week!

We had a visit from our new Technology Integration Specialist, Jeff Badillo, and he taught us how to log on to the computers and how to access our new google accounts.  We will be using these accounts to access my maps as part of our geography unit. 

In Writer's Workshop we are getting close to wrapping up our small moment stories.  On Friday we picked a piece that we will publish and share with our classmates next week.  Notes went home in the Friday folders with details about this Celebration. 

In Reader's workshop we continue to talk about characters and how we can use characters to help us retell stories.  Next week we will focus on Author's intentions.  After the long weekend, we will be moving on to informational texts.

In math we are focusing on numbers and how we use place value to identify those numbers and compare them.  We have used unifix cubes to help us visualize this concept by looking at groups of tens and individual unifix cubes for the ones.  We will use this learning and apply it to add bigger numbers together. 

This week and the beginning will be our wrap up of our community project.  On Friday we finished up our collages of what makes up a community.  We did these on the ipad using a collage app.  On Tuesday we will share out all of our hard work we have done during our Community Unit.

Gift wrap orders are due.  If you have orders, please send them in on Monday. 
 
Next Thursday is our Author Visit from Dave Pilkey!  The students are very excited.

Have a wonderful weekend,
Nancy