It was nice to see 23 smiling faces come back from spring break! Each of them had wonderful and exciting adventures to share about their spring break!
Thank you to Mrs. Cohen for coming in to be our Mystery Reader this week! Everyone always loves to guess who the mystery reader is from their clues and hear a new story!
Thank you to Mrs. Cohen for coming in to be our Mystery Reader this week! Everyone always loves to guess who the mystery reader is from their clues and hear a new story!
Literacy
This week we were able to focus in on a new anchor text called, "Our World in Space: Planets" which is an informational text. Students worked on their close reading strategies using both the text an illustrations to answer questions this week related to key details and facts, text features and by comparing and contrasting. We also used a few graphic organizers to better understand text features and their purposes. We learned that text features such as headings, illustrations, word boxes, captions, diagrams, labels and so on help the reader to better understand the text or to give new information about that topic. Here are two of the graphic organizers we completed as a group:
This week we were able to focus in on a new anchor text called, "Our World in Space: Planets" which is an informational text. Students worked on their close reading strategies using both the text an illustrations to answer questions this week related to key details and facts, text features and by comparing and contrasting. We also used a few graphic organizers to better understand text features and their purposes. We learned that text features such as headings, illustrations, word boxes, captions, diagrams, labels and so on help the reader to better understand the text or to give new information about that topic. Here are two of the graphic organizers we completed as a group:
To reinforce this at home make sure you are reading about 50 percent informational text and have your child point out different text features as they read. Ask your child questions that require them to reference the text features in their answers. (Example: Q: How did you know that Mars was the 4 planet from the sun? A: Well in the diagram of the solar system I can count and Mars is the planet that is labeled and is 4th from the sun.) We also focused on the following vocabulary words: Our World in Space: The Planets Vocab.
Writing
Students were excited to begin a new writing unit on informational writing. They will be connecting to our ReadyGEN reading program by using the facts they have been learning about space to write a question and answer informational book about outer space! This week students learned how to "grab their reader's attention" by having an interesting introduction such as asking questions, using a surprising fact, or starting with a joke that relates to the topic.
Students were excited to begin a new writing unit on informational writing. They will be connecting to our ReadyGEN reading program by using the facts they have been learning about space to write a question and answer informational book about outer space! This week students learned how to "grab their reader's attention" by having an interesting introduction such as asking questions, using a surprising fact, or starting with a joke that relates to the topic.
Math
Just before our class went on spring break our class learned about fractions with shapes. We worked on the following common core standard:
1.G.A.3 Partition circles and rectangles into two and four equal shares, describe the shares using the words halves, fourths, and quarters, and use the phrases half of, fourth of, and quarter of. Describe the whole as two of, or four of the shares. Understand for these examples that decomposing into more equal shares creates smaller shares.
Student Friendly Objective: I can split circles and rectangles into halves and fourths and compare the sizes of those pieces.
Students first learned that a fraction is a part of a whole. Then, students practiced using a 4 inch by 4 inch square paper to fold into equal parts (into halves and then later in quarters) as they heard a story about a brother and sister who made sandwiches for lunch and cut them into equal pieces. Students discovers that there was not only one way to equally divide the shapes into different pieces some folded horizontally, some diagonally, some vertically and some used a combination of folds. We also practiced writing the fraction out and learned that the top part of the fraction is the number of parts being talked about while the bottom number show how many equal parts the whole has been broken into. We will continue this study on fractions into next week using other various shapes.
This week we were able to return our focus to addition and subtraction. Our new unit is focused on solving and creating word problems that relate to addition and subtraction problems, write equations to match problems and using place value to add and subtract up to 100. Here are some examples of the problems we were working on this week:
Just before our class went on spring break our class learned about fractions with shapes. We worked on the following common core standard:
1.G.A.3 Partition circles and rectangles into two and four equal shares, describe the shares using the words halves, fourths, and quarters, and use the phrases half of, fourth of, and quarter of. Describe the whole as two of, or four of the shares. Understand for these examples that decomposing into more equal shares creates smaller shares.
Student Friendly Objective: I can split circles and rectangles into halves and fourths and compare the sizes of those pieces.
Students first learned that a fraction is a part of a whole. Then, students practiced using a 4 inch by 4 inch square paper to fold into equal parts (into halves and then later in quarters) as they heard a story about a brother and sister who made sandwiches for lunch and cut them into equal pieces. Students discovers that there was not only one way to equally divide the shapes into different pieces some folded horizontally, some diagonally, some vertically and some used a combination of folds. We also practiced writing the fraction out and learned that the top part of the fraction is the number of parts being talked about while the bottom number show how many equal parts the whole has been broken into. We will continue this study on fractions into next week using other various shapes.
This week we were able to return our focus to addition and subtraction. Our new unit is focused on solving and creating word problems that relate to addition and subtraction problems, write equations to match problems and using place value to add and subtract up to 100. Here are some examples of the problems we were working on this week:
Social Studies
This week we wrapped up our famous Americans study by creating a cover and putting our books together. Next week students are excited to begin a new science topic: Sound and Light!
This week we wrapped up our famous Americans study by creating a cover and putting our books together. Next week students are excited to begin a new science topic: Sound and Light!
Upcoming Events
Wednesday, April 10: Scholastic Book Order Due! (Also, last book order of the year.)
Thursday, April 18th: Early release, students dismissed at 1:00pm.
Friday, April 19th: No school
Monday, April 22nd: No school
Wednesday, April 10: Scholastic Book Order Due! (Also, last book order of the year.)
Thursday, April 18th: Early release, students dismissed at 1:00pm.
Friday, April 19th: No school
Monday, April 22nd: No school