Friday Letter February 6, 2015

Happy Friday! With only having 3 school days this week, it seems like it was just Friday.  The next 2 weeks before Winter Break are going to be very busy.  Next week, we'll start assessments for reading, math, & writing.  We finished our timed addition & subtraction assessments this week.  Our class schedule may change within the next few weeks, to ensure we complete all the assessments on time.

Since we had 2 snow days & not enough ample time to practice the spelling words this week in class, the same words will go home next week.  We will have the spelling test next Friday.

Valentine’s Day is next Saturday.  Out of respect for families who do not celebrate Valentine’s Day, we will not be celebrating it in class.  We will however, be celebrating the 100th day of school.  A letter explaining this, will also go home with your child today.

Here is a re-cap of what we did this week:

Reading: After today, we will have had two rounds of literacy centers.  Students practiced their handwriting, read leveled books, wrote who their favorite character was (Piggie or Elephant), and completed word work activities.  Students were also given the opportunity to read their Piggie and Elephant plays to a partner.  They also read Piggie and Elephant books, taking turns being the different characters.  Next week, we will start reading Mo Willems’ Pigeon series.

Writing:  We have been getting ready to start our opinion writing unit.  Students had practice writing a short opinion piece during their writing center.  We will be spending a great deal of time on this after assessments.  Students also reviewed nouns, verbs, and adjectives.

Math: We finished up our measurement unit.  Students took a quick measurement assessment this week.  We also practiced subtraction with a fun subtraction activity. Our next focus with be on telling time to the hour and half hour.

Science:  Students finished their birch tree paintings by adding shadows.  They are beautiful!  We will do some more projects with light and then start learning about sound.

Social Studies:  We started learning about Chinese New Year and their customs.  We also started a cherry blossom multi-media project. We will finish this up next week.

Have a great weekend!  Andrea