Monday, December 17, 2012

Updates for 12/17/2012


Happy Monday!

I wanted to give you a quick update about the last week before Winter Break:

Reading à  While the kids have daily lessons on fluency and vocabulary, this week they will practice fluency in a new way:  Idiom Plays!  If idioms don’t “ring a bell”, you may have “missed the mark”, and you’ll have to see what your child says about them (oh, wonderful wordplay).  We are also focusing on summarizing and sequencing…ask your child about the gesture we use for “sequencing”!

Math à  After tacking some multiplication, the kids will be exploring division over the next few weeks.  I’m going to be showing them a mental math strategy called “Partial Quotients” which is a precursor for “Looooooooooooooooooooong Division”.  This will take practice, but the kids have worked hard at learning their facts, so division will be a lot easier.  *Note:  if your child is struggling with the homework tonight, simply have him/her finish the 10 [6s], 20 [6s], 30 [6s], etc. section.  We will cover this again tomorrow – the kids only experienced the beginning stages of division today.*

Social Studies à  This week we are going to focus on the Appalachian Mountains region in the Southeast.  They will be learning about ways of life, watermills, the Cumberland Gap, Daniel Boone, and lots of other concepts.  Also, see if your child can draw a map of the Southeast without any other map.  They might also start singing, “I know the southeastern states:  Louisiana, Mississippi, and Florida…”

Science à  Our Magnetism and Electricity kits are on the way!  We will begin this unit starting the Monday after break.  Don’t worry…we won’t be working electric power stronger than a D-cell battery.

Behavior à  I will continue working with students on staying organized at school.  The kids are expected to have their homework, red folder, and agenda each day.  I also expect their desks to stay tidy during the day.  Looking for ideas at home?  Take a picture of an often messy area after it has been cleaned.  Post the picture, and when a mess arises, simply say “Match the picture.”


Happy holidays from my family to yours.  Hopefully the kids will have some snow to play in during break!

No comments:

Post a Comment