Dear
Families,
Thank you so much for all the
generous gifts and cards. I appreciate
each and every one (and the thought behind them) and thank you card went home. I hope you saw the thank you as I was very
overwhelmed with such kindness. The true
gift is having the opportunity to work with such fun kids each day.
As we return from winter break, here’s what we’ll
be up to! As always, please feel free to
contact me with any questions, comments, or concerns.
Writing: As a class, we are deep into learning how to
add elaboration to our stories by stopping to describe. The winter stories are turning out
nicely. We will finish editing them this
week and then they will be typed up for display. Typed stories should be printed and will be
due to Mrs. Allen by January 22nd.
I want to ask that you please read through your child’s finished story
to check for typos and errors before printing.
Please have your child use Century Gothic, Arial, or Times New Roman as
their font and have them use size 14 font.
We will display them once they are written in a finished copy format. The students will complete some artwork to go
with this finished piece. Next in
writing, we will be writing a fun Haiku Poem about winter as a soft landing
back from the break and then we will be learning about expository writing. Students will learn that expository writing
is when we write to teach, share information, or explain step by step. Students will learn that expository writing
has DEARFD (details, examples, anecdotes, reasons, facts, and definitions) used
to support their ideas. Student will
learn how to add each of these kinds of support to their writing to accurately
explain their topic. As always, please
continue to reinforce the importance of good editing skills at home. Encourage the use of dictionaries and
checking all written work carefully after completion.
Math: We will be finishing up
our unit on multi-digit multiplication the week back from winter break and we
will have an end of the unit test on these skills on Tuesday, January 8th.
Then we will be moving into learning
about division concepts. Of course,
knowing your math facts for multiplication is vital for learning to solve for
division and higher level fraction concepts (coming in late January) so
students who have not “passed” their facts through their 12s by February 6th
(the last Wednesday with math fact volunteers before winter parent conferences)
will need to stay in one recess each day after that to practice their facts in
partners. Please ensure that your child
is practicing their multiplication facts each
day for at least 10 minutes. I can’t
stress enough that knowing these facts are instrumental to learning more
advanced concepts and feeling confident in math (and the sooner, the better). Thanks
again to Mrs. Kotrlik, Mrs. Harding, Mrs. Hansen, Mr. Carlson, and Mrs.
Gehrmann for their help with math facts each week.
Reading: Our
reading focus this month will be finishing up our study on Stone Fox and
summarizing/main idea. Then we will move
into learning about inferencing. To make
an inference, we use text clues and what we already know (our background
knowledge) to make conclusions about what the author wants us to know or learn
from the text. Our reading equation for
this is TC (text clues) + BK (background knowledge) = Inference. We will explore inferencing in our reading
groups and read aloud. Our next book report
and book is well
under way. It should be a chapter book
(100-200 pages) at your child’s reading level that tells a story. The book
should tell about a part of northwest history.
Some ideas could be a story about a Native American, Early Sea Explorer,
or a Pioneer heading west. The students
should have already chosen a book and be actively reading the book. Check in with your child about the book they
selected and make sure they are making progress on it. The organizer for the rough draft was sent
home before the break and there will be samples posted in our class for the
students to see. I will also post sample
book reports on my blog. I will send
home the final draft paper after I have seen each student’s rough draft filled
out. The rough draft of the book report
is due Friday, February 22nd.
The final copy poster is due Friday, March 8th. Encourage best writing on the book report
including strong supporting details, excellent spelling and punctuation. Students are to trace over words with BLACK
pen for final copy. We are continuing
our High Five Book Club winter trimester.
The challenge to the students is to read chapter books at their own
level to total 500 pages read by the end of winter trimester. Each time they finish a book; they complete a
summary of the book and turn it in. They
receive a star shaped punch for their High Five Reading card for each 100 pages
read and once they reach the goal of five punches for the trimester, they
receive a prize. Check with your child
about their progress toward this goal. High
Five Book Club summaries are due by March 15th.
Social Studies/Science: In Social Studies, we will be learning about famous
Northwest explorers who discovered Washington State. We will focus most on Lewis and Clark and
Sacagawea and their contributions. As
part of this learning, students are to create a possible bag- a bag that an
explorer or fur trapper/trader might have carried as they traveled. The directions for this project came home
before winter break. The directions are
on the front side and the pattern is on the back side. The possibles bag is due on January 14th
and the students will present their bags to the class and share the items in
their bags with the class that day. In science, we will begin learning about
environments. We will closely study how
animals live together with their environment as we move into February.
POW (Problem of the
Week): You may have already seen
POWs (Gray Whales in Winter was one) coming home and Human Calculators will be
coming home soon. These are released
WASL and MSP items that are used to give students an opportunity to build
confidence with the MSP (Measure of Student Progress) test and practice
important skills. Students complete most
of the POW in class and most of the time I will check and ask students to
correct missed problems. I will have
parents sign the POW so that you are informed as to how your child is progressing
toward state standards. Please keep an
eye on how your student is progressing with these practice passages.
Conference Days in
February: There are two half days
set aside in February for parent conferences: the 12th and 14th. I
will conference with students and parents for which I have special concerns. If
you would like to request a conference with me for that time, you are welcome
to. I will contact you with days and
times if I feel like it is necessary at this point. The end of our winter trimester grading
period is March 15th.
Thank
you for your support and I will talk to you soon! Have a wonderful 2013!
Warm
Regards,
Karri
Allen
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