Highlights from the End of January

Hello families,
Can you believe tomorrow is February? This month sailed by! One thing that always makes time go quickly is being super engaged in learning and projects, like our PBL. The Fox Kits have done amazing learning about sound and how it's produced. They have designed and built their own instruments. They have practiced performing a song as a band. Now all that's left is for you to join us to see and hear their hard work! Please come to room 25 on Monday February 3rd (right after the weekend) at 2:15. We are excited to share our music with you!

This week we ended our second number sense math unit and began our measurement unit! Next week I will be assessing students one-on-one in reading using the Fountas and Pinnell leveling system. This helps to make sure all students are receiving instruction at their just right level. We are also getting into the swing of things in our non-fiction writing unit. Most students are working on writing their
second book teaching the readers about something they know a lot about.

We read 2 books about animals this week: Animal Adapatations and Spikes, Scales and Armor. Both books teach about special things about animals that help them to survive. We noticed humans mimicking some of these things to help them in daily life too.

Last week I sent home a note and class list for valentine's day. If your child would like to bring valentines in please make sure there is one for every child in the class. There is no obligation to bring anything. We will all celebrate together the afternoon of February 14th.

We dumped our hearts on Tuesday, had an All School Morning Meeting on Thursday, and had a costume day celebration on Friday! It was a pretty fun week!

Dates to Remember:

• February 3 - PBL Band Performances! 2:15-3:00
• February 7 - 100th Day!
• February 12 - Half Day 12:15 dismissal; activities available with prior sign-up
• February 14 - Valentine's Day Celebration 2:10-2:40 
• February 24 - March 3 - Winter Break + Inservice Days - No School
• March 4 - school resumes

Have a great weekend!

❤ Mrs. Fox

Highlights of Our Week

Hello families,

What a busy week we've had! We continue reading non-fiction books and write our own. Many students worked on wrapping up their first non-fiction books by writing conclusions and glossaries before doing their final editing. 

This week our read alouds focused on our PBL theme of sound, music, and experimentation. We read: I Got the Rhythm, Max Found Two Sticks, Magic School Bus and the Haunted Sound Museum and The Most Magnificent Thing. In PBL we made our initial plan for building our instruments on Tuesday. On Thursday and Friday we built, tested, changed, retested, tweaked, altered, and finally finished our instruments! Next week the students will work in teams (or bands) to create a song together to perform on February 3rd. Please join us on Monday Feb. 3rd from 2:15-3:00 for the performances! All our PBL learning comes together in this final presentation.

With all the extra PBL times we have had math sporadically. We worked on reviewing the topics in our unit that students self-assessed they needed more work with. We will show what we've learned on the end of unit assessment on Tuesday.

Dates to Remember:

• February 3 - PBL Band Performances! 2:15-3:00
• February 12 - Half Day 12:15 dismissal; activities available with prior sign-up
• February 14 - Valentine's Day Celebration 2:10-2:40 *(change in time)
• February 24 - March 3 - Winter Break + Inservice Days - No School
• March 4 - school resumes

Have a great weekend!

❤ Mrs. Fox

Highlights of the Week 1-17-20

Hello families,

This week we went to see the HS Theatre students who have been working on a theatre-for-young-audiences play called "Fairy Tale News". It was so funny and silly. The high schoolers did a great job. We loved the show!

We did some sound experiments in our PBL work. We've been passing around different percussion instruments during morning meeting to see lots of different ways we can produce different sounds. We used tuning forks to really experience the vibrations that create the sound waves that we hear. Then we looked at some slow motion videos of cymbals and drums to see the vibrations and what happens when their sound is produced. We also made a kazoo in 3 different ways: with tin foil, saran wrap and waxed paper. We noticed the change in the sound of the kazoos based on the material used and each decided which one we liked the best.

In math we worked in station groups to practice some of our skills as we wrap up this unit: skip counting, find 10, true/false equality representations, story problems and combinations.

We continue reading non-fiction during reading choices and read aloud. This week we practiced making our reading smooth and lively, telling a partner about what we learn in the book, and thinking about the key words or vocabulary in the book that helps us learn about the topic. In reading groups we are beginning to write some of the things we learn from the books we read. Together we have read Seasons of the Year, A Tree for all Seasons, and Martin's Big Words.

We added more to our non-fiction teaching books this week too. We wrote in twin sentences to give an idea and then say more. We used writer's carrots to add in missing words to make our writing even better. We also paid close attention to our illustrations, making at least one diagram with labels while focusing on the size, color, and shape of what we needed to draw to teach the readers about our topics. We also continue to add words to our word wall to help us in our writing of these common words.

The snow on Thursday really made our day! There were so many fun things to do outside in the snow!

Dates to Remember:

• January 20 - Martin Luther King Jr. Day - NO SCHOOL
• February 3 - PBL Band Performances! 2:15-3:00
• February 12 - Half Day 12:15 dismissal; activities available with prior sign-up
• February 14 - Valentine's Day Celebration 11:30-12:00
• February 24 - March 3 - Winter Break + Inservice Days - No School
• March 4 - school resumes

Have a great weekend!

❤ Mrs. Fox

Highlights from a Wintery Week

Hello families,

This was a wintery week for sure. Lots of snow, ice, cloudy skies, cold days and bright white snow. Students who have all their winter gear have more fun at recess because they can play in the snow. Please be sure to send your child each day with a coat, boots, snowpants, hat, and gloves/mittens!

We filled our heart jar this week! We celebrated by doing some flashlight reading on Thursday!

We started our first PBL (Project Based Learning) of the year. A PBL is an integrated unit that requires planning, inquiry, collaboration and communication. Our PBL is a science, music, and engineering unit about sound! This week we looked and listened closely to hear different sounds, describe the sounds, and figure out how the sound was being made. We did a few experiments in the class to think about how different materials can be used to produce different kinds of sounds. The students are excited because the final project is making our own instruments from recycled materials! If you have any clean and nut-free recyclables at home please send them in on Thursday 1/23. We will begin making our instruments that day! Also, please mark your calendars for Monday February 3rd from 2:15-3:00. This will be the day our class will perform and demonstrate their learning from our sound PBL!

In math we focused on the make 10 facts (9+1, 8+2, 7+3, 6+4, 5+5, 4+6, 3+7, 2+8, 9+1) and used them while practicing a new addition strategy called Find 10. Here are samples of how to use this strategy. (Sorry--can't upload photos from home--will add them next week!)

In FUNdations we began a new unit that combines our short vowel and digraph work with the bonus letter rule. If a short vowel word ends with an ff, ll, ss right after the short vowel it gets a bonus letter!  We also learned the chunk all and how that has a bonus letter but is a little different because the a changes its sound. Here are some examples of words from this unit: shell, miss, fall, huff, chill, wall, cuff, moss.

In reading and writing we are focusing on non-fiction. We are learning specific reading strategies to help us learn about non-fiction text features and how best to learn by reading non-fiction books. We also started to write books about things we already know a lot about! Students are writing "All About" or "How to..." books on topics where they are experts! Some topics include: soccer, fish, dinosaurs, HEART, art, red pandas, trains.

Dates to Remember:

• January 20 - Martin Luther King Jr. Day - NO SCHOOL
• February 3 - PBL Band Performances! 2:15-3:00
• February 12 - Half Day 12:15 dismissal; activities available with prior sign-up
• February 14 - Valentine's Day Celebration 11:30-12:00
• February 24 - March 3 - Winter Break + Inservice Days - No School
• March 4 - school resumes

Have a great weekend!

❤ Mrs. Fox

Highlights Before Winter Break

Hello families,

During our last week before Winter Break we did lots of reading and projects about winter. We read: Snowballs, Stranger in the Woods, The Mitten, Sledding, The First Day of Winter, and Winter Solstice. We made some snowpeople of our own, finishing writing and illustrating the 5 Little Snowmen poem, and made a gift to share with our families.

On Monday we participated in the Hour of Code using the Kodable app on some ipads. The kids had lots of fun learning how to give directions to get through the mazes and collect stars! 

On Tuesday we had a visit from author/illustrator Amy Huntington. She shared with us some of her work, read us 2 books she is working on, and created a funny illustration with us about Mia and Martha, a snake and a centipede going sock shopping!

On Friday, the Winter Solstice, we celebrated the shortest day and longest night by making bright wishes for the new winter season.

Dates to Remember:

• December 23 - January 1 - Winter Break
• January 2 - School resumes
• January 8 - Half Day 12:15 dismissal; activities available with prior sign-up
• January 20 - Martin Luther King Jr. Day - NO SCHOOL
• February 12 - Half Day 12:15 dismissal; activities available with prior sign-up

Have a great vacation. See you in the new year!

❤ Mrs. Fox

Highlights of the Week - Halfway Through December Already!

Hello families,

It was so nice to be all back together again this week after I was out with a sick kiddo and then sick myself for most of last week. Thanks for your understanding. Here are a few highlights from the past 2 weeks.

We were excited to see the school HEART monitor was full. We celebrated with a comfy clothes and movie day last Wednesday. Last Thursday we also went to a special traveling science museum from St. Michael's College setup right in our cafeteria!

This week we worked hard to finish up our small moment stories, practice reading/storytelling, and write our about the author pages. We celebrated our learning with many of you and some teachers Friday afternoon. Thanks to all who came to support our learning and achievement. I love seeing the kids so excited about their amazing work. They've really grown as writers this year!

This week we also practiced for and performed our winter concert on Thursday! What a great job they did singing and listening to others perform in school and at night!

In math we continue working on solving addition, subtraction, and combination story problems. We show our thinking by making a representation, writing an equation, and writing the answer with a label. We are practicing counting by different number patterns: 10s, 5s, 2s. We played a game called pathways and did a new routine called Today's Number.

We are finishing up our digraph unit in FUNdations (wh, ch, sh, th, ck). Next week we'll assess what they have learned about writing CVC and CCVC words as well as trick words.

Dates to Remember:

• December 23 - January 1 - Winter Break
• January 2 - School resumes

Have a great weekend!

❤ Mrs. Fox