Hello there. I hope you are enjoying your weekend. I constantly find it fascinating living in Montana. One minute...snow, the other 70 degrees. No matter what though, I find that that is one of the reasons I LOVE Montana!
Liam was our star of the week this week. Liam enjoys hiking and collecting fossils. He also shared a soft cloth that his grandmother gave him along with a bag he was given with some soccer player autographs. It was great getting to know him a little better! Thanks for sharing Liam!!!
Academically this week we will be learning...
Lead 21 Reading-We will be wrapping up Unit One: Heritage. Each Unit we will be doing an Inquiry project to help us bring what we learned to life. Sometimes this will include a research project and presentation. When thinking about what to have students do for this unit, I looked up and noticed our Where in the World Is Tauzha wall. I then realized that we have been doing an inquiry project all along. We have been curious learners about another culture while following her across Spain each day for the past 5 weeks. It's funny how teacher's think that there has to be a poster, powerpoint, or other visual report to show that we learn. When really, we have been learning all along just by having amazing conversations full of I wonders! Tauzha is now back in the USA, and she will be visiting the class next Tuesday morning at 9:30. She has many things to share about all of her adventures. Please feel free to join us if you are free. She is quite the amazing woman!!!
Language-We will continue to review subjects, predicates, types of sentences, and nouns. We will be adding on irregular plural nouns this week, including those that end in y. By the week's end, students will know when to add an s, es, ies, complete spelling change, or leave the noun as it is.
Spelling-We will be doing two things this week. Unit 6 is a Review Unit for words used in Units 1-5. Students will do classroom activities helping them to keep these words fresh and active in their brains. We will also move onto Unit 7: vowel sounds. We will work with words that have the u/oo/yoo sounds. Those that passed the homophone test with a 100% and/or took the alternate test last week will be able to decide if they want to be challenged with this week's challenge words. These words contain the same vowel sounds, but may take a little more effort to discover meaning to and connect to. They are words on a 5th and 6th grade level. Student's will need to decide on Monday which test they are taking. Once decided, they may not change their minds. I am so proud of all of those that took the challenge last week, and I am even more excited to see that challenged they were. It was fun to see them having to go the extra mile, use dictionaries and ipads to discover word's meanings. Even I learned some new words! Awesome!
Math-We will continue on with our decimal study. We had to delay our lessons this week and do some reteaching and retest on Ch. 1. The retakes were sooooo much better for the most part. Math is challenging in itself. When you throw all of the skills onto one sheet of paper, it can seem even more challenging. So, we scaled back and slowed down. Those that did not improve their grades will work with our volunteers this week to find out the trouble areas and help with a better understanding of those concepts. By the end of this week, students should be able to demonstrate mastery of reading, writing, and saying decimals along with rounding, comparing, and drawing them.
MT History-Now that we have completed our Fallen Rock study, we will look at the different regions found in Montana. Students will visit all three regions and discover why different plants, landforms, animals, and weather is found across our amazing state. They will also include writing into this process. They will be writing a narrative about an event that they imagine will happen in one of the regions, using all that they learn.
Regional SS-Students will take their final Fallen Rock tests. Study guides will come home this week. Test will be on Thursday.
Upcoming Events for this week...
October 8, Coffee with the principal at 8:30 a.m. Come join Mrs. Meier for coffee and talk "Arrowhead shop."
October 8-The BELIEVE fundraiser will come home and begin. Man our PTA rocks!
October 9th-Walk or Bike to school day. Those that do, will be eligible for prize drawings.
October 11th-School Store before school in front lobby.
Tuesday Folders-NILE Field Trip permission slips come home.
Lastly, I would like to poll the parental group. I have received many Scholastic book catalogs. When I was a child, I always loved the day that I came to school to find new books on my desk. There are some pretty fun books in these and they are pretty reasonably priced. The best part, for every book you order online our classroom gets one for free for our library. This is usually where all our fun CC Meeting books come from! So, what I need to know is are you interested in these? If so, please write YES in the planner. If you would rather wait or not have them at all write NO. If the majority of you want them, I will begin to send them home in November. (Thinking Christmas gifts!!!). We have the bookfair at Arrowhead at the end of October, so I don't want to interfere with that. Hence...the wait till November. It is totally up to you! Thanks for your input!
Have an amazing weekend with your kids!
Ms. Erickson
