Two Week Update 2/4-2/14

Update 2/19 - It seems that this post wouldn't post! I've republished it in hopes that it shows up this time! Sorry for the delay parents and families!

Language Arts

Over the past two weeks we've learned two new sight words, "with" and "you." These are two words that are very important for students to learn as they are both words they use often in their writing. Both words have been sent home for their sight word key rings to be sure you continue to practice reading, spelling and writing these words during vacation.

The students have been working very hard on being able to retell familiar stories we've read a few times in class. Story retelling is an important part to their reading skills and have been doing a wonderful job so far with this new skill. We've focused on retelling folk tales which we've been learning about during our reading times. This skill will also be used in their work during reading groups and can be used at home after rereading a familiar story with families. Students are often very excited to tell you what they remember about a story and love to retell that favorite story in their own words.

Math

A new unit in math has begun and we've moved into learning about numbers to 100! Students have begun to learn how to skip count by 2's, 5's and 10's to begin getting familiar with how groups of numbers work. It's important that students understand how to skip count and you can practice at home before bed, in the car on a trip somewhere or during any other time during your day where your student will have fun showing off their new math skills.

You will notice that much of the work your student will practice at home will focus on groups of 10 and some left over. We've been trying to see a group of 10 as 1 group instead of 10 groups. This concept can be tricky and frustrating for students, so it's important to keep this concept as visual for them as possible (think about how we counted 10 groups of 10 to create or 100's Day Collections). If your student gets stuck at home figuring out their homework, use toothpicks, Legos, hair elastics, crayons, anything that will help them to visualize the quantity and help to skip count in groups to the higher number. We've begun to move away from counting all (counting each individual object each time we count the group) to skip counting, so it's important that they continue this practice at home.

Science

The students have continued to enjoy learning more about solids and we explored objects that sink and float. We used clay and aluminum foil to create different object that would be able to float in water. Most of the students figured out that creating a boat-like structure that didn't take on water would float in the water and hold glass beads even if that object, like clay, sunk if it was a ball before and now it's a boat, you can still make it float. The students loved being able to figure out how to make the solids into something that would float in the water and had great success with it.

Important Updates

*Please remember to continue to read with your student over vacation. Also, practice skip counting by 2's, 5's and 10's throughout the week to keep their new math skills fresh for them.
*The week we return from vacation, students will bring home more paper books from their browsing bags to practice reading at home instead of their reading bags.
*There were two sets of Valentine's that were lost in the shuffle of the party on Friday afternoon that will be sent home when we return to school - sorry for any confusion!
*Parent Conferences are coming up! If you know that there may be a conflict with your conference time, please be in touch as soon as possible to see if we can accommodate a new time for you and I to meet.