Weekly Update

Monday’s
Musings

Welcome back to another full week of learning. I can’t believe that April is halfway over, and the end of the year is near. Here are some notes for the week:

• Reading Workshop- continuing our fairy tale genre. This week we’ll be looking more at how authors weave different fairy tales together. We will be working on learning a script for a fairy tale play in the next couple of weeks. By Friday, we will have read through the script and assigned parts so that students can begin learning their lines over the weekend. Your child also should have brought home a paper on Friday which details the activities we are doing in class for guided reading. You will see this every Friday, and I hope it gives you more information about our everyday learning.




• Writing Workshop-
  today we wrote sensory poems based on emotions. Students will have time to work on
  their free verse poetry for the rest of the month, but we will be focusing
  more on specific types of poems this week such as haikus and concrete
  poems. Soon we will practice reading and recording our poems, as well as famous ones, for you to upload to your favorite mp3 player.




• Math Workshop- first grade is continuing their study of geometry and working on symmetry with pattern blocks this week. We will also be exploring tangrams after reading Grandfather Tang’s Story on Thursday. Second grade is beginning a review on fractions this week.




• Science- today we did an experiment on
  motion using whirlycopters. Students will be bringing home three
  different designs to study for homework tonight. This is a very fun activity for the
  whole family, so I hope you will be involved in testing the copters on
  speed and rotation. You may keep the whirycopters at home. All that needs returned for homework is the worksheet with the chart on it.




• Project- we are in stage two deciding on our areas of focus.

Wednesday is an early release day. Students will be released from school at 3 pm.

Please be sure to return spring picture orders if you are interested in purchasing them.