Changes!

Good afternoon!  I hope you all had a wonderful 3-day weekend with your children.  We have been enjoying a few new changes in our classroom.  On Thursday of last week, we received a new, bigger SMARTBoard and our older one was taken out to one of the "cabin" classrooms.  The response from the students truly showed what amazing character they have.  Although they were excited to get the new board, they felt sorry for the class that was getting our old, smaller one.  What an amazing group of kids!  We also welcomed another new student to our class:  Eva.  Today she shared pictures and stories about her life in Senegal!

Quick Curriculum Update:

Reading:  Our main selection this week is a non-fiction piece titled The Journey:  Stories of Migration by Cynthia Rylant.  We will be using Venn diagrams to compare and contrast information in this text as well as our small group books.  Students will also be identifying sensory language that aid in visualizing these stories. 

Spelling:  This week is a review of some of our previous spelling patterns:  adding -s, -es, -ed, -ing

Writing:  Students are learning the components of a great descriptive paragraph.  They will also be drafting one of their own.

Math:  Students began the first lesson in Unit 8's study of fractions.  This unit has two main objectives:

• To review the use of fractions and fraction notation
• To help students develop a solid understanding of equivalent fractions, or fractions that have the same value

Science:  We will continue to use hydroponics to grow our bean plants and will measure its growth each week.  In addition to this, we have been observing (and playing with) bess beatles.  The students are super excited for tomorrow's delivery....crayfish!  I will be sure to post pictures soon of all of our little creatures. 

**Please remember there is no school for students next Monday and Tuesdsay (February 25 and 26)**

I look forward to meeting with all of you at parent/teacher conferences to discuss your child over the next couple of weeks! 

Have a great evening,
Mrs. Johnsen
johnsen.jill@iccsd.k12.ia.us

Good afternoon parents!  We have been having so much fun this week, reading great stories, having wonderful discussions, doing new SMARTBoard activities, and watching our seeds sprout! 

Here is a quick curriculum update: 

Reading:  This week's main selection is a non-fiction piece titled Life on the Ice by Susan E. Goodman.  She wrote all about her adventures while in Antarctica and we had some wonderful discussions about whether or not we would want to travel there (most said, "No way!").  During the week, we have also practiced finding the main ideas within different texts and identifying details that support them. 

**The Optimist Good Reader Program is due next Friday!  Many students have already finished reading all 9 books!  Please check in with your child to see how he/she is progressing.  This weekend would be a great time to finish all of the reading as there will not be time in class next week to do the work.  Thank you for all of your support with this!  It is such an empowering feeling for these kids to know they have/will successfully complete the program! 

Spelling:  Our pattern of the week is compound words.  Students realized that if they know how to spell each part of the word separately, they can spell the entire word as well.  Yesterday, we had a great time illustrating the meaning of compound words!  Here is one example:




Can you figure out what this compound word is? 



Grammar:  Our focus this week is on correctly identifying/writing contractions. 

Math:  We are finishing up Unit 7 in math this week.  Students will be bringing home a review packet tonight and we will go over it tomorrow.  They will have their Unit 7 test on Monday. 

Science:  The students are having a great time learning about the properties of different seeds!  We observed and placed  four different types of seeds (bush beans, sunflower, popcorn, and pea) in mini-sprouters and have been watering them daily.  We are taking note of the changes we see in them throughout the week and many of them are beginning to sprout!  Students are working on identifying the important parts of seeds:  the seed coat, cotelydon, embryo, and leaves.  Here are some pictures for you to enjoy! 

Have a great day! 
Mrs. Johnsen
johnsen.jill@iccsd.k12.ia.us