HARD WORKERS

Classroom C All Stars worked hard this week.  They completed a reading assessment, a math test, and formulated ideas for their island writing.  We also enjoyed a field experience yesterday. I am sending home graded work, such as math tests and Gazetteers in the Friday Folder.  Please send the folder work back on Monday.  Below is a snapshot for next week - only 4 days and a reminder:

BLUES IN THE SCHOOLS WEEK IS HERE!

Blues in the Schools at Grant info

Friday, 9/23

Bring $1 to buy your commemorative blues button on playground before school

Tj Wheeler arrives

10 Years of Blues in the Schools at Grant Art Exhibit at Central Bank of Boone County, 720 East Broadway, 5:30 to 6:30PM

Tuesday, 9/27

Bring $1 to buy your commemorative blues button on the playground before school

Thursday, 9/29

Arts & Blues Night at Grant, 5:30 to 7:30PM

Friday, 9/30

Music Makers Blues Revue returns to Grant for an assembly, 2:15PM

Saturday, 10/1

Grant Blues Corps performs at the Blues in the Schools stage, Roots N Blues N BBQ Fest, Stephens Amphitheater, 12:00-4:00


READING: After completing the DRA, I have a solid picture of where each child is as a reader.  Next week, I will help students with choices for just right Book Share books.  This week we practiced questions and next week we will likely practice predictions.

WRITING: Our writing focus is on two long range projects: the Travel Brochure and the I AM Poem.  For the Travel Brochure, we will focus on paragraph structure and using nonfiction conventions.  This is the last piece of writing for our Island project.  We will celebrate all this work on Oct 3 with the Travel Show.  For the I AM Poem, the focus has been descriptive words and poetry structure.  Some students will have time to record their poem using iMovie on their ipad.

MATH: For math we have moved on to Multiplication.  We will spend time covering efficient strategies as problems get progressively more difficult.  Our class struggled with rounding in the last unit and on the test.  So I am supporting rounding and estimating as we introduce multiplication.  I also noticed students were slow to remember their basic facts so that is something they can practice at home or anytime really. Highlighting multiplication in the real world is helpful too because we will be applying our skills to multi step problems.

SOCIAL STUDIES:  In social studies, we have used our textbook and pics/videos of geographical features to inspire our island work.  We read about resources, conservation, and economy.  Students spent a good amount of time brainstorming creative ideas for their islands.

SCIENCE: Our science focus this week was based around our Gov't Walk field trip.  We also practiced communicating about science by reading articles and responding to them.

GREAT WEEK

This was a solid week in Classroom C.  Students were productive and we achieved a lot of creative work in the classroom and in the community.  I am very impressed with students' island maps.  The art work and the accompanying writing are both very creative.  We had two fantastic community experiences this week, focusing on ecology of food at CCUA and arts in our community at Orr St Studios.  There are many great photos on the CPBL link to the right.

Here's our focus in each subject area:
READING: I have completed listening to everyone read for their DRA reading assessment.  Next week, they will respond in writing to demonstrate their comprehension.  This work is helping know each reader better and I will use this information to help choose books.  During our independent reading, we are recording or thoughts and sharing these responses to set a standard of communicating about reading.

WRITING: Students have their I AM drafts completed.  After a couple lessons on lines and synonyms, we make our finals and put the poems with our sketches.  Students also demonstrated their writing skills with their Gazetteer and the Travel Brochure for their islands. We will focus on using nonfiction features like headings and pictures when we make our brochures.

MATH: We spent a couple days looking at addition and subtraction strategies and are practicing with adding and subtracting decimals.  There will be a test on adding and subtracting decimals next Tuesday.  The next unit will be multiplication.

SOCIAL STUDIES: Students are deep into their island work.  We discuss landforms and resources in class and in the field.  Students are using their experience around town in Columbia to influence their island ideas.  On our arts field trip, they sketched a piece of art or a flag or sculpture to represent island.  Next week, we will find a day for our gov't walk downtown and we will visit City Hall.

SCIENCE: Scientists are still gathering inspirations and practicing their observations and questions in our trips.  Some days we are using science tools to identify or measure or observe. On our trips, we are often discussing science topics like resource usage, ecology, and geography.

We received our ipads this week!  Very soon we will already be using learning apps to enhance our learning.

BLUES IN THE SCHOOLS COMING SOON!!!

Blues in the Schools at Grant info

Friday, 9/23

Bring $1 to buy your commemorative blues button on playground before school

Tj Wheeler arrives

10 Years of Blues in the Schools at Grant Art Exhibit at Central Bank of Boone County, 720 East Broadway, 5:30 to 6:30PM

Tuesday, 9/27

Bring $1 to buy your commemorative blues button on the playground before school

Thursday, 9/29

Arts & Blues Night at Grant, 5:30 to 7:30PM

Friday, 9/30

Music Makers Blues Revue returns to Grant for an assembly, 2:15PM

Saturday, 10/1

Grant Blues Corps performs at the Blues in the Schools stage, Roots N Blues N BBQ Fest, Stephens Amphitheater, 12:00-4:00

HAPPY LABOR DAY!

I hope everyone enjoyed their 3 day weekend.  Thank you to those who made it to the Potluck/Back to School Night. Classroom C All-Stars were creative and productive this week.  Below, there is a current update on all our work.  I also updated photos from our field experiences on the CPBL page.

Reading: This week we had discussions about genre and book shares.  Readers are recording a variety of thinking already.  We will use their reading responses in their journals to begin our reading comprehension work.  First, I am completing the DRA, District Reading Assessment.  This means I will hear all readers read out loud and they will also respond to questions about their reading.  Overall, this assessment gives me more information about a reader's comprehension and fluency.

Writing: We have 2 writing projects developing currently.  First, we are taking steps to draft and complete our I AM poems.  This poetry will focus on expressing student's lives and using descriptive phrases.  We also began our Gazetteers for our islands.  This alphabetical description of places on student islands is due Wednesday, September 14.  Many students are typing this work in a Google Doc which they can access from home.  Students are also welcome to craft a hand made Gazetteer.  And the Island Maps are Awesome!  So creative.  I'll post a few tomorrow.

Math: This week students went over their graded math test.  We started a unit on rounding, adding, and subtracting, with a focus on decimals.  This gives us a chance to review mental math addition and subtraction.  It will also give students more experience with decimals, which we will work with all year.

Social Studies:  The maps look fantastic!  We spent a lot of time finishing the maps this week.  We had time to look at pictures of real land forms around the world during ss and math.  We also discussed using inspirations from our field experiences on their islands.  Now we are describing or islands in writing through making a Gazetteer, a glossary of places on a map.

Science:  Students had time to make final copies of their field experience observation sheets.  Our gov't walk was cancelled today due to the rain.  We will make it up some nice morning in the next two weeks.  Next week, is our big trip to the urban farm at CCUA. Please consider donating to their Planting for Pantry program.  We are accepting donations through next Tuesday.  This trip includes science classes and great observation opportunities.  Kids are doing a great job in the field as learners. All of our community experiences become the foundation for our community science project this year.

TOTALLY AWESOME MAPS!!!! CHECK EM OUT!!!!