5-2 Updates ~ 10/16/16

Hello 5-2 Families ~

Hope you are enjoying our beautiful fall weekend!  GO CUBS!!

Important Dates

Open House ~ Thursday, October 20th at 6:30-8:00pm - please plan to enjoy us for an evening at our annual Open House!  Students have fun showing their parents around the classroom and building, and it's a great chance for a chat :)

Halloween Party ~ Monday, October 31st at 1:10pm - Our Room Moms have been very busy planning an exciting party for your children - a great big thank you to Mrs. Attea, Mrs. D'Amico, and Mrs. Downing for all their hard work!  Please note a few changes for this year's party:

1) Per Dr. Bein's letter, no food will be served at the Halloween party.  Students will enjoy a full afternoon of activities and crafts planned by our room moms.

2) Online Halloween Permission Slip - this year, we will be collecting permission for students to go home for lunch through a Google Doc.  Please click on this link and complete the form for your child BEFORE Monday, 10/24/16.

https://docs.google.com/a/sd25.org/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScODp36-_EcCqAPV8JT00HmAItpKSLojcavz3qBnvlT7dutrw/viewform

3) As you know, we can have 7 volunteers in the classroom this year.  Several of you have let me know you would like to be entered into the drawing to be a volunteer for the party - thank you so much for offering your time!  I will draw the names on Wednesday, 10/19, so if you would still like to get your name in the hat, please email me!

All of you are invited to our Annual Halloween Parade!  The parade route will be the same as last year - we will be walking along Belmont to Thomas, then back to Olive.  We hope to see many of you along the route!  Please refer to the Olive Blog for more information on rain plans, as well as halloween costume expectations.

Math

My math class finished Unit 2 last week with an assessment on Friday.  These tests will be coming home on Monday for a sign and return.  We will pre-test for Unit 3 on Monday, then dive into Geometry concepts on Tuesday.  Students will be measuring angles and classifying geometric shapes in this unit.  They will also be introduced to a new online math resource in this unit - LearnZillion.  Students will be able to log on and watch videos on this site as an additional instructional tool for this geometry unit.

Science

Our study of the human body began this week as we learned about the purpose of our skeletal system, how bones provide structure and protection for our body, and how joints allow us to move.  Ask your child if they remember the three different major types of joints in their body, and the location of each of these joints!  Next week, we will learn how the muscles work in pairs to move the bones, then they will have an opportunity to build models of joints using a variety of supplies in their science teams this week.  While we don't have a unit assessment for a couple of weeks in science, it's important for students to keep up on the vocabulary learned in this unit.  The graphic organizers they complete for each chapter have the most important information and vocabulary for each lesson - have your child continue to review these throughout the unit.

Reading

I was so impressed with the time your children took to produce t-shirts that reflected the novels they chose to review with such detail!  Their individual creativity came through in their brilliant designs, and their excitement for their books came through in their engaging presentations.  The Book Review Fashion Show served to ignite a passion for reading in many students, and increased the excitement in others to have new titles to read.  I've included some pictures below of their fantastic t-shirts ~ they'll be hanging in our room during Open House as well.  

We will be wrapping up our Launching Unit this week in reading.  Students have done an amazing job learning the routines and practices for our Reading Workshop, and they have developed such an excitement for reading!  In the Launching Unit, students were exposed to many genres of writing as they established routines, and they spent time this past week reflecting and setting goals for the upcoming weeks in reading.  We will be starting our Nonfiction Unit next week!

Writing

We took a break from our WEX curriculum on Personal Narratives this week and learned to develop strong, descriptive language with a study on poetry this past week.  Students wrote Sensory, Cinquain, and Haiku poems about autumn.  We will finish up our Poetry Unit this week with Diamante and Acrostic poems.  Students will then be able to choose their favorite poem to polish up for final publication this week.  They have been asked to bring in leaves on Wednesday to do a leaf rubbing, so head outside and take a walk with your kiddos to pick up some of those beautiful fall leaves!

As always, please feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns.  

Have a fantastic week ~

Live so that when your children think of fairness, caring, and integrity, they think of you.

H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

Cheers ~

Theresa Fowler