Friday, May 13

Hello Friends and Families!

Here are the updates from this week.

We Need...

More snack.  We could also use some more tissues.  As we read in a book this week, "Spring is the season of Kleenex!"

Thank You!

Rachel's family has generously offered to adopt our class fish.  Thanks!

End of the Year

We are in the process of planning end of the year events.  Zazy, Judy, and I will be in touch about dates and  details of what to bring, etc.  I hope to have this information ready by next Friday.  If you know that you will miss some of the end of the year, please let me know as soon as possible.

Constructing Cambridge

The books arrived and they were sent home today!  Happy reading and thanks again to all those who helped.

Conferences and Goals

I have sent home all conference goal sheets.  If you did not receive yours please let me know.  Today we reviewed our goals and reflected on our progress.  Please check in with your child to see how the goals are going!

Our Learning

Our Mysteries of Science unit is wrapping up.  Students used their time this week to finish observations of all minerals.  We discussed the skill of writing detailed descriptions.  Next week, the students will receive their mystery and will use their detective skills to solve The Case of the Missing Mineral!

In Reading we are deep into our mysteries.  We focused on collecting clues, keeping track of where our detective goes, and listing suspects.  Students are discussing their mysteries in book clubs and the room is abuzz with predictions of culprits, discussions of alibis, and wariness of red herrings.  Next week we will continue to read our mysteries and we will learn how detectives ask just the right questions.

Our room of poets learned more poetry tools in  Writing. We talked about line breaks and how to eliminate words to make our poems more powerful.  We also learned about concrete poems, poems that take a shape to add to the poem.  Next week, students will select poems for their own poem anthology.

In Math we finished our Math MCAS.  This was our last MCAS for the year.  We also continued to talk about fractions.  We learned how to write fractions for sets and were faced with the challenge of sharing 7 objects among 4 people equally.  Students are also learning how to have discussions about their math.  We have been presenting our solutions and asking questions about strategies.  Next week we will continue our work with fractions and start to recognize their connection with decimals.

Have a great weekend! 

Sincerely,
Meg