Weekly Update 9/20/19

This week, our school celebrated International Dot Day, inspired by the book The Dot by Peter H. Reynolds. After listening to the story, which encourages children to try new things and enjoy being creative, each child decorated their own "dot" with pictures or words that incorporated one or more dots. The book also teaches how important it is to have encouragement from others, so after decorating the front of their dots, they passed them around to their friends who added kind words on the back. Now, each student can read their dot when they need some encouraging words in the future!

In math, we have finished up the first chapter. Students have been working on solving a variety of word problems that use addition and subtraction, including two-step word problems. We also reviewed fact families and worked to find missing addends in number sentences. If your child is unsure of their basic facts through 20 in addition or subtraction, studying those facts at home would be beneficial.

In reading, the students are learning a variety of strategies to help them decode tricky words, as well as determine the meaning of unknown words. Students are also writing about the connections they are having to their reading group books.

The children are finishing up their rough drafts of their personal narratives in writing, and are beginning to revise their writing to make it stronger. They learned several strategies to make a strong beginning that hooks the reader's attention, including using dialogue, asking a question, and describing the setting.

It's been a busy week in science. The students have been paleontologists all week! First, they dug up dinosaur bones. Then, they drew pictures of their bones and tried to infer what part of the dinosaur it came from. Children measured the bones and sorted them in groups based on size. Finally, they worked in teams to put all of the bones together to make a skeleton. They are learning the importance of observing, asking questions, and writing detailed notes and drawings to learn more about new things.

A few Lego creations from our STEM bins!