It was nice seeing many of you at the Fun Run on Saturday. The students did such a great job! I couldn't run that far, without stopping, when I six or seven.
Here's what we've been working on in the classroom:
Reading : Before break, the students finished their nonfiction research projects, which we called 'wondering boxes.' To wrap up our nonfiction unit, they presented their wondering boxes to their classmates. They all did a great job with their presentations!
Last week, we started working on our next reading unit, which is about visualizing. While we've been talking about mental images all year, we'll be focusing on more complex aspects of visualizing in this unit. So far, we've spoken about using all of our senses to visualize exactly what's going on in texts. Take a look in the poetry section of your child's binder to see some of the work he/she has done.
Writing : I hope you all got a chance to see your child's nonfiction writing piece. Thank you for sending them back to school the next day. You will get all of your child's published pieces at the end of the school year.
Now that the students have developed so much as writers, we have gone back to working on personal narratives (or small moment stories) for a bit.
Math : Recently we've been spending a lot of time talking about money (bills and making change) and techniques for adding two-digit numbers. Many of you have asked if it's 'okay' to teach your child the traditional method of adding two-digit numbers, by stacking one number on top of the other, adding the ones digits and then adding the tens digits. This is absolutely okay! In school, I haven't explicitly taught that technique because I want to make sure they understand the underlying meaning of adding the tens and ones together. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask!
Here are some pictures of 1-Bu in the classroom :