Friday, November 20, 2015

November 30- December 4th

Writing
This week will be all about letter writing! We will review the components of a letter, and write a letter to one of our favorite fictional holiday characters. We will also be studying synonyms and antonyms.

Please remember that Life Journals are due every Friday.
Life Journal expectations are as follows:
1. Students will glue or draw an item in their Life Journals. It could be a movie or game ticket, a picture, a drawing, an envelope with a special letter in it…as long as it can fit in their notebook, students may use it.
2. Students will write at least a paragraph about what was glued or drawn into their Life Journal. The visual placed in a Life Journal will assist in writing about it.

Reading
This week in reading we will focus on Media Literacy. We’ll ask students the question, “What is media?” and how does it affect our lives.  Students will use comprehension skills to analyze how words, images, graphics, and sounds work together in various forms to impact meaning. Using media resources, we will discuss different purposes of media (e.x.: informational, entertainment) and identify various written conventions for using digital media (e.g., e-mail, website, video game).

Please remember to read 100 minutes a week at home.  If students read 20 minutes at least 5 days a week, they will reach this goal.  Challenge your child to use more than one strategy they’ve learned in class during their at home reading time.

Math
3 digit place value continues this week. We will practice adding and subtracting 100 from 3 digit numbers and think about different ways to make the same number. For example, 325 can be made of 3 hundreds, 2 tens, and 5 ones, or 32 tens and 5 ones. We will review everything we’ve learned and wrap up the week with an assessment.

iXL: M.5, M.10, M.13

Continue to practice those basic facts! We want every child to be able to recall addition and subtraction facts to 18 automatically!

Social Studies:
It’s National Geography Week!  We will be studying different types of maps and discussing why it’s important to be able to read a map.  We will also learn about globes and where the continents and bodies of water are on Earth.  
Science:
We will be engineers this week as we design a bridge to get from Gnome Village to Gnome Market.  We will be working as a team, coming up with a design, building it and testing it out.  If you have any containers you can keep over the Thanksgiving break and send in for us to use that would be wonderful.  

Building supplies:
empty toilet paper rolls
empty paper towel rolls
empty plastic tubs (like yogurt)
empty boxes (like crackers)
Scotch tape would also be helpful for building

Research question of the week: Research a holiday from a different country. Tell what country it is from, why they celebrate it, and what they do to celebrate it.

Reminders:
November 23-27 Thanksgiving Holidays
December 2: Early Release
December 3: Field Trip- sack lunch and closed-toed shoes
December 7-11: Book Fair
December 18-January 4 Winter Break
January 5th First Day back after Winter Break

Friday, November 13, 2015

November 16-20

The Kinsa FLUency program is now live for Caraway Elementary!!!


Please redeem your FREE Kinsa Smart Thermometer by following these easy steps:
  • Download the Kinsa app for iOS or Android
  • Check that your phone is compatible with Kinsa Smart Thermometers
  • Follow the prompts to create profiles for anyone in your family
  • Swipe right to search for our school group – hit “Find”
  • Search using our school name and zip code
  • Join Group and follow the prompts to redeem your thermometer
  • Kinsa will send a thermometer directly to your home address!  


Writing
We will wrap up our unit on expository and informational writing this week. We will use what we have learned to create another expository on a prompt of our choice.


Please remember that Life Journals are due every Friday.
Life Journal expectations are as follows:
1. Students will glue or draw an item in their Life Journals. It could be a movie or game ticket, a picture, a drawing, an envelope with a special letter in it…as long as it can fit in their notebook, students may use it.
2. Students will write at least a paragraph about what was glued or drawn into their Life Journal. The visual placed in a Life Journal will assist in writing about it.


Reading
This week in reading we will focus on fiction vs. nonfiction. Students will be able to identify the differences between fiction and nonfiction text by reading books about the same topic, one fiction and the other nonfiction.  Students will make inferences and draw conclusions about nonfiction texts. We will learn about the features of nonfiction text.  Some of the text features they will learn are index, table of contents, glossary, captions maps, bold print and photographs.   Students will learn to understand the purpose of each of the text features and how it can help them understand nonfiction text more easily.


Math
We are looking at 3 digit place value this week. We will review the different ways we can write numbers and apply that knowledge to 3 digit numbers. We will practice building 3 digit numbers out of base-ten blocks and decide if that number is odd or even. We will talk about the value of each digit and why the 6 has a different value in 624 and 216. We will wrap up the week with a pumpkin I-Spy and a mystery puzzle where kids will have to work out clues in order to reveal a picture!

iXL: M.5, M.10, M.13

Continue to practice those basic facts! We want every child to be able to recall addition and subtraction facts to 18 automatically!

Social Studies:
It’s National Geography Week!  We will be studying different types of maps and discussing why it’s important to be able to read a map.  We will also learn about globes and where the continents and bodies of water are on Earth.  
Science:
We will be focused on magnets this week!  We will learn all about magnets and their properties.  We will look at the forces of push and pull with magnets.  We will investigate with magnets during some fun hands on experiments.


Some great websites to go to to continue your child’s science experience:  
http://www.sciencekids.co.nz/gamesactivities/detectivescience/magnets.html


Research question of the week: How many different versions of the fairy tale, Cinderella, can you find?
Bonus points: Write your own version!


Reminders:
November 23-27 Thanksgiving Holidays
December 2  Early Release
December 7-11: Book Fair
December 18-January 4 Winter Break
January 5th First Day back after Winter Break

Thursday, November 12, 2015

Pictures

Here are some pictures from some of our adventures!

Showing off our character pumpkins:


Halloween STEM challenge:








Learning to make kimbap: a sushi-like Korean dish!




Yum!


A big thanks to Mr. and Mrs. Lee for teaching us!

Friday, November 6, 2015

November 9-13

The Kinsa FLUency program is now live for Caraway Elementary!!!
Please redeem your FREE Kinsa Smart Thermometer by following these easy steps:
  • Download the Kinsa app for iOS or Android
  • Check that your phone is compatible with Kinsa Smart Thermometers
  • Follow the prompts to create profiles for anyone in your family
  • Swipe right to search for our school group – hit “Find”
  • Search using our school name and zip code
  • Join Group and follow the prompts to redeem your thermometer
  • Kinsa will send a thermometer directly to your home address!  

Writing

We will continue learning about the features of expository and informational writing this week. We will use what we have learned to create a piece all about South Korea!


Reading and Social Studies
Our study of South Korea continues this week. We will be studying the different symbols on the flag, learning about lotus flowers, making traditional Korean fans, and even trying our hand at calligraphy! 

We will also will have a fun demonstration from Sang and Jung Lee (Lynn's parents) as they teach us how to make a Korean dish called Kimbap!


Math
We are continuing subtraction this week. Last week we learned several different strategies for subtracting and this week we are practicing them. With several games and lots of word problems, we will become subtraction stars! We will also begin working on mixed word problems, meaning that now kids will have to decide if the problem is asking them to add or subtract. Asking kids to review addition and subtraction key words will help them remember!


Continue to practice those basic facts- it is a goal of every second grader to recall their basic facts automatically!


iXL: L.7, L.8, and L.9









Science:
We will continue to study force and motion this week. We will be doing lots of experiments and we need some materials to help us in our learning.  Please let me know if you can send in any of the following. Label them with your name as most of the supplies will be returned to you!


10 toy cars
4 large sheets of sandpaper
10 marbles
10 containers of bubbles- these won't be returned
5 pool noodles- these won't be returned as they will be cut in half
10 tops
5 pinwheels- the kind you blow to spin-
10 bouncy balls


Thanks!


Some great websites to go to to continue your child’s science experience:  


Research Question of the week: What are hieroglyphs?


Reminders:
11/10 Holiday pictures and picture retakes
11/23-11/27- No school! Thanksgiving Break