Saturday, November 21, 2015

Week in Review--Pilgrims and Native Americans


Reading:

In reading this week we focused on the CAFE strategy “Respond to Questions”. Learning to ask and answer questions throughout the reading of a story is an important strategy because it teaches the reader to think aloud. It helps the reader review important points in the text, evaluate and refine predictions. The most effective way to teach this strategy is through modeling the questioning process while reading aloud to your child. We read several Thanksgiving, Pilgrim and Native American books this week. We read books that were reality and a few that were fantasy as well. It is important to read a variety of reading material where your child can practice this strategy.

Our sight words this week were "are" and "now". We made pirate hats on Monday to kick off learning the sight word "arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrre". So much fun!











We used the app Popplet to create "popples" of words in our -at word family. By the end of the week we were creating -at and -ot words!

 

Another way we practice our word families is by searching for those words in a word search on "Word Search Wednesday"!




We had a new word work choice this week called "Rainbow Writing". Students roll a dice to figure out what color of marker to use to write a sight word and then write the word in that color on the recording sheet. After they write the word, they roll the dice again and write a new word in a new color! By the end, the page is very colorful....like a rainbow!


Our vocabulary review lesson this week, we focused on the word "community". Students took a video of their iPad partner saying their definition of the word community and then they sent it to me in the app Showbie!






Here are a few videos of students explaining their definition of the vocabulary word community.


















Our poem of the week!




Math:

This week in math we wrote in our math journals using the app Book Creator and practiced addition using math tools, number line and mental math! We practiced Monday and Tuesday this week adding our math writing vocabulary word "triangle" to our math journals and practicing an activity called number of the day that we do every day, but adding it into our iPad math journals. We take a picture of the vocabulary word or the dice and then write all about the word or number. After we are finished, students use the record option within the app to record telling me what they did and their review of their journal entry. This week we worked with a partner in case we had questions or forgot a step. I am hoping for students to complete these two activities independently in the next couple of weeks. I will post a video of a few students reviewing their entry next week!












Math vocabulary writing example.



Number of the day example.












Practicing addition using a number line!
 












Writing:
We continued studying and writing our True Stories this week. We started the week off by first practicing writing with meatball and noodle spaces and then moved to creating a chart of topics that we could write about that would be a true story from our lives. After each student finished a book, they can go get a new book to start! On Friday, we chose our favorite book that we wrote throughout the week and published the book in Book Creator. I posted a few videos of those published books below.






































Content:

We are gearing up for Thanksgiving and learned about Pilgrims and Native Americans this week. We focused the beginning of the week on Pilgrims, then moved to learning about Native Americans and finished the week comparing both, as well as discussing the differences between their lives then and our lives now!



















Other:

The class earned their last "warm fuzzy" in the jar this week! We pulled a prize out of the prize package and the class earned to bring a stuffed animal from home to school for the entire day! There is a video below showing the students dancing along with their animals to the Freeze Dance!









 
 

PRACTICE AT HOME:
Have your child explain differences and similarities from the way the Pilgrims and Native Americans lived to how we live today!
 


Next Week:

  • In reading we will review previous learned CAFE Strategies, sight words and word families.
  • In writing we will continue learning how to write a narrative story.
  • In math we will focus on writing numbers 1-20!
  • Our theme next week is continuing to learn about the first Thanksgiving and the Pilgrims and Native Americans!

Important Dates/Information:

 
  • 11/26-11/27 Thanksgiving break--NO SCHOOL
  • 12/4--All School Behavior Incentive Field Trip--PMO Christmas Show
  • 12/8-Barnes and Noble Night 5-7:30
  • 12/16-Christmas Program. Students arrive at McCutcheon High School no later than 6:30 and the show begins at 7:00
  • 12/18-End of 2nd Nine Weeks