Rain Rain Go Away

Looks like next week will have some rainy weather as well. Please be sure your child is dressed for the weather. If we are outside, the playground will be wet and muddy.

It was fun to see so many families at Fun Night! What a great fundraiser for our school! Thank you again for your donations to our auction basket. Your donations meant someone brought a great basket to enjoy and the money went right into the PTO bank!

Here are somethings we were working on this week:

Literacy:

Our new unit that we started will continue students’ journey as they learn more about the early history of our country. Students already learned in the Columbus and the Pilgrims domain that the Pilgrims came to America from England to seek religious freedom. The setting for Colonial Towns and Townspeople's more than 150 years later, after the colonies had been firmly established. These read-alouds will acquaint students with what daily life was like for the people who lived during these times, and how very different it was from students’ own present-day experiences. This background knowledge will help set the stage for an in-depth understanding in later grades of specific historical events that also took place during colonial times. During these years, America evolved from a small group of dependent British colonies to a growing, independent nation.

We were able to get with Mrs. Baird's class this week to make ships like the Mayflower and see if they could float. We were the pilgrims and Mrs. Baird's class was the Native American's. It was cute to see them working together!

*****We are planning an event at the end of this unit- the last week in April. We will be showcasing different trades from the colonial times. If you have any neat old items or something you would like to show, please let me know. It is hard for students to understand what life was like in the 1700's for kids their age, so we thought demonstrating an old town and blacksmithing, butter churning, sewing, etc, might help build some understanding.

Math:

This week we continued to practice addition with our different strategies we are learning. We talked about the symbols used in math such as the + sign (which means combining groups) and the = sign (which tells us both sides are the same of an equation. Up until this point we have been using the words 5 AND 2 Make 7, but now students are able to transition to 5 +2=7 with a good understanding of what the symbols mean.

Here we are working in groups to solve a story problem that I gave them. One student is solving using chips, one using an equation, one using a picture and one using a number line. Then we are checking answers.

Congratulations to our STAR Student, Jack! He works really hard at making sure everyone has what they need. He is the go to person and is happy to help if you need something for students and staff!