February 24, 2017

I hope everyone has been enjoying the warm weather! I hear it is going to get cold out again! Please remember to make sure that your child is dressed appropriately for the weather. They can be outside for recess for up to 30 minutes on some days. The weather changes quickly and many students have been coming to school with out jackets!

Last week in Reading we had a blast re-enacting the Second Continental Congress! This week in reading we are continuing to learn how to research. Students have been working on researching a new topic to add to their informational books they are writing. We have learned that it helps to read an easy text about a subject so that you can gain some background knowledge before you read a harder text about the subject. We also learned how to tackle complex words, you don’t know a word just by knowing its definition. You really know a word when you can give an example of it, explain how it goes and tell about different kinds of it. we practiced using the word boycott. Students read 3 different passages about the American Revolution that had the word boycott. Students came up with a definition, gave examples of different kinds of boycotts and explained how boycotts tend to go.

In writing the students are continuing to draft their All About books. students focused on writing an essay that explains why the topic they are researcing was an important event in the American Revolution. Then students selected a new subject to write a 4th chapter about, some are writing about the role of women in the American Revolution, or comparing soldiers in the Continental Army to soldiers in the British Army. They are researching and wikk be drafting this next section on Monday.

This week in math we have been working on adding and subtracting fractions with like denominators. The math has been relatively easy so we have added the challenge of reducing fractions to their simplest forms. I have noticed that many students do not read word problems carefully and make careless mistakes vecause of this.

In Social Studies we are finishing up our Black History month studies. Each student is creating a “quilt square” on paper that depicts a famous person and event from both slavery and civil rights. Our next Social Studies unit begins next week. We will be studying the government of the U.S. Starting with the Constitution and the Preamble to the Constitution.