September 10th through 14th

Keenoy Kardinal News                                       9-14-18

Dear Families,

I hope that everyone had a terrific week.  The Keenoy family will stay extremely busy with kiddo activities.  Caleb and Gabby have soccer games and Natalie has gymnastics.  I’m happy that Caleb’s soccer will give me a chance to visit with my Grandma in St. Louis on Saturday.  I hope that the weekend treats you very well!

Our classroom is also entering a silent auction basket. Our theme basket this year is the St. Louis Blues Hockey Team!   Please send in donations so that our basket will appeal to others and will receive many bids.      

Math

Students took an assessment over Unit 1 (Area/Volume) on Friday.  These will be scored and shared with you next week.  Although I would love for each student to have mastered all the Unit 1 concepts, I need to keep reminding myself that our new math curriculum spirals.  This means that many of the concepts taught will show up again later in the year.  It is okay for students to not have each of these skills mastered yet.

We will begin Unit 2 next week.  This unit will focus on: place value, larger digit multiplication strategies, exponents, and larger digit division strategies.

In preparation for this unit, I have really emphasized the importance of knowing their basic facts fluently.   I am giving students 30 seconds to solve 12 basic fact problems.  If students know these facts without much hesitation, they are usually finished in about 15 seconds.  We take one of these checks every 3 ish days so students can study the number that they are on.  Students have a chart in their planner that keeps track of their progress.

*Knowing their basic facts fluently is essential for these units.  Thank you for taking the time to make sure that your child is studying their facts each evening.

Writing

I am extremely happy with the progress that students are making with writing.  Next week, we will continue spending time reviewing the rubric and looking at student exemplar papers.   Students will start drafting our Personal Narratives next week.

Reading

I am really enjoying our conversations each day while reading, Jackie’s Wild Seattle, by Will Hobbs.  We will continue discussing/modeling:

*how characters in a story or drama respond to challenges

*compare and contrast two or more characters, settings, or events in a story

*explain the relationships or interactions between two or more individuals

*compare and contrast the overall structure (e.g. problem/solution) of events, ideas, concepts, or information in two or more texts

Students are asked to practice these comprehension skills in during independent reading and for homework.

Social Studies

This week, students took a quiz over the continents and oceans.  I’m proud of their scores and improvement shown since their pre-test.   In chapter 1, students learned about The United States having many different landforms, climates, resources (renewable/nonrenewable).   Our discussions focused on how these affect people living in a particular region.

On Thursday, we started learning about the Native American Regions in chapter 2.   Students will be researching information about these regions: People of the Northwest, The People of the Southwest, The People of the Plains, and The Eastern Woodlands.

My uncle hunts for arrowheads.  We texted him a few questions that connect with what we are reading about.  The class enjoyed looking at the picture of a 10,000 year old lance point that he found.  This tool was used to kill the mammoth during the “Ice Age.”  These pictures sparked great conversations and peaked a lot of student interest.

Science

Students have continued learning more about the Earth Systems (Biosphere, Atmosphere, Geosphere, and Hydrosphere) and how the interact with each other.

Word Study

Students were given a pre-test with words that have the long a sound.  Words that were missed became their spelling words for the week.  If students were successful with spelling each of the words on the pre-test, they were given more difficult words to focus on this week.

Upcoming Important Dates

Sept. 24 No School / Teacher Collaboration

Oct. 6 Pumpkin Fun Run

Oct. 12 Comet Carnival (5:00-8:00)

Have a fantastic week!

                                                                                                Sincerely,

                                                                                                Dan Keenoy