Classroom Snapshot of Events

Welcome back!  I hope that everyone has a fantastic Spring Break with your families full of rest and relaxation!  Here is a snapshot of what has been happening in our class:

Literacy:

Our class just finished a poetry unit that focused on the structural elements of poetry, the importance of sound in poems, sensory details in poems, the big idea hidden inside of a poem, and feelings evoked from reading various poems.  At the end of the unit, students created their own Haiku and shape poems.  During Grammar time, the students have been working with action verbs that involve present-tense, past-tense, and future-tense concepts.  In addition, we've been studying irregular verbs, verbs of being, linking verbs, and verbs using contractions.  

Writing:

The students have just completed Unit 2 in our WEX Program entitled "Response to Literature".  At the beginning of the unit, together we read the book called Charlotte's Web.  Using excerpts from the book, students learned how to find evidence, analyze, and write about  character traits of the main characters in our book.  We also had fun writing about particular moments in time that the characters in the book had to endure and compared them to our own personal lives and situations.  Throughout the lessons, the students continued to concentrate on the concepts of focus, details, and sentence mechanics.

In collaboration with our Solar System Unit, students learned also how to write persuasive   paragraphs.   The students have been learning how to compose a persuasive paragraph using the "OREO Method":

O= Stating an opinion of persuasion

R= Providing reasons in our research to support our opinion

E= Citing specific examples to give support to our reasons

O= Forming a conclusion that reinforces our opinion

Currently, the students are working on writing an informational paragraph that includes a topic sentence, supporting details, elaborations of our details, and a concluding sentence.  We're also learning how to add transition words to make our sentences flow better.  

Math:

Our class just completed Unit 7 that focused on multiplication and division facts, strategies, and concepts.   It is important for your child to continue to practice their multiplication and division facts online at home. Using a pre-test, your student will continue to be placed into a differentiated math workshop group for math lessons and activities.   

Science:

Throughout this past trimester, students explored the Solar System.   Through experimentation and class lessons, the students learned about what causes day and night, the Earth's rotation and revolution, the moon's phases, and constellations.  

Our unit concluded with students being put into research groups to explore a planet and write a persuasive speech for Solar Awards.  Click on this website link to view the planet winners!