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Hi there. I sure hope your few days off have been wonderful. I know I have enjoyed them. I spent some time in Roundup, MT helping teachers set up their morning meetings with Rusty, and getting their money systems going. What a great school up there! The rest of the time was spent with family, cows, and my online class. Teachers have to re-certify every six years in Billings by taking a college course and attending workshops. It is my year to do so, so I am back in college again. Weird! I am taking a class about character in the classroom. I thought it would be a shoe in, cuz that is my number one passion, but it has really been interesting. It actually has applied more to the mind of the child and how they develop character rather than how to teach it. Interesting!
Well, as you can see our Valentine's Day Party was a success. All committees did a great job and everyone had fun, including me!
This week we will be back to business as usual with one exception. Tomorrow, Tuesday, we will have the NAPE test. Please make sure your child is well rested and has a healthy breakfast before leaving the house tomorrow morning. Think eggs and peanut butter. :0) Healthy, protein snacks are also encouraged. All kids need to know about this test is that they are expected to do their very best and apply all that they know. There will be stuff they know and stuff they won't know. They just need to try and give it their best effort. Time to shine diamonds!
MONTCAS testing is also right around the corner. The window begins the first week of March. I will post the exact schedule when I know it. Love this test, because it is yet another time to really shine. Yes, I am the teacher, but testing is when kids show what they know and what they can figure out on their own without me, the teacher. Please help me encourage kids that testing is not brutal or scary, but just a time to reflect back on their entire education process and just let us know what they know. Please know that I completely understand that these are children and not data machines. I encourage their best, but it is not every thing, actually it is not even close to every thing!
We will begin our tour of the Southern states. They are off to the right for study reasons. There are only four of them. We will also proceed with more MT History. We will take a better look into what the Lewis and Clark exposition meant to American Indians at that time. We will log some first encounter experiences and hear some stories from tribal members. We should be able to wrap up this section this week. Next up is fur trappers in MT!
In math, we will wrap up fractions and begin measurement. We will also be reviewing and mastering long division. Expect those skills for homework this week along with some review problems from previous units.
In reading, we will continue trying to solve the mystery happening at the Drive Thru Funeral Parlor in Besseldorf. The author is throwing many red herring clues at us, and it has been fun to see how the kids think they know but they find out they were tricked by the author's clues. We are working hard on the skills of character analysis, figurative language, and recording and analyzing clues. Kids are finding it easier and easier to spot idioms, similes, metaphors, personification, and onomatopoeia examples.
In Lead 21, we are still working on predicting, cause and effect, main idea and details, synonyms, antonyms, and using charts in a text as we read more about the Midwest region. This week we will move forward to the lower regions and work on summary writing along with all the skills above.
Spelling will resume this week as well. The words are off to the fight. We will focus on breaking words into syllables to help us spell them.
In science, we will begin to really hit fossils hard. We will share our drawings we did last week, and talk about different tools needed to work with fossils. Then, we will dive into the study of how fossils come about, where we can find them, and what they tell us about the past. Fun!
Our banana split assembly for the Read-A-Thon is tomorrow. It will be fun to turn Mr. English into a human banana split. Be careful though, Mr. English is allergic to bananas for real!!!! What a great sport of doing this for the kiddos. The kids did a great job of achieving their goals. I also hear that we have a winner for the Nook in our class. Awards will be presented at the assembly. Way to go E4!
Well, that about does it. Have a wonderful last day off. I can't wait to see all the kids again tomorrow.
