Fantastic first weeks!

The first two weeks of school have been fabulous!  All my students are so eager to learn and are working hard everyday.  I am so proud of each and every one of them!   

September 4 - 7

Reading Groups & Centers
On Wednesday of this week we will begin our small-leveled reading groups and centers.  Your child will meet with me and four to five other students who read at their level for 15 to 20 minutes.  After they have met with me they will be working at a center for the rest of our reading block time. 

Reading Logs will continue to be sent home in the blue homework folder each night.  Please read with your child each night and initial the log.

Spelling
We will begin Words Their Way Spelling on Monday of next week.  Students will be grouped into differentiated spelling groups. A letter explaining how to do this homework with your child will be stapled inside the orange spelling folder.  Both the folder and the baggie of words are to stay at home for homework each night. Please note: this week your child will bring home spelling words and homework from the basal book story we will be reading. 

Vocabulary
Each week we will be learning and defining new vocabulary words from our basal story.  These vocabulary words may also come from social studies, science, or math some weeks.  Students will write, define and use these words in sentences in their reading notebooks.  We will have a test on these words every Friday.

High Frequncy Words 
We will be learning a new set of high frequency words each week.  I will send home the entire list this week in your child's blue homework folder. These are words that don’t usually follow a spelling pattern and are seen very often in reading and writing.  Please review them often with your child.

Writing
This week we will focus on writing a complete sentence.  As well as answering the questions, who, what, when, where, and why to expand our sentences and make them more interesting.  Please note: on most Thursdays your child will bring home a rough writing draft.  Please work on the final draft with your child on these days to be turned in on the next day.

EnVision Math
This week we will begin with an overview of numbers 1 to 999, tens and ones, reading and writing numbers, and place value.  A math worksheet will go home each night and will review what we learned in class that day.

Social Studies
We will begin our study of maps.  Students will use maps symbols to represent streets, roads, buildings, etc.  This unit will conclude with an activity where small groups of students use a campus map to track down several treasure treats on the NCS campus!

Read Aloud
Adventures await us in every book we read!  For our teacher rread aloud we will begin Flat Stanley by Jeff Brown.  Stanley is a little boy who got smashed flat as a pancake.  He and his friends and family have many funny adventures together!  As k your child about the crazy things Stanley did each day.

Reminders

• Red Monday folders will be coming home on Tuesday, 9/4 of this week.  PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU REMOVE ALL PAPERS FROM THIS FOLDER AND SIGN AND RETURN THOSE PAPERS THAT REQUEST THIS.
• If you haven't already sent in the $10 for Time & Newsweek, please do so this week.
• All students need ear buds or ear phones for technology, please send them in with your child on Tuesday.
• All students must have a yellow Spanish notebook and folder, please send those in with your child on Tuesday.

Requests

• I have changed my mind on the use of tennis balls on the bottoms of our chairs.  The room is extremely noisy and echoes with the moving of chairs. 
• URGENT!  Please have your child bring in 4 tennis balls with (2) two inch cross-cuts in them on Tuesday.

TESTS THIS WEEK

Friday
Vocabulary-you will find these words defined in your child's Reading notebook
Sentences- these will be in your child's DLR folder
Spelling-words from Basal this week