April 4th

Writing: We published our pen pal letters, and they turned out really good! The students used their nice handwriting and they added illustrations, as well. Later in the week our class enjoyed sharing our letters with our classmates. Our class also learned how to write lowercase letters: u, w, and o. 

Reading: A Dinosaur Named Sue was the title of the mentor text that we used this week. We practiced applying fix-up strategies and we explained how images help to clarify text. This week we also worked on identifying problems and solutions within nonfiction texts. 

Phonics: We have been studying words with related root words.

Math: Using different units to estimate and measure length is a topic we explored this week. We also learned how to compare lengths. 

Science: The Native American regions that we’ve been studying include: the Plains, the Southeast, and the Northeast. Learning about the different forms of shelter, transportation, tools, and more has been a lot of fun!

March 28th

Reading: This week we read a passage called, “Primary Sources”. We had several focuses: taking notes to identify key details of the passage, we determined the main idea and found supporting details, we studied the text features, and determined how the images helped clarify the passage.  

Phonics: Our phonics pattern this week was focused on adding inflectional endings (ing, ed) to the ends of words.  There were 2 rules we learned: To double the consonant when a word has a short vowel and delete the e when a word has a long vowel.

Writing:  This week we continued focusing on our narrative letters to a “pen pal”.  We revised several parts of our writing this week by adding details, and describing words, removing parts that did not make sense, and then strengthening our introductions and conclusions.  We drafted our letter structure, which included the date, greeting, several paragraphs, and a closing.  

Math: Measurement has been a hit with the class!  We have been measuring various items in inches, centimeters, feet, yards, and meters.  We have learned how to correctly line up a measuring tool (always starting at 0), and focusing on what unit is asked of us to use.  We have compared the differences between the units and learned about why it takes more of some units to measure the same item than others (more inches, than feet, etc.). 

Science: Our unit focus is on Native Americans.  We will be studying all of the regions that Native Americans lived in, within the United States.  We are learning about their homes, clothing, food, natural resources, tools, and transportation.  This week we learned about the Northeast and Far North regions. 

March 13th

Science: We wrapped up our explorer unit this week with a fun activity. We took a trip to Crestwood Park where we created maps showing what we discovered. The students did a great job and had a lot of fun!

Math: This week we reviewed place value, three-digit addition, and three-digit subtraction. Any addition practice at home with adding and subtracting numbers into the hundreds place would be helpful. When we return from Spring Break we will begin our measurement unit.

Reading: This week in reading we read a story called, "Ranch Flyer".  We studied the photographs and discussed how they helped us understand the text.  We summarized the story, and described the connection between a series of events. We also enjoyed reading The Sour Grape and Couch Potato. We practiced identifying the lessons in each of those stories.

Phonics: Our phonics pattern this week was compound words with vowel teams (ex: rainbow).

Writing:  We spent our week working on our personal narrative letter.  We brainstormed topic ideas, chose a topic, and then began writing our draft.  We learned about greetings and closing in letters and where to place commas. After break we will begin editing, revising, and publishing these letters. 

Spring Party Fun!

March 7th

Science: This week we continued to learn about early explorer groups, and we looked at the types of shelters, transportation and tools they used. The students enjoyed creating salt dough models and map keys to represent different explorer areas. Then we had a gallery walk so we could view all of the different projects. They turned out great! Later in the week, the students were tasked with using pattern blocks to design different tools and modes of transportation. 

Reading: This week we started a new unit. Unit 7 is titled “Investigating the Past.” We began with a story about the Oregon Trail and a child’s diary entries. We looked at how text features help us better understand the story. We also read a story called “Ranch Flyer.” In this story we looked at how events in the story are connected. In phonics, we learned about compound words and words with silent letters (ex: snowman, doorknob).

Writing: We finished writing our fictional narrative drafts last week. This week we published our pieces, and we enjoyed getting the chance to read our classmates’ stories. After reading a story, the students left a compliment for the writer. The students really enjoyed that activity! 

Math: This week we learned about adding multiple 2 digit numbers together. Next week we will review and then take our unit 3 test.