5V News

Class conversation to share:
At morning meeting we had a great class discussion on how the past couple of weeks have felt with impending projects due.  Many students expressed that they learned the importance of trying to plan ahead and realized the benefit of working on small parts of a project over several days instead of waiting until last minute.  I am always impressed with the students' reflective thinking and willingness to share their thoughts and feelings with each other. 

We are learning about:

• Early Native Americans
• Geometry
• Personal Narrative
• Inferring

Some activities we did this week:

• Used population data to practice comparing numbers
• Reviewed the types of angles
• Practiced measuring angles
• Learned about adjacent and vertical angles
• Played Angle Tangle
• Explored personal narrative picture books
• Identified what makes a personal narrative
• Began brainstorming ideas for our personal narratives
• Determined the rules for making plural nouns
• Inferred the meaning of unknown words using the book Caleb and Kate
• Used inferring to determine theme and author's message using Aesop's Fables
• Shared our research on our Native American tribes
• Experimented with watercolors to create paper to use in our altered book

Notes and reminders:

• Students should be logging into Xtra math a couple of times per week to practice math facts
• No school- November 23rd- 25th 
• Scholastic Book Fair- November 28th- December 1st 

Have a great Thanksgiving break and enjoy the time with your families!  

5V News

We are learning about:

• Inferring
• Publishing our writing
• Traditional multiplication
• Native American civilizations

Some activities we did this week:

• Reviewed for our unit 2 math test
• Took our unit 2 math test
• Studied and discussed "trans" vocabulary words
• Made inferences using advertisements from magazines that had one item covered
• Used the netbooks to type and revise our stories
• Decided on the "so what?" of our stories
• Designed our Native American books
• Continued listening to Something Upstairs by Avi
• Had a Halloween celebration
• Researched the parts of speech during computer in order to make a brochure  
• Read with our second grade reading buddies
• Learned about analogies and how to solve them  
• Created envelope and tag templates to use in our altered books

Notes and reminders:

• Instead of weekly math for the next two weeks student will be working on a geometry picture.  Directions will go home on Monday and it will be due Friday, November 18th.  
• Early releases- Wednesday, November 9th and 16th 
• No school- Thursday, November 10th and Friday, November 11th
• We have been discussing the importance of reading at home whether it's thirty minutes a night or spread out in different increments. 

kidblog: http://kidblog.org/MsValentisClass/
diigo: http://www.diigo.com/user/Msvalenti
flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/msvalentisclass/

5V News

Class conversation to share:
We had a class discussion about behavior and work expectations because there have been many reminders about focusing and getting our best work done.  I was so impressed with the honesty that came from the students.  They were able to vocalize what they saw happening, how it feels and how they can help make a more positive learning environment.  I was most impressed with the metaphors that came up naturally in the conversation.  Students compared us to a football team where everyone plays an important role and a pyramid because we need to support each other.  I wanted to share that we truly have a class of bright, thoughtful and reflective students. 

We are learning about:

• Reading comprehension strategies
• Publishing our first piece of writing
• Early Native Americans
• Traditional multiplication 

 Some activities we did this week:

• Practiced and reviewed traditional multiplication
• Made estimates before multiplying with decimals
• Learned about words with the "mal" prefix
• Reviewed regular and irregular past tense verbs
• "Lifted a line" from our writer's notebook to begin a new entry
• Tried starting our stories with three different leads- with character's thoughts, dialogue and action
• Began typing our stories
• Discussed how inferring is using your schema and evidence from the text
• Practiced inferring what type of person would use an object we found in recycling
• Researched our Native American tribes
• Started planning our codex on Native American life 
• Began our altered book project
• Had a class discussion about behavior expectations and how we can help each other do our best work

 Notes and reminders:

• Flickr- I've created a flickr account for our class and have started uploading pictures.  More to come! http://www.flickr.com/photos/msvalentisclass/
• Parent Conferences- I will be sending home a reminder in today's Friday folder.  Please let me know if you'd like to schedule a different time. 
  
• Homework- we are into our regular homework routine for the school year with the exception of some future project work that may need to be finished at home.  Here is what should be happening weekly:
• Reading- nightly
• Weekly math- due Friday
• Practice five spelling words- by Thursday
• Find a word that fits into our vocabulary study- by Friday
• Blog post and comments- by Friday
• Practice math facts on Xtra Math at least twice a week
• Study links or math practice will be sent home most nights