Unit 2 Week 2 Preview

This week we discuss cooperation and our role in helping out. We discuss families and neighbors working together to help each other. Our oral vocabulary words are appreciate, partner, cooperate, responsibility, and delectable. This week we will continue with the comprehension strategy of summarizing. We will focus on short vowel 'e' (tell, went) in spelling and touch on long 'o' spelled 'o_e' (hope, note). Our sight vocabulary words are eat, no, of, some, who. For grammar we will pluralize nouns requiring '-es' (lunches, dishes). We will complete a simple Flow Map in order to retell a story. We will complete our personal Tree Map of favorites and then begin work on a Tree Map which we will use for the brainstorming (prewrite) of our unit project on neighborhood workers. I would expect for our parents to know the neighborhood worker of their child's choosing and to be discussing the tools, dress, and duties of the worker in order to facilitate and improve writing fluency. 

In Social Science we will discuss at length how physical environments affect the way people live (food, shelter, clothing, transportation, recreation) (HSS 1.2.4) (tested). We will compare the environments of Alaska, Spain, and California.

Forty-Sixth Day of School

In Science today we worked in small groups to solve a problem concerning small particle solids using graduated separating screens. More groups than expected (based on performance in years passed) were quite successful.

Great News! The equipment request for our Final Project (it is being referred to as "final" but is not exactly final as the majority of the work will take place in March) has been funded through DonorsChoose. A great big thank you to those parents, other family members, and foundations for their generous gifts and quick response. The project was funded much more quickly than anticipated. Look for progress updates posted here. The tentative plan is to have an early evening filming in early March (probably beginning at 5:30) during Family Literacy Night. We will probably need to start earlier than 5:30 for those that can be there earlier so as to accommodate everyone.

There is Math homework this weekend and a test on Monday.

Reminder: We will not be sharing treats the day of Halloween.

Forty-Fifth Day of School

Today the students worked in groups to develop interview questions for a particular type of animal about which their group read (RI.1.1). Three of the 4 groups were very successful with this task.

We will likely have a Topic 4 Math Test on Monday.

Forty-Fourth Day of School

Today we read several selections about baby animals and their development and how they are raised by their families. We used the texts to differentiate between the  main idea and details.

We examined photos of school rooms from two different eras and found that children wore different clothes to school long ago and the girls specifically were required to wear dresses. The new classroom had computers and chairs made of a composite material as opposed to wood. Our classroom as well as the old classroom both had chalkboards (tested).

Some students wanted information to be posted about the downtown Los Angeles Library. If you have never been, it's quite an amazing place just to walk around and see. It is very accessible from the end of the blue line by just walking north 3 blocks. There is also an amazing children's section with a beautiful, appropriately-sized theater. From the library, if you continue walking one block east and 2 blocks north you will reach the historic Angel's Flight just past 4th on S. Olive. Riding the flight to the bottom of the hill puts you directly across the street from the Grand Central Market. There you will find a wide variety of foods to sample. From Grand Central Market walk two blocks south to Pershing Square. Board the red line with a transfer back to Metro Center Station and then transfer back to the blue line. There is a blue line park-and-ride on Wardlow (223rd turns into Wardlow) and Pacific.

Another good family outing is to take the Balboa Island car-ferry. Take PCH south to Jamboree and turn right. Jamboree becomes Marine Avenue which ends at South Bay Front. Turn right on South Bay Front which takes you to the ferry. However, if it is busy, the queue for the ferry may build from the north-approaching street which is Agate. Once across the bay you will be on Balboa Peninsula. Once there you will find the Balboa Fun Zone and Pavilion. Continuing northwest on Balboa Blvd. brings you to Newport Blvd. and then back to PCH.

Bring me photos/drawings or post a link to untagged images (in the comment section) of your excursion for extra homework and have fun.

Eight Unit 1 Projects are now complete.

Final Project Update

A DonorsChoose project was placed in Room 11's name recently to supply most of what we will need for our final project. I am posting this link because until October 22, the DonorsChoose board is matching all donations which use the promo code INSPIRE during checkout. All gifts are tax deductible. So, if you know of anyone with some extra cash laying around looking for a tax write-off send them our way. We are already $70 dollars up.

Forty-Third Day of School

Today we learned the important skill of how to summarize a selection. A summary is different than a retell in that it only gives the main idea of a selection without details. A good summary is about a sentence long and answers the questions: where, when, who, what, and how, often in that order, Today we summarized two selections. We found that some genres may not have a setting so where and when will be excluded from the summary. Summarization is a good skill to be practicing at home during reading time especially if a child is being read to.

We also recalled the selection we read about Alexander Graham Bell and developed essential questions to ask in an interview. Some students shared their interviewing skills again. The students who shared their interview are quite likely the same students to be earning a 4 on their report card in speaking. Our essential questions were:

• What did Alexander Graham Bell do for a living?
• Tell me about Alexander Graham Bell's mother.
• What did Alexander Graham Bell try to do when he was young?
• Tell about Alexander Graham Bell as a teacher.
• What was Alexander Graham Bell famous for?

Six students have completed and turned in their Unit 1Project.

Tomorrow the following question will be asked in class.

Hal has 3 chance tickets. Jude has the same amount of chance tickets as Kip. Altogether there are 15 chance tickets. How many chance tickets does Kip have? Explain how you know.

Unit 2 Week 1 Preview

Our weekly themes in this second unit will center around our families and our neighbors having already examined ourselves, our abilities, and our growth. Our last idea about teams was that families are the most important kind of team. This week, we will explore the idea of families taking care of each other. For a unit project students will focus on a worker of their choice and write an expository piece about them. Our oral vocabulary words are guide, protect, provide, separate, wild. Our sight words are her, our, they, two. Our comprehension strategy this week will be to focus on summarizing a selection. We learn to summarize by developing the skill of distinguishing main ideas from details. Summarizing a selection is a different skill than a retell. Where a retell would be to tell a story in our own words with as much interesting detail as possible, a summary isolates only the most important ideas answering the basic questions of who? what? where? when? why? and perhaps how? This story is about a girl walking in the forest who seeks food and rest in the home of 3 bears. In phonics and spelling, will take a more detailed look at some long vowel spellings this week beginning with 'a_e'  (cane) and 'i_e' (ride) along with inflectional ending '-ed'. In grammar we will discuss sentence subjects and nouns.

For Social Science we will continue comparing and contrasting the past with the present (HSS 1.1.4) (tested). We will examine photos of schools long ago.