December 7 - 11

This week we looked for word chunks and words within words when we read. The students were very adept at finding chunks like "sh," "ing," and "ch." We also found many of our sight words (an, day, to, he, me, my...) inside larger words. We have talked a lot about how practicing something hard makes you better at it. We are now re-reading our guided reading books independently for 10 straight minutes every day. Please remind your students to take 10-20 minutes each night to practice reading, and remind them of the importance of re-reading books again and again!

In writing we wrote about what we like to do in the snow and then in the other seasons of the year. We discussed what makes each season different than the others and what acitivites we like to do depending on the weather, and what we like to do no matter what the weather is like. Students are using many resources to remember how to spell unknown words: making their best guess based on what sounds they hear, looking at their word rings, finding words around the room, and remembering words they have read in their guided reading books.

This week in math we measured the length of many things around the room using nonstandard units (dominos, dice, our hands...). We also continued to study the penny and nickel, make the largest two digit number possible (reviewing place value), use tally marks, make up equations based on story problems, and find pairs of numbers that add up to ten. We also looked for patterns in addition and practiced adding doubles (5+5) to help us solve harder problems (if you know 5+5 it will be easier to figure out 5+6 or 5+4).

I have begun filling out second quarter progress reports which will go home at the end of the month. Please let me know if you would like to meet in January to discuss your child's academic and social achievement.

Dates to remember:

• 12/23/09 Dismissal at 1:20
  
• 12/24/09 - 1/1/10 No School
• 1/4/09 - 1/8/09 Optional Intersession (contact office for enrollment inquiries)