Sulima's Scoop - Week of November 3

Weekly Reminders:
*Lesson 10 spelling pretest on Monday.

*No School on Tuesday - Teacher Institute.

*Buona Beef District Fundraiser on Wednesday. (Click here: http://www.ccsd66.org/PTO/Nov52008_BB.pdf)

*Picture Retakes on Thursday.

*Parent Support Group Meeting Thursday evening, 7-9 at PV.

*Lesson 10 spelling test on Friday.

Plan Ahead:

*Monday, Nov. 10 - poinsettia order forms due.

*Friday, Nov. 14 - Roller Skating permission slips due.

*Tuesday, Nov. 18 - Roller Skating Party, 4:00-6:45.

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Help Wanted:
The Social Studies committee is looking for two parents who have an education or history background to be involved in the adoption of new Social Studies textbooks. You would have to meet with the committee and provide input choosing our textbook for the coming years. The Social Studies committee will be meeting once every other month for the next two years. Please email mpellin@ccsd66.org if you would be interested in joining the Social Studies committee. Thank you!

November 3 through November 14, 2008 - Book Worm Angels

We are delighted to be holding a book drive for Book Worm Angels, a program designed to place New or Gently Used Fun Books in Chicago Elementary Schools where a majority of the children read below grade level. Please look on your book shelves...look in your attic..look in your basement...ask your friends and neighbors to look for new or gently used fun books that could help a child (PreK-8th grade) learn the enjoyment of reading. Please no religious, text books or encyclopedias.

Halloween Thank You: I would like to thank all the parents that made our Halloween Party a success. We all had a "spook-tacular" time!

Classroom Happenings:

Science: We will continue our worm study. Children will bring home their worms on Friday. They should make sure their soil is moist. Worms will need to return to school on Wednesday or Thursday. They will need to worm-sit for a few days. On Monday, we will go over the race track rules for our "Worm Race." The children should use the information they have gained from our experiments to develop a race track that meets the criteria and will encourage their worm to move toward the finish line. Race tracks will need to be brought in on Thursday, which is racing day! May the best worm win!

Social Studies: We will begin chapter 5. This chapter focuses on the important people of the Northeast. We will start by studying the Narragansett Tribe.

Accelerated Math: We have now finished our unit on Data and Statistics. Your child will receive their chapter 3 test early in the week. This week, we will begin working on chapter 4. This chapter covers multiplying whole numbers. We will begin the week by reviewing the multiplication properties. Then we will move onto estimating and finding exact products when multiplying by 2 and 3-digit numbers.

Spelling: Our spelling unit fits in perfectly with our English lessons this week. We will be working on making nouns plural that end in a y. Please practice your words in cursive.

English: We will continue our study of nouns. Our focus on Wednesday and Thursday will be on forming plural nouns.

Reading: The children will receive a Readers' Theater script on Monday. They should practice their reading parts each day. Scripts should stay in their reading pocket all week. The children may have time during class to practice with other students. We will read together on Thursday. The children will also watch Skylark, which is the sequel to Sarah, Plain and Tall, on Thursday and Friday.

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Language Arts Students: Please send in a 1 GB portable storage companion (flash drive). Make sure your name is on the flash drive. You can get these at Wal-Mart, Target, Best Buy, etc. (Look for sales...the cheapest one will do.) We will be typing stories and projects in the computer lab. What doesn't get finished, we will finish at home. Please try to have one by the week of Nov. 10. Thanks!

Sulima's Scoop - Week of October 27

Weekly Reminders:
*Earl the Earthworm's habitat is due on Monday.
*Chapter 3 Accelerated Math test on Wednesday.
*Open book/notes social studies end of chapter assessment on Wednesday.
*Lesson 8 spelling review test on Friday.
*Halloween parade Friday at 1:15 (outside...weather permitting).
*Halloween Party Friday at 1:30.

Plan Ahead:
*Book Worm Angels drive November 3-14.
*No School/Teacher Institute on Tuesday, November 4.
*Picture Retakes on Thursday, November 6.
*Parent Support Group on Thursday, November 6 at Prairieview (7:00-9:00).

Halloween Costumes: Children should bring their costume to school in a bag labeled with their name. They will have a very brief time to change into their costumes. There will not be time for putting on make-up. We will change in our classrooms. Boys and girls will be in different classrooms. They will be unable to go to the washroom to change into their costume. If possible send in a costume that can go over your child's clothing.

Halloween Party Helpers: Those parents who signed up to help with the party may arrive around 1:15. Please check-in with the office before coming up.

NutriKids Lunch Accounts: If you are going to send in a check to replenish your child's lunch account, please continue to send in on Mondays. If you have extra lunch tickets at home, please send them in a sealed envelope with your child's name, homeroom, and number of tickets. The money for these tickets will be deposited into your child's account.

Classroom Happenings:
Science: We will begin our worm study this week. The children will be using the scientific process during our worm observations.

Social Studies: The children will take an open book/notes assessment on chapter 4 on Wednesday. They can review for this by looking over their t-charts and quizzes/worksheets for each lesson, reread the lessons, and attempt the problems in the chapter review (located at the end of the chapter).

Accelerated Math: We have now finished our data/statistics chapter. We will take the chapter 3 test on Wednesday. Monday and Tuesday will be used to review the many tables, charts, graphs, and ways to summarize and organize data. This will be more of a performance-based test. The children will be given sets of data and will be asked to organize the data in a variety of ways. Part of the test (not on Wednesday) will be in the computer lab. The children will be asked to create a double bar graph based on a set of data. We will do another sample computer graph before the final assessment.

Spelling: We will be working on lesson 8 this week. This is a review unit. Your child will receive a list on Monday. We do not take pretests on review weeks. The children should spend the week working on the workbook pages and reviewing the rules from all the previous lessons. The list that they receive on Monday is not necessarily the words that will be on the test on Friday, but it does help your child focus on the specific rules that we practiced in lesson 1-7. The test will be a different format. The children will be asked to find the misspelled word in each group of words.

English: On Monday, your child will receive their new English contract. They will need to choose their enrichment option by Tuesday. We will begin the new unit on Wednesday.

Reading: We will begin the week by finishing Sarah, Plain and Tall. The children will continue to work with the 4 types of questions (Right There, Think & Search, Author & You, and On Your Own). We will also watch the movie on Sarah, Plain and Tall.

Writing: The children will finish their creative Halloween narratives. I am hoping to also make a class book of Halloween Alliterations this week. Alliteration is the repetition of an initial sound. (Ex. The spooky spotted spider sat still on its stringy silk.)

Earl the Earthworm...

Here are some links that may help in the designing of Earl's habitat.

http://yucky.discovery.com/flash/worm/index.html

http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/academic/agriculture/sustainable_agriculture/faqs/earthworm-faq.html

http://www.nysite.com/nature/fauna/earthworm.htm

http://www.backyardnature.net/earthwrm.htm

http://www.mcwdn.org/Animals/Earthworms.html

http://www.amonline.net.au/factsheets/earthworms.htm

http://www.naturewatch.ca/english/wormwatch/about/ecology.html

http://www.urbanext.uiuc.edu/worms/facts/index.html

http://www.biologyjunction.com/earthworm%20facts.htm

http://www.allaboutworms.com/10-great-earth-worm-facts

https://c1.livetext.com/doc/3396732/17337605

Please remember that Earl's habitat is due on or before

Monday, October 27.

Sulima's Scoop - Week of October 20

Northeast Region Update:
I would like to thank the following families for making our northeast resource tasting a success: Fisher, Pierropoulos, Blazevich, Knight, Dourdourekas, Wascher, Kryk, and Liu. We enjoyed grapes hand-picked from the vineyard, cranberry juice & dried cranberries harvested from the bog, pancakes (made by Chef Sulima), and maple syrup made from sap collected from the many sugar maple trees found in the northeast. What a treat!


Weekly Reminders:
*Lesson 7 spelling pretest on Monday.
*Lesson 4 science quiz on Tuesday.
*Early dismissal on Wednesday, 11:00.
*Unit 1 English test on Thursday (The Sentence).
*Lesson 7 spelling test on Friday.




Plan Ahead:

*Worm Habitat due on Monday, October 27.
*Halloween Parade and Party on Friday, October 31.





Band Update:
Wow! What a responsible group of band students I have this year! They are doing well with choosing band buddies, watching their schedule, and completing assignments missed. I am so proud of them! This is such a WONDERFUL opportunity for them to learn to play an instrument and develop responsibility skills that will last a lifetime.

Classroom Happenings:
Science: We will finish our study of soil on Monday. The children will have a quiz on lesson 4 on Tuesday. This is the last lesson in Chapter 7, The Rock Cycle. We will review during the rest of the week and take the Chapter 7 test on Friday.
Some helpful sites:
http://www.oum.ox.ac.uk/thezone/rocks/games/index.htm
http://www.tki.org.nz/r/wick_ed/science/rock.php
http://www.learner.org/interactives/rockcycle/diagram.html
http://classroom.jc-schools.net/coleytech/dynamic_curriculum/science/rockcyc_jeapordy.ppt
http://www.kidsgeo.com/geology-games/rocks-game.php
http://www.lizzadromuseum.org/rm/Challenge.html

On Monday, your child will receive a note from Earl the Earthworm. They will need to research what Earl would need to live and create a habitat that would support those needs. These worm habitats will be due on or before Monday, October 27.

Social Studies: We will continue our study of the Northeast by exploring Chesapeake Bay. Find out more about Chesapeake Bay at:
http://www.beanies-webworld.com/chesapeake/index.html
http://www.baydreaming.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chesapeake_Bay
http://www.chesapeakebay.net/bayfun.htm
http://www.livingclassrooms.org/lbo/index.html

Accelerated Math: The children will take an open book/notes checkpoint review on Monday. They should have a solid understanding of qualitative/quantitative, line plots and frequency tables, bar graphs, line graphs, pictographs, pie charts, mean, median, mode, and range. They will be allowed to use a calculator during this review. On Tuesday and Wednesday, our focus will be on stem-and-leaf plots. Stem-and-leaf plots provide a concise way to organize many numbers by their front digits. At the end of the week, we will explore coordinate graphing.

Spelling: We will work on lesson 7 this week. These are words spelled with ie or ei. Remember this phrase: i before e, except after c, or when sounded like a, as in neighbor or weigh.

English: The children have now finished the lessons from Unit 1, The Sentence. We will review for the test on Tuesday. Our test will be on Thursday. The children should review the following concepts:
*Sentence or Fragment
*Statements and Questions
*Commands and Exclamations
*Subjects and Predicates
*Simple Subjects and Simple Predicates
*Correcting Run-on Sentences

Reading: We will be working on the 4 types of questions this week. We have already covered 2 types during our Earthquake Terror book clubs. These were the "thin" (Right There) questions and "thick" (Author and You) questions. We will add Think and Search and On Your Own questions this week. We will be using a wonderful short novel called Sarah, Plain and Tall. The children will be answering and writing Right There, Author & You, Think and Search, and On Your Own questions based on this novel.

Writing: The children are using their creativity and imagination to write Halloween stories. We will be going to the computer lab on Thursday to publish these wonderful stories.

Sulima's Scoop - Week of October 13

Weekly Reminders:
*No school on Monday due to Columbus Day.
*No spelling lesson this week.
*Tuesday we are following a Monday schedule.
*Science quiz on weathering, erosion, and sinkholes on Tuesday.
*Northeast Map test on Tuesday.
*Book Fair on Thursday, 6:30-8:00.
*Social Studies quiz (open notes/book) on Friday.


Plan Ahead:
*Early Dismissal (11:00) on Wednesday, October 22.
*Halloween Parade/Party on Friday, October 31.

Classroom Happenings:
Science: We are really "digging deep" into our Earth Science study with lesson 4 on soil. We will compare particle sizes in different types of soil, describe what soil is, and explain how soil forms and differ.
Get the "dirt on soil" at: http://school.discoveryeducation.com/schooladventures/soil/
Take and Underground Adventure at: http://www.fieldmuseum.org/undergroundadventure/virtual_tour/index.shtml
Is soil made through magic? Find out at: http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/feature/education/squirm/skQ1.html
Solve the case at "Soiled Again" http://www.urbanext.uiuc.edu/gpe/case2/index.html

Social Studies: Now that we know about the land of the northeast, we are going to move on to explore what resources are common in this region. I am looking for a few volunteers to bring in some goodies to help make these resources more memorable. If you are interested, please contact me, and I will let you know what you can send in to help make this possible. The students will be taking an open book/notes quiz on chapter 4, lesson 2 on Friday.

Accelerated Math: This week we will continue our unit on data and statistics. On Tuesday, we will focus on summarizing data using mean, median, mode, and range. On Wednesday, we will return to the computer lab to finish our double bar graphs. The children will also explore the other kinds of graphs that OpenOffice Calculator (Excel) can make. During the rest of the week we will work on graphing data and reading graphs. Our graphing will include: bar graphs, line graphs, pie graphs, and pictographs.

Spelling: We are taking the week off of spelling due to the shortened week. Please note: most four day weeks we will do spelling. The next unit is a more difficult one, and the fourth grade team felt a full week would be better for the children.

English: We will continue with our unit on sentences. This week we will cover subjects and predicates, simple subjects, simple predicates, and correcting run-on sentences. Since we are not doing spelling this week, my plan is to do English on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. These lessons will conclude this chapter. Our test on sentences will be on Thursday, October 23.

Reading: We will finish A Family Apart this week. The children have been doing a wonderful job on GIST summaries and character traits. We will have a comprehension test (children can use their book) on Thursday. They will not have a reader's response on this test. It will be multiple choice, true & false, and one question on character traits.

Sulima's Scoop - Week of October 6

Weekly Reminders:

*Midpoint of trimester one...please check your child's grades online.

*Beginning band lessons start this week.

*Science Quiz covering the Rock Cycle on Monday.

*Lesson 6 spelling pretest on Monday.

*Accelerated Math test covering Chapter 2 on Tuesday.

*Lesson 6 spelling test on Friday.

Plan Ahead:

*No school on Monday, October 13.

*We will follow a Monday schedule on Tuesday, October 14.

*Northeast Region test on Tuesday, October 14.

*Book Fair on Thursday, October 16, from 6:30-8:00.

Classroom Happenings:

Science: The students will take a quiz on the rock cycle on Monday. This will conclude lesson 2. In lesson 3, we will attempt to answer how weathering and erosion affect rocks. We will probably have a quiz on lesson 3 on Friday. Watch your child's assignment notebook for a definite date.

Social Studies: We will begin our tour of the northeast this week. Our focus will be on the land and resources of the northeast. The children should be studying the 11 states in the northeast at home. We will take our northeast map test on Tuesday, October 14. The children will need to know location and spelling of each state. They can also earn 1/4 point for each capital city that they correctly identify and if they can label our nation's capital.

Fun Links to help practice for the northeast test:

http://users.tellurian.com/teach/regions/

http://www.sheppardsoftware.com/web_games.htm

http://www.maps.com/FunFacts.aspx?nav=FF

http://www.pibmug.com/files/map_test.swf

http://www.sheppardsoftware.com/states_experiment_drag-drop_Intermed_State15s_500.html

http://www.primarygames.com/states/start.htm

Accelerated Math: Our pretests on chapter 2 showed that the children did not need to spend a great deal of time on the concepts covered in this chapter. We have done a quick review of addition properties, using compatible numbers or compensation while solving problems mentally, inverse operations, rounding whole numbers and decimals (to get a closer estimate), adding and subtracting whole numbers, and adding and subtracting decimals. We will review all these concepts one last time on Monday. Our test on this chapter will be on Tuesday. Our next unit will be on data and statistics. We will begin this unit on Wednesday.

Spelling: Please help your child practice their spelling words at home in cursive. We are working on lesson 6 words this week.

English: On Monday, I will meet with each child to discuss their selection for an English enrichment projects. We will begin our sentence unit on Tuesday. This week we will review sentences versus fragments, statements, questions, commands, and exclamations. If your child has shown mastery of these concepts on the pretest, they will be working on their enrichment projects during the time I am teaching these lessons in class.

Reading: We will continue our historical fiction novel, A Family Apart. Ask your child about the huge sacrifice that was made in the fourth chapter. We will continue working on our GIST summaries (20 words or less). This strategy is helping to focus the children on the most important events and details in the story. We will also work on character traits this week.