Crew News 12.15.11

Students did a GREAT job leading the All School Meeting! Watching students overcome nerves and show leadership at the all school meeting was a highlight of the week!

  

Keep Up the Good Work with Technology :) Over the break and during the next semester, students are encouraged to keep up the good work with technology at home.  *Students can log onto kidblog.org/MrsLaurensCrew to write reading response blogs about what they are reading. (I have to approve all blogs/comments before they will appear). *Students are also welcome to log on to TypingPal to work on typing skills. Here is more information about how to log on.

 

Holiday Celebration For tomorrow, I have invited students to wear their pajamas to school and to bring from home their favorite holiday/winter books. Students can also bring a pillow or stuffed animal. We will have a celebration at the end of the day where students will enjoy hot chocolate and reading stories to each other. Sounds like a cozy and festive way to spend our afternoon!

Crew Learning Expedition: We have continued our geography study in learning about landforms and becoming experts in Colorado geography. HINTS AT HOME: Share some interesting facts you learned about Colorado geography.

Writing/Language Workshop: This week, we have been practicing writing summaries. This is tough to master, so we will revisit it in January. HINTS AT HOME: Have your child summarize something they read at home.

Math: Today we took our unit assessment on place value. Students should be comfortable with writing and comparing numbers to the ten-thousands place. It is okay if they are still not comfortable with decimals/fractions. They are not expected to master this yet. HINTS AT HOME: Continue studying multiplication/division facts at home. There are tons of great internet/ipad/cell phone games/resources that make practicing these fun.

Reading Workshop: We continued working on the reading strategy of "monitoring understanding." Students demonstrated that they could not only identify when they were having trouble understanding, but also that they could use their strategies to increase understanding. HINTS AT HOME: Hope you enjoy some great reads over the break!

Electronic Progress Reports (EPRs): EPRs will be available through Parent Portal tomorrow. Please see the email sent home on Wednesday about grades this semester. If you have questions or concerns, I would be happy to meet with you after the break.

Schedule Change: We will be in school next Friday (December 16) and January 3^rd is a Teacher Workday. Students will return from the break on Wednesday, January 4^th. This is different than other schools in the district, so please be aware of the change. 

Music Blog: Check out Ms. Cheryl's blog about what the students are doing in music! http://remsmusic.wordpress.com/ 

Dec 16: Winter Celebration (Bring favorite holiday stories & wear PJs)

     **Electronic Progress Reports available through Parent Portal

Dec 19-Jan 2: Holiday Break

Jan 3: Teacher Work Day

Jan 4: Students Return to School
Jan 28: REMS Winter Festival
Feb 29-Mar 1: Winter Voyage

Crew News 12.8.11

Thank you for coming to student led conferences! A big thank you for coming to student led conferences this week. It is a exciting time for parents to celebrate all the great work and learning that we are doing in our classroom. Students reflected how proud they felt and their determination to work on their goals. Awesome!

  

Holiday Celebration Next Friday, I am going to invite students to wear their pajamas to school and to bring from home their favorite holiday/winter books. We will have a celebration at the end of the day where students will enjoy hot chocolate and reading stories to each other. Sounds like a cozy and festive way to spend our afternoon!

Crew Learning Expedition: Students have been learning a lot about geography this week. They have looked at continents/oceans of the world, regions of the U.S., types of maps, reading a map grid, the compass rose and using a map key. HINTS AT HOME: Share some interesting facts you learned about geography.

Writing/Language Workshop: Our new genre study is BOOK REVIEWS. We noticed that an important part of a book review is a summary of the story, so in writing we have been practicing our skills of summarizing. Students have found it challenging to give an overview of the story without making it too detailed or too brief. Tricky! HINTS AT HOME: Have students summarize (out loud or in writing) a story they are reading at home.

Math: We have moved from numbers in the ten thousands to decimals: tenths and hundredths. To help build understanding of decimals/fractions being parts of a whole, we have used base-ten blocks and shading which helps visualize these numbers. HINTS AT HOME: Continue studying multiplication/division facts at home. There are tons of great internet/ipad/cell phone games/resources that make practicing these fun.

Reading Workshop: Our next reading theme unit is titled “Now and Then.” We have been reading a variety of text that compares people, places, and cultures in the present and past. The reading strategy we are working on is MONITORING UNDERSTANDING. We have defined this as noticing when you are or are not understanding text, and then using one of the many strategies you know to understand (reread, reflect on meaning, ask questions, used genre knowledge, and etc.). HINTS AT HOME: Have you child point out a spot in their nightly reading of where they notice they were not understanding, and then tell you about what strategy they used to comprehend.

All School Meeting: On December 14^th, our crew will be leading the all school meeting. Parents welcome! We will be wearing Santa hats to be festive. :)

Spelling : Here are this week’s spelling words. Spelling practice homework and tests are due/on Wednesdays.

-Spelling List Week 12

-Description of Spelling Practice Options

Electronic Progress Reports (EPRs): EPRs will be available through Parent Portal. I will give more information about these next week.

Schedule Change: We will be in school next Friday (December 16) and January 3^rd is a Teacher Workday. Students will return from the break on Wednesday, January 4^th. This is different than other schools in the district, so please be aware of the change.

Dec 14: Our Crew Leads All School Meeting (Bring your Santa hat)

Dec 16: Winter Celebration (Bring favorite holiday stories)

     **Electronic Progress Reports available through Parent Portal

Dec 19-Jan 2: Holiday Break

Jan 3: Teacher Work Day

Jan 4: Students Return to School

Crew News 12.1.11

Student Led Conferences Part II Thank you for signing up for student led conferences next week. Here is a little bit more information about this conference. Preparation:          To prepare for student led conferences, students will be reviewing their work to select samples from each content area that they would like to showcase. This is a thoughtful process for students to reflect about their learning. Students will practice their presentation skills to gain confidence in explaining their selected works as well as why they were chosen. The Conference:          The student is the presenter. The parents are the audience. The teacher is the timekeeper and the facilitator. Parent’s Role During the Conference: Please arrive on time with your child to the conference (it is preferred not to have younger siblings present so that the focus is on the student).           ***Please ask probing questions! Students will have prepared to speak about their selected works, but it is very beneficial to ask them questions about why they were selected. Here are sample questions to ask:          -What makes this your best work?          -Why did you select this piece?          -If you could go back and work more on this, what would you do?          -What was important to you as you worked on this piece?          -How does this relate to what you learned before?          -What would you like someone to notice about you as a (math/reading/writing) student?          -How can you use what you have learned in the real world?          -What are you most proud of?          -What has been a challenge? How did you work to overcome that challenge?    If you have questions about the format or process of student led conferences, I would be happy to clarify. Again, these conferences are a time to celebrate and not a time to express concerns. I am excited for you to come and see all the great learning we have been doing!

 

Technology Launch: This week, students have learned about how to use their district email, document sharing, kidblogs, and Typing Pal. With each of these, we will be practicing in class and library before there is any expectation to do these at home. I am glad to see so much enthusiasm about this!  Please check out this Q&A about Google Apps used at home. Please read!

  

Crew Learning Expedition: This week we have been using some expedition time to prepare for student led conferences. Students updated their portfolios with this year’s work, and tomorrow they will begin selecting work they want to share at conferences. Also, we began a mini-unit on geography that we will be working on through December. During a gallery walk, students brainstormed what they already know about this topic and what questions they have. HINTS AT HOME: If you can, please send in various kinds on maps and geographical books/puzzles for us to look at during the next two weeks.

Writing Workshop: Besides our launch of technology, we have been revisiting what makes a good sentence (capital, punctuation, spelling, clear idea of who/what and an action). We have been brainstorming why it is easy to identify a good sentence, but it seems challenging for this to transfer into our writing. Hmm! HINTS AT HOME: Ask students to do some writing at home. Ask them to show you what makes a good sentence.

Math: This unit expands our understanding of place value up to the millions. Students have done a great job with reading and comparing numbers with seven digits. HINTS AT HOME: Continue studying multiplication/division facts at home. There are tons of great internet/ipad/cell phone games/resources that make practicing these fun.

Reading/Language Workshop: We are building up to our new genre study, which still has not been revealed. To prepare for the study, we have been thinking about what things we love about books and what big things we remember about a book (which will develop into summarizing). HINTS AT HOME: Many students are choosing books that are too easy or too difficult. Check in to see that students are reading just right books at home!

All School Meeting: On December 14^th, our crew will be leading the all school meeting. Parents are always welcome to come to these! It is a fun way to see how we build culture and to see what is going on at Renaissance.

Spelling : In an effort for students to deepen their understanding of spelling patterns (not just for the weekly test but so that it transfers into their independent writing), I have asked that students begin doing weekly spelling practice homework. Students have a choice on what spelling practice they would like to do. As the year continues, I will add to this list. Spelling homework will be due on Wednesdays.

-Spelling List Week 11

-Description of Spelling Practice Options

Book Orders: New scholastic book orders will go home on Friday. Please submit orders online by next Wednesday, December 7th, so that orders will be delivered before we leave for winter break. The website is www.scholastic.com/bookclubs  and our class activation code is GP449.

 

Dec 5-9: Student Led Conferences (Don’t forget to sign up!)

Dec 14: Our Crew Leads All School Meeting

Dec 16: Electronic Progress Reports available through Parent Portal

Dec 19-Jan 2: Holiday Break

Jan 3: Teacher Work Day

Jan 4: Students Return to School