It is very nice to see the sun when I'm waking up for work these days. I hope that winter is soon gone, and that means spring break is around the corner. Winter grades will be coming out soon too. Here's the latest...
Language Arts This week we will be continuing our exploration and learning about the moon. We learned all about Mae Jemison (who recently did an AMA on Reddit btw), and her experience as the first woman of color sent into space. I read a short read-aloud book about the Apollo 11 landing and Neil Armstrong's first steps on the moon to the students, and we watched some real footage 'The Eagle' landing. Various other books about the moon will be read and discussed this week as well. Writer's Workshop We will be wrapping up our little hiatus from our regularly scheduled curriculum this week. Nouns were taught last week, verbs (or action words) this week. The students will be doing various activities finding verbs within sentences, building word walls daily with various verbs, and watching a few videos on verbs as well. Additionally, the students will finish up their 'noun dictionaries' from last week. Math The students have embarked on the latest unit in math. The topic is based all around graphs, data, and sorting. We will be creating various graphs (bar, pie, etc.) to look at data, and use more complex words to understand what the data means (greater/fewer than). The students are still continuing with their math scrolls with many students getting close the 1,000 mark (and some beyond!). Science On Tuesday, the students learned all about craters. We looked at some photographs, and explored the moon using Google Earth. There was a short experiment showing how craters are formed, and how to label the crater itself (floor, walls, rim). They just finished up a moon craft activity which will be hung in the hallway. Additionally, students spent time in the computer lab reading more about space on National Geographic Kids. Miscellaneous -A little birdie told me that some of you were able to make it to the PTA fundraiser/gala last week. There is another PTA meeting scheduled for March 3rd at Middleton (not sure on time at the moment), but come out if you can. Thank you for helping support this important organization! -Institute Day on Friday (2/27), and Pulaski Day on Monday (3/2). No School! -Student submissions for the playground equipment design contest are due by March 3rd. If you have any insights, experience or thoughts, pass them along. -Another big thanks to all of the parents who came out to read last week for Readers are Leaders week. I know I didn't get everyone in to read, but if you would still like an opportunity to come in, just contact me and we'll schedule something at a later date. That is all for now. Thanks for everything! ~Mr. Layes
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I came down with the flu on Thursday night and I'm still feeling the effects as of Sunday afternoon. Because of this, I'll be taking Monday off as well. I'm sorry for any inconveniences this has caused (I'd much rather be in the classroom). Next, I'd like to thank all of you who helped out with your kids' IXL homework last week. I realize that it was a ton of work, and I hope that with the time spent working on those lessons at school, the homework became less of a burden. I will be assigning more IXL homework in the future, but only 1-2 elements at a time. Another thank you to all of those parents who came out last week to read in room 130 Readers are Leaders week. I know that the students really enjoyed having special guests come in and read fun and special books in addition to hearing more about how important reading is to adults too. Hello everybody,
We just wrapped up an exciting week in room 130! We had a great field trip to see some Chinese acrobats. It was seriously fun, and had me and all the kids on the edge of their seat (ask them about the man standing on the chairs). We also celebrated our second publishing party with our finished informational text teaching stories. The books turned out great and I was very happy to learn so much about Minecraft, Christmas, butterflies, baking cookies, among other amazing topics. Readers Are Leaders week is starting tomorrow! If you would like to come in and read a book to the class and talk about how books have been important to you, please email me with a few possible times and I'll get back to you. Language Arts We are continuing with our informational text unit. We will be learning all about space, astronauts, and the moon landing. Students will discuss and recall important facts from the stories read, and highlight any informational text features that we see. Writer's Workshop We will be taking a week off from our normal writing curriculum to study nouns and verbs. Word work is something that I feel is important to highlight at this juncture. We will watch a few videos, work on a short dictionary, and perhaps introduce some silly mad-libs as well. Math Our class just finished up with our Unit 5 assessment, and I decided to take a week off from our curriculum to focus on IXL. Please see the page that will be sent home on Tuesday with instructions. Essentially, this will act like our reading log as there will be homework for the students every single night. Please initial when completed. As a class, we will be using IXL for our review lessons and independent work as well during our math block. Science/Social Studies Since our Language Arts unit is discussing space, I wanted to take the opportunity to shelf 'rocks' for two weeks and explore everything about space during our science instruction. We will be looking at images from the Hubble Space Telescope, asking questions and hopefully answering some of them too. We will use Google Earth and explore our moon and beyond. Additionally, we will learn more about President's Day, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. Miscellaneous -First off, I'd like to thank all of those parents who came out last week for winter conferences. I appreciate meeting each of you and sharing what I can about your child. If you felt that you need to talk further, please reach out at any time. -Thanks to those parents who were able to help chaperon our field trip. I hope the noisy bus ride didn't scare you. -Friday night is the PTA Adult night silent auction. Please think about supporting this cause and enjoying a night out at the same time. For more information, please see the Middleton Weekly. - Hello everybody,
I hope that all of you survived our little blizzard this weekend. I have to say that it was nice to have the day off after the Super Bowl, especially after how my Seahawks lost it in the last second. Yikes. Anyhoo, enough about me and my sporting woes. Here's the latest... Language Arts In this shortened week, the students will be looking more at informational text. We'll read one book about a harbor seal pup and another about a kangaroo joey. The students will work with partners to discuss things they learned in the book, and we'll continue to explore different ways to visualize the text. Asking students to be curious and wonder about these animals helps fuel discussion. On a side note, thank you to those of you who helped with the altered reading log/reading response homework. There is another this week as well. Writer's Workshop Because of our snow day, we will be continuing to work on our informational text teaching books until early next week. Our publishing party will be held on Tuesday. Until then, we are working on new punctuation strategies, reviewing craft moves we have learned from other authors, and finally choosing and editing one piece to publish. Math The math scrolls are a complete success in our room. Many students are well into the 300-400 range with a few pushing 1000 and beyond. This activity help reinforce base-10 knowledge, and we are looking at all the patterns they can find within the 100's chart. More puzzles will be coming their way as well. Science This week we were able to investigate a beautiful rock collection shared by Ms. K's room. The students were able to examine a variety of rocks that included obsidian, quartz, lead, pyrite, and pumice among others. It's great to see a room full of kids with magnifying glasses looking at cool rocks. They were very excited at learning the names of each rock, and the story behind the rock collection itself. Miscellaneous -Valentine's Day is coming up. Please be on the lookout for a letter that will be coming home that will give details about the holiday. Because it falls on a Saturday, and we have conferences on the Friday before, we will be celebrating next Thursday afternoon. Note, no candy should be brought to school. -Wellness Week is this week and the students are learning about how to keep their body healthy by eating good food and exercising regularly. We are using the track and field portion of GoNoodle to help us stay active in the classroom. Today the students learned about the steeplechase from a US Olympian. -Parent/Teacher conferences are scheduled for next Thursday evening and the following Friday morning. At this time I have about half of the student's parents signed up. Understand that this is an optional conference, and grades will be sent out in March. If you would like to schedule a conference and have yet to do so, or need help signing up, please contact me so I can help. Thanks. -After reading and being inspired by a few articles on social/emotional learning, I have decided that in the first few weeks of February I will invite each student to have lunch with me in my classroom (with partners). I have sat down with a couple of pairs already, and my only request is that we don't talk about school. I wanted to be able to get to know my students on a level at which I felt I could improve upon, and build even stronger rapport with them. -Our field trip is coming up next week. I have received all the permission slips, however, there are still a few students who have yet to pay. The cost is $6.75. I will reach out to those who haven't yet paid, and thank you to those that have (and put both the slip and money is a clearly marked envelope). That is all for now. Signing off ~Mr. Layes |
AuthorMr. Layes hails from the Pacific NW, cut his teeth on the streets of NYC, and now calls the Midwest... home. Archives
September 2017
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