Sorry, I had a meeting at the end of day and although folders are filled and ready to go, they did not get passed back. If you child forget theirs today, please send them to school tomorrow. So, the post about IXL will apply tomorrow. Thanks.
Monthly Archives: September 2015
IXL
Hi, the following letter was sent home in their take home folders today. If your child forgot their folder, please have them bring them tomorrow. Their paper will have their user name and password. (You can access the IXL link directly from the blog. It is posted under school links. On a desk top these links on the their right hand side and on tablet and phones scroll to the bottom.)
Dear Parent,
I am pleased to tell you that we will be once again using a website called IXL in our classroom this year. For those of you new to our classroom, IXL is a comprehensive math review site with an unlimited number of practice questions in thousands of skills—all of which are aligned to state standards. One of the best things about IXL is that your child can access it from home, so you have a chance to see your child’s progress!
To get your child started on your home computer, please follow these easy steps:
- Enter your child’s username and password and click Sign in.
Username_____________________
Password_____________________
- Click on Math at the top of the page and navigate to your child’s grade level.
- Find a skill to practice by doing one of the following:
- Select a specific skill to practice from the list of skills. You can place your mouse over any skill to see a sample question and click on the link to begin.
- Go to the Awards Each grade level presents challenges for your child to conquer and virtual prizes to be uncovered. Place your mouse over any challenge to begin.
In addition to making math practice exciting, IXL is designed to help your child learn at his or her own pace. The website is adaptive and will adjust to your child’s demonstrated ability level. The site also saves all of your child’s results, so you can monitor your child’s progress anytime by clicking on the Reports at the top of the page.
This resource is paid for by the school and it is an expectation that students will use this program on a regular basis. Throughout the year, I will post IXL lessons that coordinate with the unit of study in the classroom. You will find these on the classroom blog, under the page IXL. These Lessons will be homework. Please do not limit your child to only the homework lessons. Please encourage your child to work on IXL a little each day. Occasionally your child might struggle with a concept, please don’t have them continue on this concept if they are still not answering them correctly after reading several help prompts. IXL should be a fun learning tool and we don’t want any tears of frustration. If you do not have internet access in your home, please let me know.
Sincerely,
Ms. Brittany
Early Out
Reminder, tomorrow is early out at 1:00 p.m. I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend.
Homework Folders
First, thank you so much for helping your child learn accountability and making certain they are completing their nightly reading and returning their folders each week.
Today, in your child’s take home folder, they brought home a small slip of paper explaining our school literary magazine. This is an opportunity to create original work to be submitted to The MMA Review. The deadline for submissions is November 5th. If interested, students will be given class time to work on projects. Please feel free to talk with your child about some possible submissions pieces they would be interested in creating.
Also, we as a school are working hard to be mindful of our paper usage. I did not send home reading logs this week. My hope is that the habits are being established and that the reading is taking place for 20 minutes each night. If you feel that having an actual log helps your child be accountable for their reading, please let me know and I will place one in their folder, otherwise, I will not be sending them. Starting next week, we will be sending home a brief reading assignment to complete in relationship to their reading.
Home projects will start in October. Our first topic will be Zoology. Level 1: vertebrates, Level 2: the human body, and Level 3: invertebrates. I will first explain the criteria to the students tomorrow and then I will send out a blog post explaining the criteria and the topics through the end of the school year. So please be on the lookout.
Also, there was no flier sent out, but MMA cafe is starting tomorrow. Students may purchase items from the cafe for lunch. The menu will initially start small and will grow over the coming weeks. The following are items are available at this time:
Chocolate Milk ($1.00) Capri Sun ($.75) Microwave Mac n Cheese ($1.50) Pancakes (chocolate chip or blueberry 3 for $.75) Fruit Snacks (.$50) and Fruit/Nut bites ($.25 cents)
My understanding is that Jr. high will run the cafe on Tuesdays and 6th grade will run the cafe on Thursdays. The cafe is a fundraiser for their travel field trips in the spring.
As always, please feel free to share celebrations, concerns, or questions via email at bherrera@mariamontessoriacademy.org
Oh! Just a small side note, Ms. Susan will be out until Thursday due to training.
Gary Hogg
Today we had a wonderful assembly with Gary Hogg, a local author, who is nationally recognized for his work. The third graders were able to attend a special writers workshop with him. They focused on adding details and being more specific with their writing. This week in our take home folders there is a yellow order sheet for ordering Gary Hogg books. The deadline for ordering autographed books is tomorrow. Students can turn in their orders to the front office.
Pizza Friday and papers sent home
The form that was sent home for Pizza Friday was inaccurate since there is no school on Friday October 16th. The office is making new forms to be sent home. Only send the pink classroom pet note back if you do not want your child involved in the classroom pet. Also, Thursday is the last day to sign up for the 5k and receive a dress code friendly shirt. After Thursday you can still register, but will not receive a t-shirt. Remember that the back-to-school pancake breakfast will be the same morning as the 5k. We hope to see everyone there!