Spelling Bee and Our New School Wide Unit of Study

Connections January 15th– February 22nd

Spelling Bee February 26th   

The theme CONNECTIONS is what your child will be studying during our fourth thematic unit.  During this time, we will be focusing on growth, division, reunion, and industrialization in the Americas mainly during the 1800s but not limited to this time period.

During this theme our school will celebrate a Spelling Bee week which will include class spelling bees, lower and upper el spelling bees, and a school wide spelling bee. All students are encouraged to participate in the spelling bee that will be held in their classroom. We want all students to work with the words used in the spelling bee to help build their vocabulary and spelling knowledge.

However, if your child is not comfortable participating in this event, they can also participate in other ways. If your child decides not to take part in their classroom bee, they will need to use the spelling bee words in another way to share with their classmates. Some of these ways include but are not limited to writing a story using as many of the spelling bee words as possible, creating multiple funny sentences using the words, create a board game using the words, create a game involving good, physical activity with the words, create a classroom scavenger hunt with the words.

When words are involved, the possibilities are endless!

Scripps National Spelling Bee lists were sent home today.  Please check with your student, you will need these words in hard copy form, since we are not authorized to post these words digitally.

Home Projects

Reminder that our home projects are due Friday, January 18th.  Next week each grade level will be displaying their projects school wide.

Our display schedule:

Level 3: Wednesday, January 23rd

Level 2: Thursday, January 24th

Level 1: Friday, January 25th

The students have been having an amazing time with all of our fun STEM activities this week.  Thank you for your support with these home projects.

Cultural Festival

Our Cultural Festival with be held on Friday, November 16th from 1-3 p.m.  This is the event where your child will present their home project school wide.  Those of you who are familiar with our International Festival, the Cultural Festival will now replace that event.  Please continue to work on your projects, they will be due Thursday, November 15th.  I am so excited to see their project interests, imagination, and hard work come together for this amazing event.  Please see our previous blog posts for more information regarding the criteria for the event.

Home Project for Our Cultural Festival

The next home project is on the theme of Independence, think U.S. history. This will be for the Cultural Festival in November. Here are some ideas, but not limited to: 13 colonies, Statue of Liberty, Liberty Bell, flag, presidents, states & capitals, geography research on a state, national monuments, Declaration of Independence, Native Americans, Pilgrims, historic figures, the ideas are limitless.

The students will need a visual aide to represent their project. They can use modeling clay, poster board, diorama, mobile display, power point, etc.. They will need written titles, explanations, or information. The projects will be displayed in our classroom during the festival for your child to present to parents, teachers, and students.

I will get back to you soon with more details regarding the cultural festival.

Home Projects 2018-2019 School Year

Our blog page for home projects for the year can be found here.  For those of you who are new to our class, please take the time to read over the description of home projects and feel free to email me with any questions.  For those of you who are returning, the projects are similar in structure, just a change in themes.  The themes are school wide  and many surround school wide events.  Our first project will be due by Friday, October 5th.  Students can bring their project in at anytime between now and the 5th of October.

If you have questions or concerns, please let me know.

Thank you!

I want to thank everyone for their support today with our Earth Day service project and field experience.  The weather turned out to be beautiful and we had an amazing time.  I couldn’t do it without all your support, thank you!

We will be doing some follow-up work inside the classroom on Monday, but I would encourage you to continue conversations related to the important role we have in caring for our planet and the differences we can make.

I am looking forward to seeing everyone’s home project this week relating to Earth Day.

(Families who order pizza, your student’s pizza will be available on Monday)

 

Home Projects

Thank you for all your support with our state home projects. Reminder for this months project:

April: Our Earth

Earth day is coming up on April 22nd.  This is a great opportunity for students to do home projects in relation to our earth.  Some ideas could be: ways we can conserve water, endangered species, recycling, botany, how to compost, etc.  These projects are due April 28th, but I would really encourage students to avoid the last week of the month.

 

50 States Home Project

Your child should have brought home their 50 states home project template.  At the top I have written the state they will research.  This template is a guideline for information, but not a limitation.  Please help your child be creative with their visual aid and don’t forget the written piece.  The project is due at the end of March.

Home Projects

The “I wonder…” projects have been so much fun this month.  Thank you for supporting your child with these important assignments.  Tomorrow is the last day of the month and we will be entering our new home project topic for March.  If your child has not yet completed their project for February, please encourage them to be accountable and complete the work, even if it is late.

Our next home project is to choose one of the 50 states, every child will have a different state.  Tomorrow I will be taking sign ups, so I have asked each child to come to class with their top 3 state choices.  I will provide a template to guide their project research for this project.  I like to think of this project as a mini International Festival.  If the children want to bring artifacts, samples of food, vacation pictures, and such, they are welcomed for this project.  If you have questions or concerns, please let me know.

Also, on a side note.  I am doing something a little different for Roaring Readers and hope to have these ready for those students starting tomorrow.  I will send a separate email explaining the change.