Ms. Kaley's Classroom Room 24

Hi Everyone!

We have an eventful upcoming week!

Monday– Monday evening is the Winter Concert.  Students who come should be dressed in solid colored black pants and a solid colored shirt.  Students should arrive at the school at 6:15pm.  It will take place in the large gym that is in the Junior High.

Wednesday– Wednesday is our winter feast day!  Please remember to go to Track It Forward and look at December 19th for our sign up.  If you are bringing food or supplies, please please please have your signed up items in the south kiva no later than 11:45am.  This way we can have everything set up and when students come in from recess we can get started.  If you are planning on attending our luncheon, please be at the school by 11:50am.  This way you can get seated and when the students come back inside they can join you.  After our feast is all done, you may check your child out, if you wish.

Friday–  Friday afternoon is our Holiday party.  This party will take place at 12:45pm.  If you are planning on coming to help out and set up, please come at 11:30am and you can get set up while the kids are outside playing.  We will eat outside in the kiva while set up is going on.  Our room mother has a sign up on Track It Forward for December 21st.  Please visit Track It Forward to sign up on our event!

This coming week will bring a lot of excitement for our students and some out of schedule events (as stated above).  Some students are very sensitive to these kinds of changes and may not be able to express these feelings in words on how they are feeling.  Please remember to check in with your child and help reiterate that while we will be doing some fun activities, it is still school and school rules still apply.  December is an eager month for students and their emotions run high.  If you are able to make it to our feast and help out at our party to help, Ms. Misha and I would greatly appreciate it!  Thanks!

Past Week:

This past week we got to Zoology lessons in cultural.  Our 3rd graders were very happy to finally have it be their turn to make the Annelid earthworm model.  Students reviewed the parts of an earthworm and they should be able to tell you the basics of an earthworm.

Level 1s: Kinds of amphibians

Level 2s: Internal parts of a reptile

Level 3s: Earthworm models and review

The Lower El teachers had a representative from the computer reading program Imagine Learning on Wednesday after school.  To have your child get the correct amount of time on the program, we bumped the time up to 45 minutes when our class has the COW on Wednesday afternoon.  Students can also log on at home too to ensure their minutes and effectiveness of the program.

We’ve been talking about informational reading and writing and this week our students started on their Holiday from another country learning.  Students will work more on their reading and writing this coming week.

On Tuesday we had fun reviewing what a fact vs opinion is with each writing group.  For two of the groups we read The True Story of the Three Little Pigs.  It is a book about the Big Bad Wolf’s perspective on what he believes what happened to The Three Little Pigs.  The groups then picked apart what the facts were from the story and what the opinions were.

Colds and Illnesses:  Classrooms have been experiencing many students with colds, including ours.  Even with an eventful week ahead of us, if your child isn’t feeling well, please let them stay home and rest.

Our blog will be on Christmas vacation beginning at the end of the week!  I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday break and safe travels to anyone going anywhere!  Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!   Looking forward to seeing you all this week for our events!

Don’t forget about STEM Fair coming up in January!  Please review the previous posts and/or the project tab up top!

Ms. Kaley and Ms. Misha

Hello!

Holiday Feast December 19th

Our sign up for our Holiday feast is up on Track It Forward.  I have the food sign up available.  We will be doing soup options for our luncheon.  Please check out our sign up sheet.  We will be having immediate families joining us and some siblings, please plan for a crowd.

Snack Needed

We are in need of snack for the next two weeks.  We went through what was left for everyone to have something for snack this past week, but ran out by Friday.  The sign up on Track it Forward.

Our Holiday Party will be December 21st from 12:45pm-2:30pm

This past week in cultural lessons we did Botany, History, and Geography

Level 1s: How plants grow, Land and water landforms

Level 2s: Leaf venation symmetry, time to 5 minutes review, Earthquake parts and how they happen

Level 3s: Silurian period, Momentum in physics

Science- STEM activities

Our students were introduced to what Information writing and reading was this past Monday.  This week we will go over what a fact vs opinion is and do some practice activities.

Reminder- Monday is an early out!  Please have your student picked up at 1pm.

Hello All!

Thank you to everyone for a smooth field trip this past Friday.  The kids had a great time and they said they really enjoyed the workshop on simple machines.

STEM Fair Projects:  LE display the week of Jan 22nd.  Projects Due January 18th.

In January the school will host a STEM Fair display.  I talked to the kids this week on what their focuses will be:

1st grader’s projects:  Research a famous scientist and create a project about their life and what they did for science (what made them famous?)

2nd grade’s projects:  A simple science experiment that the student can do the scientific method on.  2nd graders should be able to: 1. Pick a focus (a topic), 2. Create a hypothesis for their topic, 3.  Conduct the experiment (take pictures/video for presentation display!) *include materials/supply list for experiment! *can the experiment be conducted multiple times? What kind of results happen each time, 4.  Write down observations, 5. Make a conclusion and was their hypothesis correct or incorrect?

3rd grader’s projects:  Choose between a project on a simple machine OR a demonstration that explains one of Newton’s Laws of Motion or a demonstration on how momentum or acceleration works.  3rd graders’ projects should be a display that can explain the meaning of the simple machine or laws of motion, explain why/how it works, and how it relates to real life.

Past Week:

3rd graders were excited to learn about round worms (such as earthworms).  We went over the parts of an earthworm and what they do.  We also looked at other kinds of Annelids such as leeches and how they are parasites.  2nd graders reviewed amphibians and the life cycle of a frog.  Since we have the COW on Wednesday afternoons, some 2nd graders got started on reading and researching on an amphibian of their choice.  1st graders learned what an amphibian is and learned they go through a change called “metamorphosis.”

3rd graders have now had a lesson on division with remainders (such as 67 divided by 8).  We will continue practicing this skill and then will work with a triple digit dividend and then move into division with a double digit divisor.  The 3rd graders have seen division in multiple ways with the use of our Test Tube material and also on a white board.  I’ve tied in their division into their multiplication, so they can see how the two are similar to each other.  A skill that is challenging for almost all our 3rd graders is a missing multiplier or missing multiplicand.  This is also true when it comes to division (ex. A x 6= 24 or 28 divided A= 4.

2nd graders are working towards seeing how addition and multiplication are similar.  This week they saw how when numbers go over 10 in a given place value the steps to solve in either addition or multiplication are similar on our materials.

1st graders have begun what we call dynamic addition.  Dynamic is when a given place value goes over 10 and there is exchanging that is needed.  We are starting basic right now, going up to just the 10s place.  As the skill develops they will work with addition that goes up to the thousands place.  This week we will look at subtraction and begin practicing.  1st graders will then have addition and subtraction skills to practice during the week.  After Winter break they will look at multiplication and see how multiplication and addition are similar.  Subtraction skills will also continue.

We begun an important prompt this past week.  It is the 1st summative writing assessment given this year.  After every 2 themes there is an assigned writing prompt that is used to see if they are applying the needed skills they have learned in their writing lessons.  1st graders should be able to write 3-4 complete sentences, 2nd graders should have a fluid beginning/middle/end to their story, and 3rd should apply what 2nd graders do, but be able to add dialogue to their writing.  This coming week the students are working on finishing up their drafts, edits, and revisions, and move into their final drafts.

Upcoming Week:

There is a Parent Night on December 6th at 5:30pm on how a Montessori Class runs and what expectations your child should be applying.  It will go over what makes a Montessori school different from other public schools and what student life at a Montessori school is like.  Please check out the Montessori Monday Moments that was just sent out.  The flyer is located on there.

Ms. Clarissa, our music teacher, is hosting a Winter Concert on December 17th at 5:30pm.  The flyer for the concert is also on the MMM that was just sent out.  Our child has been practicing for weeks in music class! Mark your calendars!

Please note that on December 10th, next Monday, is an early out.

This week I am going to create a sign up on Track It Forward for our annual Holiday Feast!  Our classroom feast will be December 19th at 12:00pm.  Immediate family members are invited to join your child.  The sign up will be for food.  Part of the sign up will be for each level to make something for the feast.  I should have that sign up out by the end of the week so that gives about 2 weeks of preparation.  Our feast will go until about 1pm.  Some years it has gone over 1pm by just a little bit.  The students also present Winter holidays in December from around the world.  We’ll see if we continue that or we change it up some.  Students are welcome to be checked out after the feast.

December Challenge!  Now that we are in December I have a challenge for the students!  If everyone completes their Spiral Maths, Word Works, Text Times, and writings before recess on Fridays in December then we can watch a Christmas movie in the afternoon.  Help encourage your child!  Spiral Math is only 1 column a day.  I tell the students to complete it right after circle time in the morning.  Word Work is also a few language exercises each day.  Text time is the shortest.  It is a short passage and then there are 3-4 questions about the reading.  If everyone followed the exercises then everyone would be done by the end of Thursday (All the exercises in Spiral Math and Word Work are Mondays-Thursdays).

Have a great upcoming week and rest of your weekend.  Happy December and for anyone who celebrates or that you know celebrates Hanukkah!

Ms. Kaley and Ms. Misha