We’ve made it through the first 6 weeks of school!  It has been such an amazing and positive experience.  I am really loving this school year.  I’m excited about all of the things that we are learning and working on.  I love your children.  Thank you for allowing me to be a part of their educational journey.  The end of the first six weeks marks the end of our Normalization period.  If you are interested in coming to observe the class or volunteering, please let me know.

In Language Arts, we have been learning about writing informative essays.  We have had some fun lessons on how important it is to use proper punctuation when writing.  We have begun our spelling/vocabulary groups.  We are doing dyad reading a few days a week.  The 6th graders have had some lessons on all of the types of pronouns and how to use them properly.  All of the students are working on grammar and parts of speech.

We are working on a wide range of topics in Math, from place value and rounding to square root to prime factorization.  I love that in addition to learning the core math standards as grade level groups, Montessori also allows students to work more individually in the areas that are appropriate to the development of that child.

Our class does not currently have a room parent.  If that is something you would be interested in taking on, please let me know.

We would love to have more parents sign up to bring snack for our class.  We currently have 22 students.  If  you can help, please sign up here:  https://www.trackitforward.com/site/389525/events

The students were assigned a book report home project a couple of weeks ago.  I sent home a paper listing 3 options the students could choose from.  I understand that not all of those papers have made it home.  If you have not received this assignment, please let me know and I will send a digital copy through e-mail.  This home project is due on October 11th.

As always, please contact me if you have any questions or concerns!  kgonzales@mariamontessoriacademy.org  Have a fantastic weekend!

Kirsten

Things are moving right along in our class!  We are full swing into our lessons and work cycle.  We have had lots of grammar lessons.  We are working on sentence editing.  We started spelling groups.  We are using our Scholastic News magazines to work on our reading and comprehension skills.  Our math assessments are all complete and we have our math groups all figured out.  We have been refreshing our memories on some things that were forgotten over the summer, but we are moving forward and working hard!  We are having history and science lessons.  We currently have some truly disgusting microorganisms growing in Petri dishes.  I am truly excited about the learning happening in our class!

One of the students in our class suggested that we have a student council for our class.  We agreed that it was a great idea!  We decided that we would elect a representative from each grade level.  The students who chose to, gave speeches to their classmates and we held elections.  Everyone did a wonderful job!  I was so proud of the thoughtful speeches the students made.  We had a truly beautiful moment with our 4th graders.  One of our 4th grade students wrote a speech, but when it was time to present it, they were too scared.  They stood in front of their classmates and couldn’t say anything.  I tried to offer words of encouragement, as did the other students, but they were still too afraid.  One of the students offered to stand next to the scared student for support.  Then another student went and stood by this student.  Soon every 4th grader was standing next to their classmate.  The student was able to give their speech and did a wonderful job!  I loved seeing the students come together to offer support and encouragement to one of their classmates that was struggling.  It was really heartwarming.

Information about our next home project will be coming home this week.  It is a book report and will be due October 11.  Please check with your student for the paper with more details.

Thanks to those of you who have been providing snack for our class for the past few weeks.  I believe we only have someone signed up  for two more weeks for the entire school year.  If you can help with snack, please sign up https://www.trackitforward.com/site/38952/events.  It is really important to the students.  We have 22 students in our class.  I noticed it says 30 on the sign up sheet.  I will need to edit that!

Papers went home last week about our upcoming Boosterthon fundraiser.  Students are able to order a free t-shirt in preparation for this event.  Please check backpacks for this paper if you haven’t seen it.  Here is a copy just in case your student misplaced theirs.

Thanks for allowing me to be a part of your child’s life!  Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Kirsten