Fun Run, Here We Come!

Fun Run

Today was our Fun Run kick off and what a way to start one of our biggest fundraisers of the year. There was dancing, singing, and even the Chick-fil-A cow!

 For those of you who are new to the 'Fun Run', students earn pledges from family and friends (either a flat pledge or a certain dollar amount per lap). Students earn individual prizes for their pledges and classes earn group prizes as they make their way towards their class goal (our class goal is $420 or $20 per student). The top 3 earning classes will get to choose from an icecream party, subs and chips from Jersey Mike's, or a pajama/popcorn/movie. The culmination will be the 'Fun Run' itself on 4/27 (parents are welcome to attend) where students will participate and wear the tie-dye t-shirts they will make in Art. 

A 'Fun Run' envelope went home in your child's daily folder this afternoon. You can enlist neighbors, grandparents, even businesses to support our school! 

Language Arts

In reading this week, we are continuing to work on identifying/retelling the main topic and details when reading non-fiction text. Ask your child to share with you the gestures for 'main topic' and 'detail'. We  are also revisiting fiction and retelling the story by stating the characters, setting, problem/solution (or stating events sequentially). As always, we continue to work on our decoding skills such as using first letter/picture clues and sounding out to determine unknown words.

Has your child identified any digraphs 'sh', 'ch', 'ng'  and/or the 'magic e' in words? If yes, then make sure you sing their praises! Being able to recognize and apply these sounds in words will help your child decode words to help them master a level C (or higher) book. 

Sight words of the week: down

In writing, we are continuing to work on creating our 'All About' books. We first start off by thinking about what we know about the main topic (giraffes). Next, we create a list of questions we want to find out about the topic. This week, the kiddos wanted to find out the following questions about giraffes:

-Where do they live?

-What do they look like up close?

-How do they eat/drink?

-How long are their tongues?

-How do they protect their babies?

-How do they protect themselves from lions? 

-What shape are their paws? 

Although all of our questions weren't answered with the book we read, some of our questions were answered (ask your kiddo how long a giraffe's tongue is...you are not going to believe the answer).  We used the questions/answers from our book and the kiddos created their very own 'All About Giraffes' book complete with a table of contents and subheadings (two text features that are commonly found in non-fiction/informational books). 

Math

In math this week, we began sharing math 'take away' stories. Just as with the addition stories, the goal right now is for the kiddos to be able to see take away stories in their own life and be able to represent the story with manipulatives, pictures, or acting it out. If they can solve it, even better, but no equations just yet. Want to support this objective at home, encourage your kiddo to see take away stories in everyday situations. For example, there are 8 slices of pizza. We ate 5 slices. How many slices are left? That's right, 8 take away 5 is 3. 

Quarter 3 Conferences

Keep your eye out for a sign up genius invite to quarter 3 conferences. This time, the kiddos will be the ones showing YOU what they have mastered including representing/solving math stories, reading level C books, sight word mastery and MORE!