Curriculum Focus: Math and Language

Math:  Our measurement unit is wrapping up, we only have about two lessons left.  We may have to have our test Monday instead of Friday to ensure all of the students have a good grasp of the concepts, and they can have the weekend to study.
Concepts covered:

• Time:  SI Notation and 24 hour clock
• Capacity
• Volume of rectangular prisms (with and without the formula), and irregular shapes (without a formula)
• Measuring Mass
• Conversions mL-L and vise versa
• Conversions mg-g-kg

Anchor Charts are up in class, and many manipulatives have been used (clocks, cubes, and experiments with capacity to name a few).

We have also done a lot of work using our Math PALS and exploring/experimenting using the three part Math lesson.

1.  Minds On:  Activity to get the kids thinking about the concept the lesson is based upon.

2.  Work on It:  The kids are given a task to work on/solve

3.  Consolidation:  This is where we meet up and look at some student work as a class to get some ideas on how to solve/tackle a question, and different strategies we can use.

Literacy:  Lit Circles, Main Idea, and Organizational Patterns

Lit Circles:  Students are in groups reading novels they have chosen themselves.  They meet as a group and discuss what they have read, and present different aspects of the novel to the class once a week (I use tasks that coincide with the CASI reading comprehension test).  They seem to be enjoying it.  They are also given time in class to read silently, and to work on Reader Responses.  At the end of the unit we will be working on different culminating tasks.  

Reading:  Main Idea:  We have done a bunch of activities with main idea, using mentor texts (story books), non-fiction articles from Time Magazine (Kids Edition), articles in the Nelson Literacy, and on the Saints we are studying in Religion.  The kids are really starting to "get" it, as they say.

Writing:  We are moving our focus from poetry to organizational patterns in non-fiction writing.  There are four we are studying:  sequence, compare/contrast, problem/solution, and cause/effect.  We will be analyzing a variety of texts to determine the elements of each type.  From there, we will choose one pattern and write a Writer's Workshop with that as our focus.

Christmas is quickly approaching, and we have begun practicing our act for the concert!  Ah!  The kids are super pumped, (and hilarious).

Ska-Nah-Doht Wednesday!  It's supposed to be above zero!  Yes!