Weekly Update for April 10th-14th

​Hi Families,
Happy April Break!

Students finished the week off strong. Every child earned a nice, relaxing, fun break! I was so impressed that we actually had everyone present for this last day  –no early travelers this time. Thank you so much for making your travel plans around school. We were able to have a productive, fulfilling day of learning and fun. I hope everyone has a wonderful time away from the demands of school –students have all earned it!

Congrats to all of our amazing Read-a-thon participants for logging so many minutes. We had two lucky students from our class win the Read-a-thon raffle –Lienn and Evan. Thank you to everyone who donated to the Read-a-thon fundraiser to support our school!

As a class, we will be celebrating the completion of our Country Project, where students researched a country, wrote an informational report, and created a map.  Our Country Presentation will be open to parents and will take place on Friday, May 5th from 12:10-12:40pm. Students are thrilled to show off their hard work. Save the date!

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​Important Upcoming Dates

• Week of April 17th: No School
• Friday, May 5th, 12:10-12:40pm: Country Presentation. Parents, please join us!

Community Building
The school added “Be Kind” to our core Barrows Beliefs. I gave out our first Star Tickets for “Being Kind” to Evan and Grant for helping classmates. I’ve noticed so much kindness happening in the classroom, from students helping one another on tricky assignments to students encouraging others to share in front of the class. We have built a strong class community this year! Ms. Raucci, the music teacher, even said we were the best class she had all week!

Literacy 
We wrapped up our study of Fables. Highlights:

• Read aloud 6 more Aesop’s fables, including “The Grasshopper and the Ants,” “The Lion and the Mouse,” and “The Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing;”
• Summarized selected fables using the “Somebody-Wanted-But-So-Then” graphic organizer;
• Learned and practiced new vocabulary words related to each fable, such as “deceived,” “enraged,” “vigilant,” and “prowled;”
• Practiced fluency with a decodable story featuring the various long “e” spellings and answered written comprehension questions about it.

Writing
This week we did more writing about Fables and finished our Country Reports. Highlights:

• Wrote sentences/short paragraphs about a chosen fable using a new vocabulary word;
• Wrote research reports about our chosen country, focusing on sentence variation, correct application of phonics rules, and liveliness.

Phonics
We finished Unit 11 of Fundations on the various spellings of long “e.” Highlights:

• Practiced reading and spelling multisyllabic  words that have “ea,” “ee,” and “ey” in them;
• Learned new trick words and compared their sounds to their unexpected spellings: ready, head, and breakfast;
• Played a word game where students wrote silly sentences using a given set of “long e” words;
• Took our Unit 11 Phonics Test.

For at-home Phonics information and practice:

• Review: Fundations Home Support Packet for Unit 11
• Next: Fundations Home Support Packet for Unit 12

Math
We continued our work in Unit 6 on Geometry, Time, and Money. We wrapped up Section A on Geometry and moved into Section B on Fractions. Highlights:

• Related geometry to fractions using pattern blocks;
• Partitioned rectangles and circles into halves, thirds, and fourths and named the pieces;
• Learned that equal pieces do not need to be the same shape;
• Explored cubes and created our own 3D cubes from 6 connected squares;
• Played math games to build fluency with addition and subtraction.

For at-home Math information and practice:

• Current: Illustrative Math Family Support Materials for Unit 6
• Review:  Illustrative Math Family Support Materials for Unit 5

Social Studies
We basically finished our Country Project. Hooray! Highlights:

• Wrote reports teaching others about our country (students had a choice between filling in a structured report or drafting their own informational text;
• Created posters to display maps and reports;
• Students who finished early created travel brochures for visitors to their countries.

As mentioned above, our Country Presentation will be Friday, May 5th at 12:10-12:40pm. Parents are encouraged to join us!

​​Thank you for taking the time to read the entire update! Please reach out with any questions, or to connect to discuss your child’s progress. Have a great break!


Check out fun pictures below: Students creating cubes;  using pattern blocks as parts of wholes;  writing silly sentences together in phonics; and posing as a class with our Country Projects.