Parent/Teacher Conferences are this week: October 19-21. Use the links below to secure your spot. We can't wait to celebrate the successes of your child and discuss their goals moving forward. Please remember that Thursday, October 20th and Friday, October 21st are early dismissal days. Students will be let out at 12:00 pm so please plan accordingly!
Reading: Readers will continue exploring theme in both familiar and non-familiar texts. Each day, we will focus on a new theme and brainstorm books that model each lesson. Themes/lessons we will focus on next week:
- Believing in yourself
- Being happy with what you have
- Accepting others' differences
- Always acting kind to others
We will also spend time discussing and writing about the differences between plot and theme. We want our learners to be able to not only identify them, but to support it with text evidence.
Writing: Writers will be introduced to new Stories From My Life (or SFML for short) this week to focus on our core questions with unfamiliar texts. We will work on concise retelling through Q1 (What is happening in this story?) and identifying theme/lesson through Q2 (What does this story mean?). Finally, we will map the story on the narrative arc to identify all of the important elements. Writers will continue exploring SFML narratives in their own writing.
Example Story Arc
Spelling: Students will get new sorts/words on Wednesday, October 19th. The assessment on those words will be the following Wednesday, October 26th. Remember to utilize the at-home spelling practice if your child could benefit from additional practice at home.
Math: Last week we began our study of subtraction with simple subtraction without any regrouping and regrouping in the hundreds and thousands places. This week we will review and then begin to subtract over zeros where multiple regrouping is necessary. As they progress right to left from the ones place, to the tens, to the hundreds and then to the thousands, students have to continually ask themselves "Can I do that?" in order to assure that the top number take away the bottom number actually works. If not, then regrouping or borrowing has to be done. Many are familiar with the rhyme "More on the floor, go next door" as a way to help determine if regrouping is needed. In applying subtraction to everyday life, students will examine word problems and differentiate among the three types of subtraction. "Take away" subtraction is the one with which kids are most familiar. Given a total number of items, a part is taken away leaving a remaining part. "Compare" subtraction presents students with two numbers where they are to find the difference between them. Words such as "how many more", "how much longer", and "how many fewer" are our key to this kind of subtraction. Often times, the comparative or "er" form of an adjective is used, such as taller, heavier, shorter, and farther. The third kind, "Missing Part" subtraction, gives the student the total number of items and describes a part and then asks what the other part might be. Here are some examples:
Take away: 643 students attend Hunters Creek Elementary. If 97 students transfer to another school, how many students will remain at the school? 643 - 97 = _____
Compare: HCE has 643 student and MDE only has 477. How many more students does Hunters Creek have than Memorial Drive? 643 - 477 = _____
Missing Part: Ms. Rozzell has 41 students in both Math classes. 17 of them are girls. How many boys are in her classes? 41 - 17 = _____
Whether your child is on addition, subtraction, or multiplication facts, always study daily for FFW and/or FFF. Addition and subtraction have an extra opportunity for success on Wednesday and will not have to study for a Friday quiz if they make a 90% or above mid week. There is a POW that is due on Friday. Please take this opportunity to work with your child and discuss strategies for finding a solution.
Science: We wrap up our study of Matter this week with a review of vocabulary and concepts and a unit test on Wednesday. Students have had vocabulary cards and a study guide for almost two weeks and we hope they have reviewed them nightly. After parent conferences, we will take a look at mixtures and then it is on to an extensive study of the different kinds of energy around us.
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