We have started our new PYP unit, How the World Works. We will be learning about how force and motion, natural disasters, and time and measurement are important components of how our world works. Science: Rather than starting off this unit by telling the students that force and motion are prevalent in creating natural disasters, students through the process of inquiry and communication, were able to uncover that central idea. Students completed a picture sort to help them arrive at our central idea. I laid on the carpet a collage of pictures. The collage included pictures about force, motion, and natural disasters. Students sorted the pictures into categories. After agreeing with one another they named their three categories: force, natural disasters, and push/pull. I was very impressed they communicated with one another to arrive at just three categories. After they categorized the pictures, I gave each student a sticky note in which they had to ask any question (otherwise known as be an inquirer) about the pictures. We then took those sticky notes and put them into two categories: force and natural disasters. There was just one sticky note left that students debated back and forth where it should go. It was after more discussion and some deep thinking students began to realize, oh wait, force is also a part of the cause of natural disasters. This is exactly where I wanted them to end up! What a wonderful way for students to learn something new and take responsibility for their learning! See our pictures below. Math: We continued working with representing time on a number line. We looked at how we can use number lines to help us find either a(n) start time, stop time, or elapsed time. On Friday we began to look at how kilograms are a unit of measurement. We talked about how kilo is a prefix and that is means 1,000. Students were able to gather that there are 1,000 grams in one kilogram. We will be continuing work with kilograms and grams this week. Please be looking over your child's math warm-ups as they come home. If they are getting a check or minus on them, please do your best to help them correct their mistakes. If you are still needing help with your child's homework remember to visit the math section of my website. There are great resources there.
Writing: Students began composing their personal narratives by starting with their first paragraph. Students learned that paragraphs are indented and that writing is not just one lump of words but broken up into paragraphs. Using their writing planners and brainstorming sheets, students began to piece together their first paragraph. We will continue to write our stories remembering to include information about what we saw, felt, tasted, heard, smelled and write as if we are writing a movie. Literacy: We continued to learn about different prefixes and how they help us with understanding the meaning of the words, which then can help us understand what is happening in the books we are reading. On Friday, we then read Scholastic News to learn about a new frog that has been discovered. Students answered questions using evidence from the text. Students need to get comfortable with providing evidence from texts to prove their answer. This is a necessary skill! This week students' behaviors were much poorer than normal. I am not sure if it was because of such a weird week but please continue to remind your child that they need to come to school with appropriate behavior and be ready to learn. They reflected on their behavior on Friday and even said that they had been talking too much and were failing to listen in specials as well. Thanks for all of your support at home with this as well. Warmly, Miss Hodgkinson This week flew by and was a ton of fun! The students spent a great deal of their week as inquirers as they worked with each other to figure out several pieces of information. Rather than telling them this is how it works or this is how to solve the problem, I often let students wrestle with it and work with one another. More times than not, they figure whatever we are learning out. :) Math: This week we took our final assessment for module one and began module two. Throughout this module students will be studying time and measurement. To begin the unit, students worked with one another to see if they could relate a clock to a number line. Here is what they came up with: Students placed 12 tick lines on their number line and then labeled them 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, etc to represent five minute intervals. Next, they had to represent our daily schedule on a number line. It took them a bit of time to figure it out but they succeeded after communicating with their teammates. They did such a wonderful job working with one another! It was a lot of fun to watch them be deep thinkers and reflect on their creations.
The students are also getting really great at skip counting by 4's and 6's. We are trying to master them so we can memorize our facts quicker! Keep practicing those facts at home! Writing: Students began to prepare and plan for writing their personal narrative. Students began to break down their stories into three main events and sketch out pictures for each of those events. They labeled their sketches using dialogue and descriptive words that described what they remember seeing, feeling, smelling, and touching. The students are very eager to turn their pictures into writing! Literacy: Our big focus in literacy this week was the study of prefixes. I placed a list of several words on the board with the prefix "re". For example, rewind and restart. I had students work with their partner to talk about what they noticed about the words that were on the board. Many of them made observations that all the words started with "re". Some students went as far as noticing that all the words had to do with doing something over again. It was after their observations and reflections that I introduced the term prefix to them. We have been looking at how prefixes change the meaning of the root word. They are finding prefixes in the books they are reading as well as in our class read aloud! We have specifically talked about the prefix "dis" and "un". Be sure to stop and talk about them if you come across them at home! :) I am excited to see what they bring to the table this week! Best, Miss Hodgkinson |
Sept. 14th- First Day of Online Learning
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