Brummitt's High Ability Blog Spot: Thinking about Valentine's Day Thursday!!!

This week at Brummitt was filled with so many awesome and exciting events. On Tuesday and Wednesday we had the 4^th grade musical. The school got to see a sneak-peak performance on Tuesday afternoon. Then the students had two performances for family and friends on Wednesday. It was an excellent time and a great show.

The fourth graders did such an amazing job with their musical. The Small Piece of the World was excellent. I think everyone really enjoyed hearing all the music from all around the world. I want to thank the Music teacher Mrs. Cardinale for all her hard work all year to create such a great show.

I was very busy with all the events and testing for the CogAT with Kindergarten. We missed some classes but not because of CogAT, but because of the other exciting events. I will continue to test kindergarten all month as I can fit it in. Next month I will test the second grade students.

All the Valentine Parties were on February 11^th. I think the students really had a great time and the parties looked like a great success. I even received a few cards. Thanks to all the students who thought of me this week.

I know the Six Flags Six Hour Reading Program is under way.Make sure to have the kids reading as much as they can so they can complete their six hours by the deadline of February 19^th.

I know the students are really looking forward to having fun with their class mates.

There will be no school on February 12^th and 15^th for mid-winter break. So don’t forget: no school Monday.

February 18^th is the student council Dress Like a Teacher Day. I can’t wait to see all the students dressed up for that day.

Mrs. Dortmund announced Dr. Seuss week will be February 22^nd thru February 26^th. We will be celebrating Dr. Seuss’s Birthday on Friday February 26^th! There will be lots of surprises happening with tons of Dr. Seuss stories. Make sure you wear red, black and white.

This week we continued learning about our Life Skills with Flexibility. This week we all had to have a lot of flexibility with all the important events and changes happening. The students are learning that we need to be flexible when things change that are out of our control.

They are very flexible in the classroom each week when we meet and don’t get to meet. They show they can roll with the punches and are ready to complete all the tasks at hand. I told them that in life we will all have to be flexible every day, because the traffic may make us late and the train may not come on time and we need to be ready and flexible to meet the challenges.

Idiom of the Week

An Idiom is an expression whose meaning is not predictable from the usual meanings of its constituent elements. This week’s was …. She has a heart of gold. This one really fits in with the theme this week with the holiday this weekend. I think the students have all heard this one. They really understood it and all said they know people like this that are so kind and caring for others. Finally someone drew a beautiful picture for this week. Thanks to Olivia we have a very creative illustration to display. Thanks Liv! She got to pick her prize. Here is the hint: It involves the world and not being below it. Good luck and I hope someone decides to draw this one.

Language Arts

First Grade:

This week we were still learning all about punctuation. The students took time to discuss the book Yo! Yes! I reread it to them and asked them some questions about the book and punctuation. They all had great ideas and thoughts about how punctuation can change the feeling and meaning of so many things that are written. The students then had a great activity where I read a paragraph that was missing all the punctuation. I made sure to read the whole paragraph with no breaks. Then they had to take their copies and go over by themselves to see if they could figure out where the punctuation belonged.

After everyone was finished we reviewed the paragraph together. They did great with the periods, but had a little trouble finding the commas. The commas are something very new for them so I expected that part to be more difficult. They all used colored pencil to add the punctuation they might have missed. They had a blast seeing if they completed each sentence right. We all laughed at one part because there was some debate of a period or exclamation mark.

I said they could go either way depending on their feeling. This week they should have come home with homework. It is an activity for them to interview an adult who remembers dime stores. They will need to describe it to them. The student will then draw a picture based on what they have learned. I hope they have fun learning about it. Next week we will continue with punctuation and some fun activities.

Second Grade:

This week we continued with our novel The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo. On Monday we continued to read the book, well listen to the next few chapters. We covered Chapters 21 through 25. The students were really upset that Edward was injured and I wanted to make sure they got through that part of the book. We stopped to discuss his visions during his black out.

It was a very intense and interesting discussion on what the students thought happened to Edward during this time. Make sure to ask them what they thought when Edward came home to Egypt Street walking on his own wearing a loving red suit. They all had great thoughts and ideas. We didn’t get to meet on Tuesday because of the musical. Next week we will continue to read the book and write in their journals. I look forward to seeing how they feel about last chapters of the book.

Third Grade:

Monday the students continued with their fairy tales. This time we completed some grammar with partners. I gave the students verbs from Snow White and they have to figure out each tense and write a sentence for it.

Then we came back together at the end of class to share our responses and sentences. We didn’t have class on Tuesday because the school went to see the 4^th grade musical.

We will pick up next week with the grammar in fairy tales. We will also read another obscure fairy tale call The Tinder Box. Next week we will also share their stories if they want to because I have a group or two still finishing up.

Fourth Grade:

The fourth grade had rehearsals during our time to meet so they missed both days this week, but next week we will pick up right where we left off with the presentations. So any student that hasn’t completed their presentation will be going on the 16^th when we get back from the break. All prezi presentations will be due on the 16^th too. So we will pick up on the 16^th and the remaining students will be presenting. Please feel free to contact me with any questions you might have. Here are the instructions which are also in the google docs for the students to view:

People Who Made a Difference Instructions

Step Seven: Create a Prezi that includes the person’s name, a photo, years lived, and contributions. (The students should have their log in information to work on at home.) Change due date because they needed more time February 16^th

Step Eight: Memorize your monologue and dress as your character. You are now ready for the People Who Made a Difference presentation. The students will be presenting on February 1^st and 2^nd.Students know which day they will present.

Monologue Criteria

-Monologue describes events in the person’s life with detail and clarity.

-Monologue includes insight to changes in the person’s life.

-Monologue explores how the person made a difference.

-Speaker confidently presents monologue using good eye contact, posture, and voice.

-Speaker engages audience with appropriate words, facial expressions, and gestures.

-The presentation is supported with appropriate costume and props