What a wild, and wacky week! We have had testing, field trips, and crazy dress up days! Spring is near, as we Spring ahead this weekend with our clocks! Don't forget to set them ahead 1 hour!
This week we worked on using the hamburger model once again to organize our thoughts for writing a persuasive paragraph. We have used it once before this year to persuade others to use the cipher to code secret messages. This time, the question is "Should parents buy their first graders a cell phone?" You will be as amazed as I was that these kiddos all said "No." We listed reasons for and against on the whiteboard, and all of them struggled to come up with reasons to but a phone for a first grader. They had many reasons why not, including the fact that they would not be getting enough exercise or outside play time. They also said that cell phones are easy to break or lose and they are expensive. Final reason not to buy one was that it could damage your eyesight. They rocked this hamburger! We will finish by writing our paragraph and it will be sent home next week.
We continued looking at the attributes of shapes this week, We played the 2 loop missing label game, where the students lay our the shapes in the loops and the other students have to figure out what the label would be for those loops. We played several rounds, and then completed our worksheet showing how we know which shapes to put in each loop.Second grade- Indian in the Cupboard
We started our new novel Indian in the Cupboard. We learned that the novel is about a young boy named Omri, who receives a secondhand toy Indian from his friend Patrick. He also received a cupboard from his brother Gillion. His mother had a bunch of keys and he found a nice shiny, small key with a red satin ribbon that fit the lock of the cupboard. He put the toy Indian inside the cupboard for the night, and the next thing he knew, the Indian had come to life! It will take us approximately 7 weeks to read the novel and activities. We will then have an end of the novel project that will need to be completed at home. I will send home the information a few weeks ahead of time for planning and such. Any homework that comes home on a Tuesday will be due that next Monday. I like to give the students plenty of time to read and enjoy the novel and complete the assignment. Thanks for your help in reminding them of their assignments and returning their books and assignments at the next class meeting. 
We did not meet on Wednesday due to the field trip for making maple syrup. When we met on Thursday we investigated the
blocks. We looked at all the faces and counted them, noting the shape of the faces are not always the same. We looked at the edges of the shapes and counted them as well. We completed the lesson by filling out a chart independently with the numbers of faces and edges on each shape. We will work more with the shapes next week!
We read an article from NPR book club about our novel. We used out annotative book marks while reading to mark words that we do not know, as well as interesting facts, important material, and connections we can make with the article. We learned that Black Beauty was written not for children, but more for adults to bring forth the topic and concern of animal cruelty.
We forged ahead and read chapter 1 together in class. Then they wrote a summary over chapter 1. I will start reading homework for this novel next week. Please watch your email for assignments and due dates. Any homework sent on a Tuesday, will be due the next time we have Language arts class on Monday. Please send me an email if you have any questions along the way.
We are whizzing right through this lesson! The students have worked on puzzles made with numbers in the 700's. They have not had to use the chart to complete the puzzles. I am proud of all their hard work!! We also completed a Think Deeply where we explained our thinking for solving the puzzles. This is always a challenge for some students that do not like to write, but I always remind them that writing down how they solved the problem is a great way to reinforce the skill in their minds, as well as it helps teachers to know what the student was thinking along the way if they made an error.
Fourth grade - did not meet due to testing. We will meet next week to get caught up.
Fourth grade math- Area and Fractions
We continued working together to figure out how much area an article receives on the front page of the newspaper. We used the math messaging board to help us solve this problem. Once they folded paper to help them figure out the denominator was 36, they added all the fractions together to find out the area that was left for the Daddy Long Legs article. Then we looked at the information provided in an article to make sure the jumps and the information was correct. We will be moving on to our Think Deeply questions next week. 
Happy Birthday, Matzen!
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