Hard Work!

Wow! I was really impressed by how hard the students worked today. You could almost hear the brains growing in room 19.

We started off the day with a lot of writing. Keeping a journal is part of the drama class activity, and since our class is close to the end of the day on Tuesday we’ll be doing it Wednesday morning. I introduced the routine to the students, and while they were writing these I held individual conferences with each student to discuss the “My Favorite Things” composition. This kind of one-on-one attention is hard to do with a class of 32, but it is so important to helping them grow as writers.

Just before recess, we went over our spelling, reading, and math homework from the day before. After recess, we went to the Tech Center where Ms. Richard introduced the students to the computers and to the routines of coming to the Tech Center. Because of the H1N1 flu, she is asking students to bring in disinfectant baby wipes to clean the keyboards each week. Students are volunteering to bring these in, so be prepared for your child asking to buy a bunch of baby wipes for school. The students also worked on the Mavis Beacon typing program.

After lunch we measured the growth in our plants again.

We discussed the “Making Connections” strategy. This involves connecting something in the text to a personal experience. It is one of the easiest and most fun of the reading strategies. The students then practiced with, using their post-it notes, with this week’s Open Court Reading story, “Sarah, Plain and Tall.”

We were already running a little late at this point, and then we had an unexpected fire drill which devoured about 20 minutes. So we were forced to postpone the Science activity until tomorrow afternoon. I gave the students about 40 minutes to get a head start on their homework. They liked that, and I didn’t mind the peace and quiet, either.  

Homework:  Do the “Sarah, Plain and Tall” questions. (2) Do Developing Thinking skills. Students will need to review pages 80-88 in the purple Science Resources book for this. (3) Do the “Environments” crossword puzzle. Be sure to use the number of letter and the word bank to help with this. (4) Do “Subtraction,” Envision Math, pages 40-41. Again, since the students may already be reasonably strong with this skill only the odd problems are mandatory.