Students have a three-day school week this week! Monday through Wednesday!

No school for students on Thursday or Friday, October 11 and 12.

Homework:

Mme Shelli’s Class: This week  students will bring home multiplication facts they need to learn.  The list of factsindividualized and drawn from a 100 fact quiz we took last week. Students can choose to create flash cards or a flip page like this one. Then, please help your child practice these problems at least 5 times over the next week.  Initial when your child has practiced & students should return the homework page next Monday, October 15th.  If your child has mastered all of the x0-x10 problems, they may have selected some more challenging facts to learn.  There is also an optional challenge math problem on the back of the homework for anyone to solve, if they wish.

Mme Jana’s Class:  Because we only have two homework days this week, and I don’t give weekend homework, French homework will extend into next week. Monday and Tuesday night this week will have homework, then the following Monday and Tuesday nights (October 15 &16) will have homework and we’ll conclude the study with a quiz on either Wednesday or Thursday. This vocabulary work reinforces the sound “oi” which is pronounced “wah” like in moi. It is an important vowel blend to recognize and master in French. Here is the homework, just in case: oi Vocab

Important Dates:

Oct 5-14   Read-a-thon week- Students received envelopes for recording dates and minutes read this past Friday. We encourage 100% participation, no matter the amount read. Parents please initial minutes read. Family & friends are welcome to donate to Charlemagne based on the minutes read or a flat donation. Go read!

Oct. 11-12  NO SCHOOL for students.  Teacher professional development.

Oct 19    School pictures &  Health Screening

Mme Jana’s News 

FLA (French Language Arts):  We did not begin reading groups this past week as I had predicted, what with  an unexpected fire drill one day and an unexpected gas situation another. So, I modified a couple of things we did, and since reading groups take a consistent, largish chunk of time, which was challenging to pull off this week, they didn’t happen. When you start a new routine, the transitions take longer, and there are materials distribution and gathering, and time just didn’t seem to be on our side. Sorry. We will do practice groups one day this week, and the kids will learn the system where the materials are kept. We still worked hard though!

We finished  lowercase letters in cursive last week, culminating with blends. Now we’ll get through the capitol letters and will work on individual names. We write in cursive every day, and will do so all year. A number of students have finished the “Moi” project, and you can take a gander at your child’s beautiful cursive and artistic abilities in the stairwell display.

Les chèvres screen shot

We began our regular writing this week. It is called “J’observe…” which means, ” I observe…” (not too surprising). I show a photo, this week’s was entitled “Les chèvres,” which is “Goats,”

and we constructed a paragraph together, so everyone should have a the same model in his/her journal. The format is, essentially, one sentence each: I observe, There are, I notice, and I like….because…. We crafted the first three sentences together as a group, then the students individually completed the last sentence, with lots of support. The students each use a paper translating dictionary, which is wonderful practice with alphabetizing, as well as vocabulary. I was very impressed with their efforts and results! We did another structured writing session with a photo called, “Une tornade de poissons,” which means “A Tornado of Fish.”

Huge swarm of jack fish dwarfs scuba diver

Most students were able to follow the format and come up with pretty good writings. As you know, each year has greater expectations of your child. This year, I am expecting more sophisticated levels of writing in grammar, context and style, which I assure you, 4th graders can do beautifully. Students will be challenged, and some students may have to really ramp up their efforts.

While I was gone, Mme Grabowski read the first Mercy Watson book in French to both classes. I read the second Mercy Watson book in French with the blue class, and will do the same with the red class this week, then I’ll get them on the same book for the next week. Your kids enjoy this series because it’s funny, and many students are familiar with the stories in English, so they have some anecdotal experience with the situation. 

Les sciences:  More of last week, we are studying Energy (l’Énergie) ! We are working on electricity and will talk much more about and do experiments with circuits, what it takes to have a complete circuit, open circuits versus closed circuits, and series and parallel circuits. We’ll also be exploring materials that are either conductors or insulators. 


Mme Shelli’s News

English Language Arts:  We will continue a unit on traditional tales.  Last week student read some myths from Greece and folktales from other countries.  This week, students will read some Greek Myth plays and will begin to write a creative narrative of a tall tale featuring a character they create.

Math: This week, we will continue a unit on factors and multiples.  It is essential that kids know their basic multiplication facts x0 through x10, so this is part of their homework this week.  In this unit, students will learn that a whole number is a multiple of its factors, and that numbers greater than 1 can be identified as prime or composite. Students will also build on their knowledge of patterns as they generate and analyze patterns to find features based on their knowledge of factors and multiples. 

Repeated from last week: One way to see how your child is doing in math is to look for half-sheet math exit tickets. These are quick math quizzes to check student understanding of concepts in class.  Points are 3=shows understanding, 2=partial understanding, 1=not yet showing understanding of concept.  Students who receive a 2 or 1 will meet with me for a brief mini-lesson & will have a chance to redo their work for understanding.  I will cross out their initial score & re-score after the reteach.