HI,
We had a busy week and fun week! We enjoyed an assembly on Friday by a magician with a message about working hard and staying drug free. It was entertaining and educational! Savanna got to be one of the volunteers on stage! She did a great job and was very funny!
We performed our reader's theaters for our first grade reading buddies on Friday afternoon. Mrs. Garcia had a microphone set up for us and everyone read well with expression! One of them was a realistic fiction piece about kids having a car wash to save the bookmobile program in their neighborhood. Another was a Japanese folktale with a message about listening to parents. The last one was a trickster tale about a sticky coyote. Ask your child about the plays.
Reading: We learned about media literacy this week. We explored a PBS website that taught us how advertisers try to persuade us to buy or do things. We looked at some commercials and evaluated them. We learned how photographers alter food and models to make them look better on film. Hopefully, the kids will think critically before asking you to buy something or believing everything they read or see online or on tv. We are continuing to read independently and talk about the books that we are reading. Be sure that your child is writing reading responses on Mondays and Tuesdays at home and that they are filling in their reading logs. They should be increasing their at home reading time as the year progresses.
Writing: We took a writing benchmark on Thursday and wrote about a surprising time. The revising and editing part was a bit tricky for most of us so we will be practicing those skills in a multiple choice format a little more. We have been working on more personal narrative entries and looking at quality published personal narratives to examine what authors do to make us feel like we are there with them in their story. We are working to make our readers feel like they are in our stories as well. Be sure that your child is writing entries at home on Wednesdays and Thursdays.
Math: Fractions and decimals have been our focus this week. We use manipulatives and pictures to help us understand these concepts. We also are always practicing problem solving using addition, subtraction (especially with regrouping), division, and multiplication. Thank you for practicing facts at home so that they become automatic and then can focus more on the problem solving strategies than on the computation. We will be doing some more work using decimals than will be working on geometry.
Social Studies: We are beginning to research two important women in Texas history. One is Bessie Coleman, a Texas born pilot who was the first African American Aviator, and Barbara Jordan, an influential Texas politician. We will then be writing essays about these women and submitting them to our district's Black History Month writing contest.
Science: We finished up our Properties of Soil unit and will be learning about Changes to the Land which includes weathering, erosion, and deposition.
Reminders:
Monday, January 23-Checkpoint #4 is due (attached)
Tuesday, January 24-Math Club-2:45-3:45 in Mrs. Washburn's portable
Thursday, January 26-Writing Club 2:45-4:00 in the library
Tuesday, January 31-Service Club-2:45-4:00-glaze bowls for Empty Bowl Project in Mrs. Arnold's room, filmed by Mrs. Rollans-need permission from you to be filmed
Thursday, February 2-Science projects are due-Math Science Night at FCE
Tuesday, February 14-Pen Pals visit and we will glaze bowls with pen pals for Empty Bowl Project and then have our Valentine's Day party!
Have a great weekend! Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.
Thanks,
Pam Bartholomew
Saturday, January 21, 2012
Friday, January 13, 2012
Newsletter-Happy Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day!
Hi,
The Service Club has organized a school-wide project for MLK Day! The students in our school learned about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and then thought about their own dreams and ways that they can help the world. Each student traced their hand and wrote about their dream and/or ways that they can be of service on the hand. Tuesday afternoon at our FCE Service Club meeting, we will be hanging the hands in the entryway of the school. Come by and see our colorful dreams for the future!
There are several MLK Day of Service events happening around town this month (especially on Monday). Have fun checking them out.
http://www.unitedway-wc.org/VOLUNTEER/volunteer_mlk.html- volunteer opportunities for Jan. 16 around Williamson county.
http://www.mlkcelebration.com/
RRISD INVITED TO MLK CELEBRATION AT TEXAS STATE UNIVERSITY – JoyLynn Occhiuzzi
Texas State University is hosting a Martin Luther King Celebration the evening of Tuesday, January 31, 2012 and has extended an invitation to all of our students and staff. The celebration will start at 5:15 p.m. in the lobby of the Avery Building with some Texas State gospel singers, a saxophonist, and a student re-enacting the “I Have a Dream” speech. Then at 6:30 p.m., Dr. Dwight Wright, Associate Professor of History from Texas State, will speak on “King, the Church, and Civil Rights.”
Reading: This week in reading we looked at drama and noticed the differences between the format of a play and a reader's theater with a piece of fiction or expository writing. We read some plays aloud and will be choosing some parts to practice and perform some quick plays for the class and our reading buddies.
Many of our students are working on book club books and we tried going onto our class moodle page and chatting about the books and the characters using our new netbooks. It was very fun and we learned appopriate and not as focused ways of chatting. We will be experimenting more with our class chat room soon.
Writing: We finished our adventure stories! Thank you for your assistance at home. The adventure personal narratives in one page turned out great! Come and look for them in the hallway! We will be working on more personal narratives as well as some more essays. Our first week of word study work at home went well. We will be continuing word study as part of our homework each evening. The directions for our word study homework is on the inside cover of their word study books.
Math: We took a math benchmark this week which was a little bit tricky for many of us. We will continue to work on fractions and decimals and continue to review multiplication and division using word problems. Be sure to continue to work on fact practice at home. Many students are depending on a multiplication chart rather than using strategies for their facts. Thank you for helping them to make their facts more automatic.
Science: We are finishing up soil and will be taking the test on properties of soil on Tuesday. Then we will work on changing earth (weathering and erosion).
Everyone has been doing a great job on their science project checkpoints so far. Keep working hard! The registration form for putting the project into the science fair is attached and is due on Friday. Checkpoint #3 is due on Tuesday.
I am attaching a flyer for a Healthy Plate Poster Contest from the PE coaches.
Have a great long weekend and let me know if you have any questions or concerns.
Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew
The Service Club has organized a school-wide project for MLK Day! The students in our school learned about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and then thought about their own dreams and ways that they can help the world. Each student traced their hand and wrote about their dream and/or ways that they can be of service on the hand. Tuesday afternoon at our FCE Service Club meeting, we will be hanging the hands in the entryway of the school. Come by and see our colorful dreams for the future!
There are several MLK Day of Service events happening around town this month (especially on Monday). Have fun checking them out.
http://www.unitedway-wc.org/VOLUNTEER/volunteer_mlk.html- volunteer opportunities for Jan. 16 around Williamson county.
http://www.mlkcelebration.com/
RRISD INVITED TO MLK CELEBRATION AT TEXAS STATE UNIVERSITY – JoyLynn Occhiuzzi
Texas State University is hosting a Martin Luther King Celebration the evening of Tuesday, January 31, 2012 and has extended an invitation to all of our students and staff. The celebration will start at 5:15 p.m. in the lobby of the Avery Building with some Texas State gospel singers, a saxophonist, and a student re-enacting the “I Have a Dream” speech. Then at 6:30 p.m., Dr. Dwight Wright, Associate Professor of History from Texas State, will speak on “King, the Church, and Civil Rights.”
Reading: This week in reading we looked at drama and noticed the differences between the format of a play and a reader's theater with a piece of fiction or expository writing. We read some plays aloud and will be choosing some parts to practice and perform some quick plays for the class and our reading buddies.
Many of our students are working on book club books and we tried going onto our class moodle page and chatting about the books and the characters using our new netbooks. It was very fun and we learned appopriate and not as focused ways of chatting. We will be experimenting more with our class chat room soon.
Writing: We finished our adventure stories! Thank you for your assistance at home. The adventure personal narratives in one page turned out great! Come and look for them in the hallway! We will be working on more personal narratives as well as some more essays. Our first week of word study work at home went well. We will be continuing word study as part of our homework each evening. The directions for our word study homework is on the inside cover of their word study books.
Math: We took a math benchmark this week which was a little bit tricky for many of us. We will continue to work on fractions and decimals and continue to review multiplication and division using word problems. Be sure to continue to work on fact practice at home. Many students are depending on a multiplication chart rather than using strategies for their facts. Thank you for helping them to make their facts more automatic.
Science: We are finishing up soil and will be taking the test on properties of soil on Tuesday. Then we will work on changing earth (weathering and erosion).
Everyone has been doing a great job on their science project checkpoints so far. Keep working hard! The registration form for putting the project into the science fair is attached and is due on Friday. Checkpoint #3 is due on Tuesday.
I am attaching a flyer for a Healthy Plate Poster Contest from the PE coaches.
Have a great long weekend and let me know if you have any questions or concerns.
Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
Wow! Amazing Holiday Reading Logs!!!!!
Hi,
I am soooo impressed with your children. Everyone read over the required 200 minutes over the holiday break. Madi read the most amount of time (14 hours) and Aden was close to her (14 hours 25 minutes)! The majority of the class read at least 5 hours! Incredible! Keep up the great work!
The last two days have been wonderful! We have all worked hard on some challenging things (equivalent fractions using fraction circles, a little bit of finding a common denominator, lots of exploring with forces) and have reviewed expectations. Everyone seems to be trying their best and that is great!
We are finishing up studying forces and are beginning to examine properties of soil. We need everyone to bring a handful of dirt from your yard in a plastic bag with your child's name on the bag. We will doing some explorations using the soil tomorrow afternoon. It will be messy but fun!
Reminder-Science Checkpoint 1 due tomorrow.
Pen Pals coming to visit on Tuesday, Jan. 10 to make clay bowls for the Empty Bowl Project on April 14. Our bowls will be donated for this event and all money raised will go to the Round Rock Serving Center.
Writing Club-next Thursday, Jan. 12
The FCE Service Club will be volunteering at the Round Rock Serving Center on Saturday, Jan. 6 from 10-11 am. We would love to see you there!
Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.
Thanks for all your support at home.
Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew
I am soooo impressed with your children. Everyone read over the required 200 minutes over the holiday break. Madi read the most amount of time (14 hours) and Aden was close to her (14 hours 25 minutes)! The majority of the class read at least 5 hours! Incredible! Keep up the great work!
The last two days have been wonderful! We have all worked hard on some challenging things (equivalent fractions using fraction circles, a little bit of finding a common denominator, lots of exploring with forces) and have reviewed expectations. Everyone seems to be trying their best and that is great!
We are finishing up studying forces and are beginning to examine properties of soil. We need everyone to bring a handful of dirt from your yard in a plastic bag with your child's name on the bag. We will doing some explorations using the soil tomorrow afternoon. It will be messy but fun!
Reminder-Science Checkpoint 1 due tomorrow.
Pen Pals coming to visit on Tuesday, Jan. 10 to make clay bowls for the Empty Bowl Project on April 14. Our bowls will be donated for this event and all money raised will go to the Round Rock Serving Center.
Writing Club-next Thursday, Jan. 12
The FCE Service Club will be volunteering at the Round Rock Serving Center on Saturday, Jan. 6 from 10-11 am. We would love to see you there!
Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.
Thanks for all your support at home.
Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew
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