Weekly Newsletter for 5/13/16

Dear Room 4 Families,

We learned so much this week! The end of the year is always very busy. Please help your child be at school with enough time to drink water and go to the bathroom, so they don’t start the day late. The weather has also been very unpredictable, so your child still needs a jacket.

This week in English Language Arts, we have been working on character’s point of view and learning how to see situations from the perspective of different characters. Room 4 students really enjoyed thinking about how different situations can be perceived. We are also working on non-fiction reading and writing. Your child learned how to rephrase and paraphrase from various texts for writing about non-fiction topics. We are going through the writing process (rough draft, editing, peer editing, final draft) in order to write organized paragraphs that have relevant information that has a focused topic.

We have also started our field trip research groups for our “All About” pamphlet that we will be working on in class. Your child will be working with students in their field trip groups. In class, we discussed how our groups were formed. They were specifically formed so that each student can learn from each other and face some challenges. I told the class that part of group work is learning how to cooperative, problem solve, and use different approaches to get work completed. I also mentioned that I would not switch students out of their research groups because they need to learn how to negotiate, delegate, and motivate each other to produce quality work.

Our field trip to CuriOdyssey will be on Tuesday, May 17th. Please talk to your child about safety and behavioral expectations. The bus leaves at 8:30 am, so please make sure your child has eaten breakfast, had a chance to drink water, and has visited the bathroom before school. Most importantly, please make sure your child is on time to school! Students who are late and miss the field trip bus departure will spend the day in Room 7 with Mr. Chen. Your child needs to bring a bagged lunch with their name written on it to be consumed and disposed of at the field trip. If your child has any Huskywear, they may wear it to help the teachers and chaperons identify our class from the other visitors at CuriOdyssey.

If your child brings any money on the field trip, they are responsible for keeping track of it. Visits to the souvenir shop are at the discretion of their parent chaperon. Please do not bring more than 20 dollars. Your child’s main focus on this field trip is to research their animal and to learn about animal habitats. If you need to reach me during the field trip, you can message me directly on ClassDojo.

Next week I will be out of the classroom on Wednesday and Thursday for professional development and SOPA testing, respectively.

Here are next week’s homework links:

• Chinese: https://graceyou.com/mandarin-homework-week-30/
• Spelling: https://graceyou.com/spelling-week-30/

Have a great weekend!

-Ms. You