Ms. Mottaz's Class: May Already?!?!

Time has been flying by and I cannot believe that we are already to May!

Important Upcoming Events

If you volunteered to chaperone, send water or a cooler, we will contact you next week.
If you didn't sign up to chaperone, but your schedule allows you to come, let us know. The more the merrier. :)

The students don't know about this, so please keep it a secret. :)
If you signed up to bring popsicles or walk with us, we will be contacting you in the next two weeks.

If your student will not be here the last week of school, please let us know as soon as possible.

We will continue studying poetry next week. We will be looking at how they rhyme, repeat, have rhythm and create images in our head. The students have enjoyed getting to read the poetry this week.
We will then move onto plays. The students will be in small groups and get to perform a play (using their scripts) for the class. This will help them to learn about how characters and settings are introduced in plays.

We will continue working our way through Unit 9. This week, we worked on partitioning shapes. The students were also introduced to measuring to the nearest half inch. We discussed how an inch can be partitioned into smaller parts to make the measurement more precise.
Next wee, we will introduce subtraction with regrouping. They will learn how to use base-10 blocks for subtraction and then how to show the trades/regrouping with numbers. Then we will work on find equivalent amounts of money being shown different ways. We will wrap the week up with a re-engagement lesson that focuses on mental math.

We finished up our Which is Better projects this week. The students enjoyed being creative with their projects. We talked about the importance of the project adding to their book.
Next week, we will working on our presentation for our Writing Celebration. The students will write up a short "script" to practice. They won't have to memorize their information, but we will practicing the presentation so they are comfortable with their presentations when parents come in.
We will also be discussing opinion writing. We will review the importance of valid reasons when supporting your opinion., The students will get an opportunity to write some short opinion pieces.

This week, we did our final observation about what plants need to survive. On Monday, when we did our observation we realized that the plants with water but without soil were actually looking better than the plants with water and soil. This led to a conversation about hydroponics and the pros of this type of gardening. We also finished up talking about food chains by making a food pyramids from different ecosystems. We actually made these pyramids 3-D and they are displayed in our classroom - when you come in you should check them out!
Next week, we will talk about seed dispersion and flower pollination

We talked about the what the Pledge of Allegiance means and today we illustrated the pledge. We will be making a Pledge of Allegiance quilt.

Starting on Wednesday, we will be doing a Countdown to Summer in the classroom. Each day, we will pop a balloon and it will have a small celebration/activity/treat for the students to enjoy. If the students need to bring something for the activity from home (board games, art supplies) or need to wear something special (tennis shoes), we will pop the balloon the day before and send an email to parents.

As the end of the year comes around, students often get bit by the "summer is almost here" bug. We have been reviewing expectations at school. Please reinforce the expectations at home. Students are expected to be safe, respectful, learners. Some of the areas we are struggling are following directions, keeping our hands to ourselves and using a respectful tone and kind words with classmates.

I hope that you have a wonderful weekend and have an opportunity to enjoy this beautiful weather!