The Wag
Mrs. Edelman and Mrs. Block's Weekly Newsletter
January 5th - January 8th
Literacy
It was so wonderful to see all your children after our winter break. We celebrated that we could change our calendar to 2016 and fun sharing all our stories of how we celebrated on New Year's eve.
The cold weather was a perfect way to begin our winter story unit. This week we spent four days studying The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats. Each day of the week we looked at the story through a different comprehension skill. On Monday, we learned how to visualize. We began reading the story normally, hearing the words and seeing the pictures, but by the middle, I read the description of what was happening but did not show the students the picture. I asked them to listen to the words in the book and try to draw a picture of what they were hearing. We then compared our pictures to the ones in the book. The students did a beautiful job. We then added our own words to our pictures and completed the activity using shaving cream to make our own snowy scene. It was a really good time to talk about the importance of adding details to our own writing in order to help our readers create pictures in their minds. We also covered retelling, by making fun retelling strips sequencing the events in the book and then retelling a friend in the class the story. To illustrate the reading strategy of connecting, we had the children compare things they like to do in the snow with things that Peter did in the book. We learned that there were many things that we had in common with Peter and also some that were different.
I encourage you to also utilize visualizing, retelling, and connecting each time you read a book with your child. If you need further assistance with questions, please don't hesitate to let me know. I am so happy to provide more guidance in helping you strengthen and enrich your child's comprehension skills.
Math
This week in Math we practiced our place value skills. On Monday, we played "Musical Tens". We had so much fun stacking our unifix cubes into groups of ten and then counting them all by 10. We determined that we had over 1,000 cubes in our classroom! On Tuesday we played place value concentration and put together skip counting puzzles. Our favorite game was the week was definitely "Place Value Path". We loved looking at the base ten blocks and determining the number that they represented.
Estimation Jar
Writing Workshop
Thank You's!
Thank you to the Emma and her family for being our Family of the Week and to Stephanie Yudin for being our Mystery Reader. Thank you to Rachel Rothstein and Ilana Tolk for helping during centers.
Upcoming Dates
-January 18: MLK Day No School
-February 4: 100th Day of School
-February 12-15: Mid Winter Break
Uniform Reminder
With a drop in temperatures, please check the following to make sure your children are coming to school compliant to the uniform.
Undershirt: Undershirts may not extend past the uniform shirt sleeve and must be white.
Outerwear: All sweaters and sweatshirts must be Davis Academy uniform items.
Socks/Tights: Socks must be ankle or knee length and must be solid white, black or navy only. Striped, patterned, and multi-colored socks are not permitted. Navy or white tights; no leggings are permitted.