The Jungle Book
Mrs. Knueven's Classroom Newsletter
Upcoming Events
12/11 Indiana's Birthday
12/15 Indiana History Test - Unit 3, Lessons 1-3
12/16 Wordly Wise 7 Test
12/17 Chapter 5 Math Test
12/18 Book Report Due
12/18 Winter Party
12/19 Winter Break Begins
Curriculum Corner
- In grammar, we will review interjections this week. By the end of the semester, students will know all 8 parts of speech and should be able to identify those parts of speech within a sentence. During the second semester, we will learn about parts of a sentence, types of phrases, and types of clauses.
- For Wordly Wise, 7 B & C will be due 12/10, and we will take our test WEDNESDAY, December 16.
- We are currently typing our persuasive essays. Once they are typed, we will edit and publish them!
Indiana History
Our next unit of Indiana History will cover the creation of the Northwest Territory, the War of 1812, and how settlers came to the Indiana Territory. We will assess over this information on 12/15.
Reading
We are reading a class novel, The Sign of the Beaver. This fits perfectly into the time period we are studying in Indiana History and has several references to our content. The reading skill we are focusing on during this book is called Question-Answer Relationships (QAR). This is a metacognitive reading strategy that helps teach students how to think about and respond to different types of comprehension questions. For some questions (Right There), the answer is found specifically within the book and the answer does not require thinking other than finding the answer. For other questions (Author & Me and Think & Search), students need to gather clues from the text to form a response that requires a deeper level of thought, such as summarizing or predicting. Lastly, there are questions (On My Own) that require students to connect to the text on a personal level to empathize with characters or develop an opinion. We will finish reading on December 17 and will watch the movie on the afternoon of December 18.
Math
Multiplication, multiplication, multiplication! The main focus of chapter 5 will be strategies for multiplication. The strategies I teach in class will be called partial products and lattice. These are methods that many of you (and I) did not learn in school, so please don't be alarmed when your child brings home work that does not look familiar. That being said, I will never tell the students what method they must use on the assessment. As long as they have a method that works for them, they may use it. Most students are able to learn and understand either partial products or lattice. If you want to teach your child "traditional" multiplication, you are welcome to! Please keep practicing those multiplication facts! They will be essential to multiplying larger numbers accurately. For their test on December 17, they will need to know the following skills:
- Estimating and writing number sentences for addition
- Multiplication of 1, 2, and 3-digit numbers
- Addition and subtraction of decimals (review skill)
- Measuring to the nearest 1/4 inch and 1/2 centimeter (review skill)
- Completing "In and Out" boxes (review skill)
Help! Parents still needed!
1) Indiana's Birthday THIS FRIDAY! If you are available to help during our button making time or our sewing time, it would be greatly appreciated!
http://www.signupgenius.com/go/10c0d4bacae22abfa7-indianas2
2) Bagels & Biographies/Class Party NEXT FRIDAY! My greatest need is for some more parents to help with the Bagels & Biographies portion. All you need to do is listen, ask questions if you have them, and let the kids know what a great job they did!
http://www.signupgenius.com/go/10c0d4bacae22abfa7-biographies