Dr. Shaw's Weekly Newsletter
September 28th - October 2nd
Greetings Everyone!
Only two weeks left in the first quarter! Wow, has the time flown by! The upcoming weeks will be busy as we wrap up our studies for this term. Please make note of the assessment dates in this week's newsletter so that you and your child can make plans accordingly.
Thank you for attending conferences last week. I truly appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedules to meet with me. I am just an email away if you have any additional questions or concerns that we did not discuss.
Entries for the PTA Reflections contest are due on September 29th. You can find the entry forms on your child's eClass page on the download tab. I hope that we will have some entries from our class!
A gentle reminder about devices. Quite a few students have devices in class and I encourage their use as long it is appropriate. The most common use for devices is as an e-reader. We've had one opportunity so far this year to use our devices to participate in an eClass discussion board. We will use our devices to play Kahoot! in order to review for our social studies chapter two test. Remember, gaming, texting, or participating in any type of social media is not allowed. Misuse of the device may result in loss of the privilege of use.
Now, let's get down to the academics....
We have the district assessments coming up this week. Each test lasts about an hour and we will be taking them online. Monday is English Language Arts, Tuesday is Social Studies, Wednesday is Science, and Friday is the Math Test. I've added content for math, science, and social studies to Quizlet and I highly encourage your child to review important terms and key concepts. These assessments are a reflection of how hard we have worked this quarter and I am confident that we will do well. The grade does count as a part of your child's overall grade for the quarter.
In math, my classes will have a daily grade on the 30th covering decimals in the four operations (add, subtract, multiply, and divide). We will continue to learn about the powers of ten and how digits in a number like 4,444 are related. Each four is ten time bigger than the four to its right and is also 1/10 the size of the four on its left. There is a cumulative test on all decimal skills October 7th.
In science, we have wrapped up our lessons on the classification of plants. A study guide will be given out early in the week with the test scheduled for Monday, October 5th. We will begin learning about inherited traits and learned behaviors to wrap up this term. A daily grade on that skill is scheduled for the 8th.
In social studies, we've finished covering Reconstruction after the Civil War. A study guide for the chapter two test will be given out on Monday. We will have a daily grade on the 30th, followed by the chapter test on the 6th.
As a culminating activity for our study of the war, the students will participate in a "jigsaw" activity. Each student will choose a topic from the war that they are interested in learning more about and then conduct independent studies about that topic. After they become "experts" in their chosen area, they will present their topic to the class so that we can all learn more about the war. As each topic is presented, all of us will learn more about the war, putting pieces of the "jigsaw" puzzle together. This is a great way to learn research skills and practice our presentation skills.
In reading, the students will wrap up their studies of summarizing and then complete a daily grade on the 1st. They will explore figurative language by identifying and writing similes and metaphors. Knowledge of similes and metaphors will be assessed on the 7th.
A final writing grade will be taken on the 28th and 29th. Students will have a total of two hours to complete their piece from the prewriting stage to final copy product.
In grammar, all graded assessments are complete for the term. The class will focus on incorporating complex, compound, and compound-complex sentences in their writing.
Finally, in Greek and Latin word study, the class will have their cumulative root test for the quarter on the 29th. All words are on Quizlet.
Mrs. Blankenship will also review synonyms, antonyms, and homographs with the class and that skill will be assessed on the 5th with a daily grade. This counts as a word study grade.
Have a wonderful week!
Dr. Shaw