April Newsletter 2017

Our Unit

We have LOVED watching the Washington DC Eagle Cam this year! We have it on in our room as often as possible and were thrilled to get to watch the eggs hatch! There are now two eaglets in the nest that we have been watching change and grow. They have grown so much already! We are hoping to still be in school when they are ready to go off and fly on their own. Please feel free to watch the free Eagle Cam at home to follow the journey of our eaglets. The link is: http://www.dceaglecam.org/
After observing eaglets hatch and be cared for by their parents, it was exciting to receive chicken eggs from Mrs. Beverly from the 4H club!  We were able to track the baby chicks for 21 days.  Using a technique called “candling”, looking at photographs and viewing videos on the Smart Board; we were able to see the changes that happen on the inside of an egg shell before the babies hatch. It was fascinating to discover how the embryo was changing each day and what was happening inside of the egg.
​After the 21 days, it was exciting to be able to see chicks hatch.  After staying in the incubator for 24 hours, we put them in a large tub where we watched them eat, drink and sleep.  A week later, we saw how much bigger they grew and the changes that were already happening such as tail feathers and wings growing longer. The chicks have now gone off to their forever homes and we miss them but are grateful that we get to visit them sometimes! 
After observing the chicks, students became interested in how other life begins. We have spent the past few weeks learning and research, asking questions and exploring animals and their beginnings. We are now working on creating projects to demonstrate our learning and will then make this learning personal by learning about our own beginnings.

Literacy:
​The students have continued to impress Ms Brenda and I with their reading and writing!! Each group is exploring different reading and writing concepts that are at their level. 
All students have been working on editing, punctuation, summarizing, beginning/middle/end and main idea. Please practice these skills at home with your child! Your children are also becoming skilled writers! They are all writing multiple sentences independently and have a lot to say! It is exciting to watch the students find their voice as authors! Within our new unit the students are beginning to develop a strong idea of how to write nonfiction texts and what makes them different from fiction stories (content, tables of contents, headings, labels, index, glossary, etc).  As we evaluate texts we use this new information to influence our own development as authors. We have also studied nonfiction pictures and illustrations and are working on creating nonfiction and accurate illustrations. This is a very challenging skill!!!

Math:
Math this month has focused around MEASUREMENT! We began by comparing different objects and deciding which ons were longer, shorter, and taller.  We learned that there are a lot of different tools that are used to measure such as stopwatches, thermometers, rulers, timers, balances, scales ... and more! We studied a variety of items and discussed what they were used to measure. Next we began to measure items using both standard and nonstandard forms. We measured with cubes, paperclips, rulers and more! We also had a lot of fun exploring with the balance and comparing the weight of different objects.
We will continue this learning next week as we dive into weight and learn that objects can be longer and taller but still weigh less than other objects!  We will then use this learning to create our birdseed babies. When we make these babies we will have to measure a lot! We will take our pantyhose that we brought in fill them with birdseed so that they weigh the amount we weighed at birth. We will measure as we go and when it is the right weight we will measure the correct length and tie it off at the correct length as well. We can't wait to see how much we have grown!
In addition to measurement we have be working hard to continue to practice our addition and subtraction skills. It can be challenging to remember to watch the sign carefully to make sure we complete the correct operation on each problem. We have grown a lot with our math skills! We are also working with missing addends and fact families to dive deeper into how numbers are related within a math sentence. Its our goal that we can not only add and subtract but also gain a deeper understanding of exactly what is going on during those processes. 

Book Fair:
We had a great time at our Spring Book Fair! Thank you so much for your support through our Book Fairs and Scholastic Book Orders throughout the year. Your positivity and support of reading makes a huge difference in your child's education. We will have one more book order coming home Monday May 1st that will be due back Friday May 5th. Thank you!