Week of 12.6-12.10

OK, today felt longer than all of last week combined!  With the weather being too cold for outdoor recess, and the break being so near, the kids have a ton of energy.  Please help them 'let it out' by giving them plenty of play time.  Active activities like cooking, building with blocks, or even 10 minutes outside will help more than sedentary activities like video games or TV.  We have a few tests this week to wrap up our units, but otherwise the kids shouldn't have much homework beyond tonight. 


Reading:  We're reading A Christmas Carol and enjoying it immensely!  It's a fantastic teaching tool for SO many skills.  We're talking about change in character, flashback, foreshadowing, setting, mood, problem, resolution, etc.  Ask your kids about it!


Writing:  We used a comic to understand how stories can be told through pictures and not many words.  The main focus of the comic was the 'resolution.'  We discussed how all endings aren't happy endings, and the way that a story may feel resolved but something in it might not have closure.  (The roof leaked, so Pa got the ladder.  The ladder broke so Pa got the saw.  The saw broke.  Pa fixed the saw, he fixed the ladder, but the roof still leaked!)

Science:  We looked at the food pyramid and learned about how different nutrients are found in the different food groups.  We analyzed a day of eating to understand that we need more energy early in the day (breakfast lunch) and less energy later in the day (dinner, bedtime) because our bodies use energy throughout the day.  This week we'll review and take the end-of-unit quiz.

Miscellaneous:Math:  The Unit 4 test will be tomorrow.  We reviewed in class today.  The students will be tested on developing concepts like decimal place value, adding & subtracting decimals

• Send your kids with a waste free lunch on Wednesday!  We hope to keep our reigning title of "Most Waste Free Lunches" and the Golden Lunchbox award!
• SIT Family Night - Holiday Showcase
  Do you have a special holiday or tradition (which can include music and dance) that you would like to share with the Whittier Community? We invite you to participate in our Family Night that will be held on Wednesday, December 15th from 5:30 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. at Whittier. Please send an email to kmoore@op97.org with a brief description of the holiday tradition and any potential activity or craft that you would like to showcase that evening.

This week's author: Tait

We finished our Social Studies simulation on Monday and nobody died! On Tuesday Clark killed a fly on a notebook during read aloud and there was blood everywhere!

On Wednesday Connor came back from Australia! He brought a lot of souveniers. Thursday was a normal day, but gym was awesome!

Friday we had finally had independent reading! (our class loves independent reading). Alec kicked his boot over the fence during recess. We all played together and built a fort!