Week of 1.24 - 1.28

Hi Everyone,

Another great week.  Hubbard Street was awesome today, the kids were so into their choreography assignment.  They created some great stuff!  I sent home a permission slip for a Bravo fieldtrip next Thursday, please sign and return asap.

I have a few more favorite quotes, this time in response to some "Time for Kids" articles we read (see below)

• "We canNOT give up art, music, gym, or Spanish- we need art for architecture!"  Sebastian
• "Yeah, it's like not getting a balanced diet without that stuff, our brain wouldn't be balanced" - Antonio
• "Yeah, and kids would kill the teachers if they were in the classroom all day" - Jackson

Reading:   We read and discussed the latest "Time for Kids."  It's not often that I get to sit and and listen to spontaneous, unguided reactions to their reading (usually when we do whole class reading I'll guide the discussion, too).  I love to hear them formulate opinions about sophisticated things like the State of the Union address or whether or not we should extend the school year.  They TOTALLY buy into having thoughtful conversations about issues like this because (you can tell) they feel so smart.  It is fun to watch.

I also gave them a reading block to work on their Heritage projects.  We did a mini-share so the kids could see each others' work.  It really helped to spark ideas and motivation.

Writing:  We did a bit more creative free writing this week, combined with some grammar lessons on 'dead verbs' and personification.  Our other writing block was spent teaching into the autobiography some more.  They began their rough drafts, where they'll take each of their five chosen events and write about them in detail.  We talked about tapping into the five senses:  what did it feel/ look/ sound/ smell/ (taste) like? How did others react?   


Science:  We only had one science this week due to Hubbard Street and having Monday off.  We hung our different-length pendulums to create a graph of our results.  Then we used that model to chart and graph the results in our notebook.  We also wrote conclusions for each experiment and the overall section.

On a science-related note, the kids voted to create a 'process-board' for our bulletin board to show during conferences.  They plan to show you how they carried out all of their pendulum experiments by showing you the 'process.'  Today we agreed on the six steps we took to reach a conclusion, divied up each of the steps to a team, and created an overall 'vision.'  It's funny: they took to heart a statistic they read in "Time for Kids" about the US not making the top 5 highest scoring countries in math or science.  I think this is their way of 'fighting back.'  They plan to set up a 'try it yourself' station during conference week, as well as a 'what's to come' station.  Goodness knows I've created little monsters, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this turns out as well as they imagine it will...

Math:  Unit 5 test will be Tuesday, February 1st.  We'll review on Monday (a family review sheet will also be sent home on Monday.  This unit covered several multiplication strategies, estimation, rounding, big numbers and powers of 10.

Spanish:  Visit Senora's site for homework:  http://d97-deatonnoticias.blogspot.com/

Miscellaneous:

• One for Books!  Please donate a dollar or your loose change at February's Book Fair to the One for Books collection box.  The PTO will use the money donated to buy books for low income kids who are patients at the Children's Clinic of Oak Park.  Scholastic will match every dollar we raise and donate books to several organizations that help kids.
• If you have not scheduled a conference for your child, please email me!  mklemchuk@op97.org
• Here's an easy way to help Whittier and be 'green' at the same time:  Bring in your empty printer cartridges (inkjet and laser) and used cell phones to the recycling center to Whittier's lobby. The Wildcat Council kids will recycle the cartridges and cell phones through Funding Factory to earn new technology and/or recreational equipment or cash.  You can get your employer or business to help too.  Just have them register online at www.FundingFactory.com, provide  Whittier's ID# 167320 and they can ship printer cartridges to Funding Factory for free with all proceeds going to Whittier's PTO.

Historian's Log by Julia
We didn't have school Monday. Tuesday, most of us finished our clay projects in art.   Wednesday was Miller's birthday! Thursday was our last day of gymnastics.   Friday we had HSDC and started recorders in music