Weekly Update

We had a great week back after a relaxing and refreshing Thanksgiving break. As we approach the Christmas season, we are getting in the spirit with fun holiday activities. Here are some curriculum updates.

Math: We began the week with a fun problem solving project using the movie Sing. The girls chose three EdPuzzles to solve with video clips from the movie. Here is one that most of them solved.

 
The next part of the project involves the girls writing a song with a partner. The challenge is that they are asked to use some Wordly Wise words in their song. They are really into this project and will perform early next week.
We also jumped into fractions and reviewed the concept of a fraction, numerators and denominators, using pictorial representations. We will continue to work with fractions up to the Christmas break.
On this week's Pick 8, the girls had to solve multi-digit addition, subtraction, multiplication and division problems. There were many careless mistakes so I encouraged the girls to look back over their work this week. I will be giving them a pop quiz on this computation next week. It will look very similar to this week's Pick 8.
Another fun math project that we started this week was solving problems to earn "Math-a-ments." Each girl has a Christmas tree on the outside of their cubby. In order to decorate it, they must correctly solve a variety of math problems to earn math-a-ments. Coloring and math make a great combination for 9-10 year old girls! Here is one:

Language Arts: The girls did a nice job reflecting on the blessings in their lives with their gratitude journals. These came home today in their Friday folders so I hope you will take a look. We finished our realistic book projects and they made some awesome book trailers using Animoto. Check them out! We are continuing with our class novel, All of a Kind Family, and I hope we will conclude the book by the break. This week, we started a new writing lab that will last for the next few weeks. It started with a partner interview with girls from Mrs. Coughlan's class. We talked about how to phrase a question to encourage a detailed response. The girls had fun interviewing each other and taking notes. Next week the girls will practice their summarizing skills and write about their partner. There's an additional piece to this activity that will place the girls on the cover of a magazine. Stay tuned.

Reminders and Announcements

• Gifts Service is December 19 - more details to follow
• No carpool helpers from our class next week
• Scavenger hunt

• Please consider participating in the Lower School Christmas Service project. Our class has been asked to bring in gifts for a girl age 15 and up.