Halloween Week

Last week's school-wide Leadership Assembly was co-M.C.'d by a student from our classroom!

Here are the notes for this week:

Leadership Assembly
Our school had an amazing Leadership Assembly last Thursday.  Different classes gave presentations on the lessons and projects they were studying in their classrooms.  The school data managers also challenged Silver Spring's boy students to raise the school reading average for boys.  One student from our classroom helped M.C. the entire assembly!  I posted some photos and a short video from the assembly in our classroom photo gallery.  You can access our classroom photo gallery buy clicking on the link to the right.

Home Reading Books
Each student went home today with two or three home reading books.  I put the books in a bright orange bag to help students keep track of it.  These books should be at your child's reading level and are great to use for reading practice.  Students can bring them back next Monday for fresh books.  If you ever feel like the books going home are two easy or too difficult please send me an email and let me know.

Important Upcoming Dates
Tuesday, November 4th - No School - Teacher Professional Day / Election Day
Thursday, November 13th - Half Day Dismissal at 11:55 AM - Conferences
Friday, November 14th - Half Day Dismissal at 11:55 AM - Conferences

Parent-Teacher Conference Sign Ups
Remember, you can sign up for parent teacher conferences by clicking here.

Halloween Parade Repost
This is the same information about Halloween I posted a few weeks ago: Silver Springs will be celebrating Halloween with our annual costume parade on October 31st.  Students will bring their costume to school that day and we will change in the afternoon for our party and the parade.  The parade will begin at 2:45 PM.  We will parade around the hallways of the school building.  Parents and families are welcome to dress in costume and attend the parade.  Parents will have a special viewing location located in our gym.  If you would like, you can see me after the parade to sign out your child.  You must sign students out with me if they are going to leave early with you.  Please follow these guidelines when planning your costume:
-Face make-up, hairspray, etc. must be applied at home.
-No fake weapons of any kind are allowed at school.
-No fake blood and no scary costumes. (If it might scare a kindergartener, please don’t wear it!) We encourage students to dress like a storybook or historical character, superhero, or something else fun and positive!  

Curriculum Overview
Literacy - Non-fiction: understanding the features in non-fiction books.  For example we will study: diagrams, captions, graphs, headers, glossaries, etc.

Math - Addition of three-digit numbers, understanding how and why to regroup

Writing - Writing about our lives, stretching out small moments into fantastic writing pieces.  This week we will begin publishing and perfecting one of our favorite stories.

Science - Earth Science.  We have a quiz this week and then will conduct an experiment on erosion.

Social Studies - In Social Studies we are continuing to learn about maps.  We learned how to find approximate distance using a map scale last week.  This week we will be learning about coordinate graphs.  We will also review maps to prepare for an upcoming quiz.  Please look for a review sheet to come home soon.

Word Study - This week we continue to work with words, discussing the many patterns that students are learning.  ALL students are introduced to all of the various word sorts for each group, each week.  They then focus on their own group's sort to practice with many activities.  We have also begun introducing and working with new vocabulary words.  The first 5 words are: ultimatum, demand, strike, impatient & neutral.  Students have learned how to pronounce the words and have been introduced to the definitions.  This week they will begin their vocabulary journals, writing each word, synonyms & antonyms for each, as well as illustrating each word and writing a "7-Up" sentence for each word (a sentence with at least 7 words.)  See if your child can talk to you about what these words mean!

Leadership – Setting our learning and personal goals for this marking period.  Look for a copy of your student's goals to go home soon.

This is the orange bag I will use to send reading books home with students.  Bring it back every Monday.  If you ever feel like the books going home are two easy or too difficult please send me an email and let me know.

Sharpen the Saw Night Was Tons of Fun!

A Room A-2 student oversees a giant game of Jenga.

It was great seeing so many of you last week at the Sharpen the Saw Family Night.  It was a lot of fun participating in those games and activities with you and your kids.  Here is the update for the week:

Halloween Recap
I wrote a full summary of the Silver Springs Halloween parade plan in last week's blog post.  Here are a few important reminders for that day:
-Students will bring their costumes to school, we will change into them before the parade.
-The parade starts at 2:45 PM.  We will parade through the hallways of the school, there is a special viewing area for parents.
-Make sure costumes are elementary school appropriate--if it might scare a kindergartner please don't wear it--no fake weapons as well.
-We will have a classroom party with cider and donuts at 2:00 PM, students will change during the party.
-If you come to the parade and want to take your student home early you need to sign them out with me when you leave.

Parent Teacher Conference Sign Ups
As I wrote last week, Parent Teacher Conferences are scheduled for November 12th, 13th, and 14th.  I have created a online sign up form at SignUpGenius.com where you can choose the time that works best for you.  It is important that I meet with all of you, if the times posted don't fit your schedule please let me know.  You can access the sign up page by clicking here.

Box Top Contest
We are having a school-wide Box Tops For Education contest.  If you have any box top cut-outs bring them in this week with "Mr. Luxon, Room A-2" written on the bag.



Curriculum Overview
Literacy - Making connections with fiction books.  The Art Lesson by Tommie dePaola.

Math - Addition of three-digit numbers, understanding how and why to regroup

Writing - Writing about our lives, stretching out small moments into fantastic writing pieces.  This week we will begin publishing and perfecting one of our favorite stories.

Science - Earth Science, understanding that when it rains some rainwater soaks into the earth while other water flows downhill forming streams and rivers that eventually flow into the ocean.

Social Studies - In Social Studies we are continuing to learn about maps.  We learned how to find approximate distance using a map scale last week.  This week we will be learning about coordinate graphs.  We will also review maps to prepare for an upcoming quiz.  Please look for a review sheet to come home soon.
 
Word Study - This week we continue to work with words, discussing the many patterns that students are learning.  ALL students are introduced to all of the various word sorts for each group, each week.  They then focus on their own group's sort to practice with many activities.  We have also begun introducing and working with new vocabulary words.  The first 5 words are: ultimatum, demand, strike, impatient & neutral.  Students have learned how to pronounce the words and have been introduced to the definitions.  This week they will begin their vocabulary journals, writing each word, synonyms & antonyms for each, as well as illustrating each word and writing a "7-Up" sentence for each word (a sentence with at least 7 words.)  See if your child can talk to you about what these words mean!

Leadership – Setting our learning and personal goals for this marking period.  Look for a copy of your student's goals to go home soon.

"Sharpen The Saw" Family Night This Thursday!

Students watch amazing school announcements on video every morning.

I hope you had an excellent weekend!  Here are the updates for this week.

Homework Journals
Thanks again for getting those Homework Journals in to me last week and again this week.  Last week I was so impressed that every single student brought in their journals and had writing for me to read.  And you did it again this week!  Thank you!

Reminder About Our Humanities Schedule
Our art teacher, Mrs. Brooks, is planning a painting lesson this coming Thursday.  Have your children wear less important clothing on that day!  Just as a reminder, here is our room’s weekly schedule of special classes:
Monday: Spanish and Gym
Tuesday: Music
Wednesday: Library
Thursday: Computer Lab and Art
Friday: Gym

"Sharpen The Saw" Family Night
As I mentioned a few weeks back, "Sharpen The Saw" Family Night is this Thursday, October 16th.  This will be a fun night of family games and activities.  I will be there helping out and running some of the games.  Admission is FREE!  That night the Silver Springs Staff will also be sponsoring a silent auction to benefit The Leader in Me and pizza and drinks will be on sale.

Halloween Parade
Silver Springs will be celebrating Halloween with our annual costume parade on October 31st.  Students will bring their costume to school that day and we will change in the afternoon for our party and the parade.  The parade will begin at 2:45 PM.  We will parade around the hallways of the school building.  Parents and families are welcome to dress in costume and attend the parade.  Parents will have a special viewing location located in our gym.  If you would like, you can see me after the parade to sign out your child.  You must sign students out with me if they are going to leave early with you.  Please follow these guidelines when planning your costume:
-Face make-up, hairspray, etc. must be applied at home.
-No fake weapons of any kind are allowed at school.
-No fake blood and no scary costumes. (If it might scare a kindergartener, please don’t wear it!) We encourage students to dress like a storybook or historical character, superhero, or something else fun and positive! 

Parent Teacher Conference Sign Ups
Parent Teacher Conferences are scheduled for November 12th, 13th, and 14th.  I have created a online sign up form at SignUpGenius.com where you can choose the time that works best for you.  It is important that I meet with all of you, if the times posted don't fit your schedule please let me know.  You can access the sign up page by clicking here.

Curriculum Overview
Literacy - Studying how characters change across a text.

Math - Three digit addition up to 1,000

Writing - Writing about our lives, stretching out small moments into fantastic writing pieces.  This week we will begin focusing on the writing process: drafting, editing, revising, and publishing.  Publishing is simply perfecting one favorite piece.

Science - Earth Science, understanding that when it rains some rainwater soaks into the earth while other water flows downhill forming streams and rivers that eventually flow into the ocean.

Social Studies - We have begun our new unit which is called “Where is my Community” by learning about maps.  We are learning that using the title, map key, symbols, and directions can help us to read a map.
   
Word Study - This week, in addition to their word sorts, students are also beginning their instruction on vocabulary.  We will begin a vocabulary journal in which students will be defining vocabulary words (from both curriculum and everyday life), identifying synonyms & antonyms, illustrating the words as well as using them in a sentence.  Games, songs and cooperative work will reinforce the words   

Leadership – Organizing our leadership notebooks.  Working on Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind.

Thanks For Your Help With The Homework Journals!

In science students conducted an experiment to study how water and land interact.

Room A-2 Families,

After this weekend it is clear that fall is here!  I hope you are staying warm.  Here are a few notes for the week:

Homework Journals
Thank you for getting those journals back to me today.  I was able to read them and write a simple note for every student this morning while students were in Spanish class.  I read through a lot of great student writing!  Thank you!

Science
In the picture above students are observing what happens when rain falls on a mountain.  In the students' experiments water flowed downhill in little rivers that collected at the bottom in what could be considered either lakes or oceans.  Also, as the water went downhill it took a lot of sand with it--we will be studying this idea of erosion more in the coming weeks.

Unicef Donation Boxes
The Silver Springs Second Graders decided that they wanted to participate in a Unicef fundraiser this Halloween.  You and your student can elect to take a handheld donation box out during trick-or-treating to collect spare change.  More information about this activity is in your Monday envelope.  This activity is totally optional.

Word Study With Mrs. Sepich
I mentioned last week that our class visits Mrs. Sepich once or twice a week to study words and vocabulary.  Mrs. Sepich has this information to share with you:  In word study, students have been working with word sorts each week.  We begin by meeting in small groups based on the initial spelling stage your child was in based on a pre-assessment that was given.  Some students are working with digraph sounds (ch, sh, th, wh), some students are focusing on the difference between long and short vowel sounds (words with cvc or cvce patterns/ consonant, vowel, consonant/) while some groups are working with long vowels (cvce or cvvc) and the different ways to get the long vowel sound.  Finally, some students are working with "other" ways to have long or irregular vowel sounds such as au, aw, ou, etc.

Each week we begin by meeting about the sort, explaining it so students understand the vowel patterns.  Students then cut and work the sort at their seat.  In following days, students work through a speed sort, a no peeking sort and a writing sort.  All of these sort activities should be internalized now.  When each sort comes home, your child should be able to explain how to do the activity at home.  This would be wonderful review for your child.

Curriculum Overview
Literacy - Identifying story elements in fairy tales and folktales: characters, setting, events, problem/resolution, and theme or message of the text.  Ask you students about The Lion and Mouse.

Math - Place value and numbers to 1,000.  Ordering numbers from least to greatest.  Adding and subtracting by tens and hundreds.

Writing - Writing about our lives, stretching out small moments into fantastic writing pieces.  This week we have been focusing on strong emotions, recalling moments from our life when were strongly happy, sad, proud, or worried.

Science - Earth Science, understanding that when it rains some rainwater soaks into the earth while other water flows downhill forming streams and rivers that eventually flow into the ocean.

Social Studies - Reading and using maps.

Leadership – Preparing our leadership notebooks.  Working on Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind.