The past few weeks and Minute To Win It fun!

It has been a while since our last blog post, so you are probably wondering what we have been up to the last 2 weeks!

In reading we finished learning about the characteristics of folktales. We learned about legends, myths, fairy tales, and fables. We have started learning how to summarize nonfiction text. We have read "The Hallelujah Flight", "Wolves", and "The Presidency". We learned that to summarize nonfiction text you need to use a main idea chart. Then you use the main idea and supporting details to make your paragraph.

In math we have been focusing on solving multiplication by using tables. We have discussed ways we will use multiplication in real life. Ask your child how they can use it in their life!!

In social studies we are using the cultural heritage interview to research our past. We are using what we learned to make cultural heritage dolls. Some things that we have learned are:
- Where are grandparents are from.
- The German flag's colors stand for a black eagle with red claws and beak and golden field.
- The Mexican flag's emblem is a bird on a cactus eating a snake.
- In France they eat snails called escargot.

MINUTE TO WIN IT!!!
Our review of our game is....
- J.E.- Devin and Maddie played "defying gravity"
- D.H.- We played breakfast scramble
- H. O.- Defying gravity was kind of hard
- D. J.- It was a fun game
- M.A.- Breakfast scramble was tricky
- A.R.- A Bit Dicey was really hard because if you move then the dice fall off the stick
-A.F.- When we did the puzzles I picked the Trait Words puzzle piece
- S.B.- I played defying gravity and it was fun because I have ninja like reflexes
- M.M.- It combined 2 of our favorite things, reading and games
-E.H.T- I liked the breakfast scramble because it was the front of a box I had not seen so it was difficult the first time. Then I memorized it and tried it again and got it
- B.W.- I played don't blow the kings. It was difficult because when you tried to blow the other cards off, the kings fell off too.

BLOG BONUS!!!!
Post a letter to Ms. Pair on the blog. Include what do liked or disliked about Minute To Win It. If you disliked something tell me what you would want to try differently to make it better/ more interesting/ more exciting. In the letter include one thing you did this weekend or something that you are looking forward to!!

Have a great weekend! :o)
Don't forget to bring your Holiday Party supplies by Wednesday!! Pictures of Minute To Win It are coming soon!!


Reading with partners



Reading!

We love to read!

"Don't Blow the Kings"!! Doing a great job!

Can you get all of the cards off the table excpet the kings?

Get those cards off that table!!!

Working on a puzzle piece!

"Defying gravity" by keeping the balloons off the ground

Working on our puzzle

Puzzle piece!

Our Minute To Win It board

Trying "A Bit Dicey" out!

Doing great!

What a great puzzle solver!

Breakfast scramble!

Doing great!

Solving the scramble

Partner reading work in class

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope that everyone is having a wonderful break from school! I am about to go run the Turkey Trot to kick off my Thanksgiving, then I am having fajitas with the family. We always eat non-traditional Thanksgiving food since my sister and I are picky eaters. After dinner my sister and I are going to do some shopping at midnight! What are you doing to celebrate thanksgiving?

List on the BLOG your Thanksgiving tradition OR tell 5 things you are thankful for and why you are thankful for them!

Look back for another BONUS this week!! 

:) Ms. Pair

It only takes one... choose, act, and reflect

It only takes one person to make a difference. This weekend choose one of the following actions to do this weekend (make sure you have parent permission):
1. Pick up trash on your street or in a park near your house
2. Read a book to a family member or a friend
3. Do an extra chore to help a family member with out being asked. (Example: take out the trash, empty the dish washer, set the table...)

After you complete the action write a reflection by answering the questions below:
1. How did you feel after the action? Why do you think you felt that way?
2. How do you think your actions made others feel?
3. Make a list of 3 or more action you could do to help your community, someone in your family, or a friend. Circle or star the action you would like to do next.

- You can post the reflection and bring in the picture (below) or you can bring the reflection and the picture in to class on Monday.

*** For a SECOND bonus... illustrate yourself doing the action step you completed!

Have a wonderful weekend :)

What's the moral- A look into fables

This week we learned about a new genre of Folktale. We learned about fables. Fables...:
- Teach a moral or lesson
- characters can be a human or an animal that has human characteristics.

We read the fable "Wolf! Wolf!" and "The Empty Pot". We also watched "The Lion and the Mouse." Ask me about the moral from each story!

We also focused on sequencing. Can you sequence your day?

We learned how to use multiplication. Multiplication is equal groups. We practice naming items that came in groups. What can you find at the grocery store that comes in groups?


Blog Bonus!!!!!:
1. Go to the same science website that we have used before:
 http://roundrockisd.stemscopes.com/login
2. Log In
Username: pair3
Password: pair3

3. Click on the link to open

4. Listen to the Science Rock song and complete the pre-assessment on mixtures (We will be learning about mixtures next week)

5. Post on the blog:
1. 1 thing you learned about mixtures
2. 1 question you have about mixtures

Have a wonderful weekend! :)

October is almost over!

In our new unit we have started personal narrative writing- writing about our lives and our experiences. We have practiced learning the strategies for gathering ideas. So far we have thought of a special person, listed small moments and turned it into a writing piece. We also have used the same strategy with a special place.


In reading we have been working on sequencing the main events of a story. We used "Bubba the Cowboy Prince" and the "Frog Prince Continued". Can you guess what new genre we are studying?!?!

For the BLOG BONUS:
- Sequence how you plan on getting ready for Halloween. Include your sequencing key words (first, second, third, next, then, lastly, finally, etc). Post on the blog or record the steps on paper and turn it in!


OR


- Write about your creepiest or scariest Halloween moment. Post on the blog or write your small moment on notebook paper and bring in.

Have a good weekend! I can't wait to see everyone on Monday! I am proud of how you worked today!

What's the MATTER?

This week, as you may have noticed, we started learning about the states of matter. This week we have focused on the properties of matter and the ways you can measure matter.

This week we also started a new IB unit. The central idea of our unit is:
People reflect on their lives through the art, writing, and sharing of literature.


We also started learning about a new genre: Fairy Tales
We learned that:
-a fairy tale is a type of folktale
- there is a fight against good and evil
- there are mystical creatures- like a Pegasus, dragon, fairy, etc
- there is magic
- animal can act and talk like humans
- there is royalty
- take place in woods and castles


BLOG BONUS:
1. GO to the same website as last week:

http://roundrockisd.stemscopes.com/login

2. Log in
User name: pair3
Password: pair3

3. Click on the link to open

4. complete the review game and listen to the science rock song

5. Post on the blog properties that describe a secret object you have. Do not post what the secret object is and I will try to guess it.

Example:
- green
- smooth and bumpy
- cube
- small
- sinks
- nonmagnetic

What am I?

Have a GREAT weekend!

We compelted our first IB unit!!

This week we completed our first IB unit. For our final project we wrote letters to Rick Perry from the point of view of farmers, construction workers, historical preservationists, environmentalists, and business owners. We tried to convince or not to convince Rick Perry to move forward with building the Trans- Texas Corridor.

Here is some information we learned:

Here is our final project- Our letters to Rick Perry

We also finished learning about addition and subtraction with regrouping. Here is our chart we made together in the classroom:



In reading we focused on main idea of fiction and non-fiction reading. We read a humors story called "Frank was a Monster Who Wanted to Dance". It was pretty silly. You can find it on "Tumble Books" under the CHE library research resources web site:



Our main idea bats after reading "Bats at the Library"



BLOG Bonus!!
You will be completing a scavenger hunt on natural resources. The website is through Round Rock ISD and the websites have been approved for student use. As teachers we use the website for planning various science lessons!
Instructions:
1. Click on the following link to go to the web site:
Click her for the bonus

2. Log in.
User name: pair3
Password: pair3

3. click on the link after you log in that is title "Unit One"

4. Click on "Web Surfing Science"

5. Click on the link titled "web quest". It will open up a document. If you click on the links it will take you to the website you need to go to to find the answers. You can print out the "Web Quest" and fill it in or you can record your answers on notebook paper!

6. If it will not work or if you have any questions, post them on the blog and I will get back to you! Happy hunting!!

:) Ms. Pair

Choices people make influences society

This week we had a discussion in the classroom about CHE becoming an IB school. We discussed that we will be learning through 6 different units this year. Our first unit has been "Who We Are". Our central idea for our unit is "Choices people make influences society." Our central idea is our reason for learning all of the concepts that we have in the last 6 weeks.

We have learned that choices can influence natural resources, the ecosystems, businesses. In order to better  understand these topics we discussed cause and effect and fact and opinion.
We are completing our first unit next week. The building of the Trans-Texas Corridor is our inspiration for our final project. We are going to be working on a project where we write a letter to Rick Perry from the view point of a construction worker, farmer, historical preservationist, environmentalist, or business owner. We will have to persuade Rick Perry to or not to build the Trans-Texas Corridor. We will be having a debate in out classroom to argue our opinions.

We watched a video where people described how building the road would effect them and their lives. Watching this video made us feel:
- like we wanted to help to change the situation
- When we learned that historical cemeteries would be destroyed it made us upset
- Sad and mad because the road will destroy plants and animals homes. It will cause people to leave their homes.

Here is a link to the video we watched in class to help us with background knowledge:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btewqYiom_o

BLOG BONUS!! Write a letter to a person of your choice persuading them to do something you want them to do. (Ex: buy candy, take you to a movie, come visit) Bring the letter in or post it on the blog by Tuesday morning. Complete for a SECRET SURPRISE!

Are you being truthful?

For this weekend- post one fact and one opinion about something that we have learned this month. Make sure you label your fact and your opinion!

Example:
Fact- Wilson Bentley loved snow.
Opinion- I think the importnat thing about the rainforest is that a sloth lives there.

Have a GREAT weekend!

Reading, and math, and social studies... Oh My!

Reminders: Fundraiser books are due back to school on Tuesday!

Conferences are coming up Oct. 10th. Reminders will be sent home again!

Reading: This week we spent our time learning about cause and effect. We learned that a cause happens first and then the effect happens. We identified 4 cause and effect clue words: because, so, since, and then. We read stories like "The Story of Ruby Bridges" and "Jimmy's Boa and the Bungee Jump Slam Dunk."

BONUS!! This weekends Blog Bonus is to create the following:

Since Lexi spent all day playing in the snow, she caught a cold and had to stay inside.

Because mom had to run and get the phone while making lunch, it cause Lady to jump on the table and eat lunch.

To Complete:

1. Find an interesting picture from online, newspaper, or magazine.

2. Cut it out and decide if it will be the cause or the effect.

3. Glue it on the cause side if it is the cause, or glue it on the effect side if it will be the effect.

4. Next brainstorm what caused the picture to happened or what the effect of the picture is. Draw in the matching picture on the opposite side of the glued in picture.

5. Label the sides "cause" and "effect"

6. Record your cause and effect sentence to match the pictures. Circle the cause and effect clue word

**Make sure it is colored!

Your reward for completing this will be held secret until Monday! If you have questions, please post them and I will respond back ASAP!

Our chart from class that we used while learning about cause and effect:

Math: In math this week we became experts on round numbers to the nearest ten and the nearest hundred. We learned to use the strategy of a number line or what we call a tree strategy. Its always important to know the two tens or the two hundreds a number comes between!

Our rounding chant: "0, 1, 2, 3, 4 hit the ground and touch the floor. 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 climb the vine!"

Social Studies: This week we discussed Free Enterprise. We talked about what jobs we could do to earn money. We discussed why we save money as well. We read about different entrepreneurs and learned about how the started their businesses. Next week we will be creating our own business plans!

Take a peak at what has been happenin'!

We have been studying nonfiction features like glossary, captions, headings titles...

Enjoying a good book!

We created a new or existing product with 3 natural resources. We had to describe the products purpose, positive and negative effects on our environment.

Another of the resource writing!

Getting that morning work done! Working hard on Lonestar Math!

We studied 5 ecosystems and learned about the natural resources, plants, and animals in the area.

What do I do when I get in the room??

Our class essential agreements.

Our "Ali" the alligator to help us compare numbers.

The ecosystem pictures that students brought in last week!

Pitter Patter....

Today as we were enjoying a library lesson on Bluebonnet Books, we were very excited to hear the glorious sound of falling rain!!

As for our update this week...

In science we researched about ecosystems. We focused on desert, arctic, rain forest, grassland, and ocean.

Desert- We learned that in there desert there is little rainfall and grass. We feel like we live in a desert because we have had very little rainfall. Along with plants and animals, we learned that there are natural resources like rocks, sand, and animals- like scorpions and tarantulas.

Ask your child to tell you ask about the other ecosystems!!

In math this week we became pros at comparing and ordering numbers. We will have an assessment on Monday to show all of our new learning in place value, ordering, and comparing numbers.

***Bonus!!
1. Bring in pictures from a different ecosystem that we have learned about in class.
2. Find 4- 4 digit number from a magazine or a newspaper and order them in order from greatest to least.

Conserving Resources

This week in science we focused on natural resources. We went on a resource hunt and found resources around our school. We also learned the difference between renewable and nonrenewable resources. We learned that it is important to conserve resources. Here is a list of 5 things we came up with that we could do at home to help conserve resources:

1. Turn off water when we are not using it. (brushing teeth, doing dishes)

2. Recycle paper and use paper to make other projects.

3. Turn off the lights when you are not needing to use them.

4. Take shorter showers.

5. Use a drying a rack outside to dry clothes instead of using the dryer

What else can you do at home to conserve resources?

A Week of Heroes!

In Reading, Science, and Social Studies this week we focused on reading about people who showed qualities of heroism and good citizenship. We learned about this by reading biographies. We read Ruby Bridges and tracked out thinking. We also read Ruby's Wish. Ruby's Wish was about a girl who was the first to go to university. We learned that these two characters were a lot alike!
- Both girls were the only ones in school.
- Both girls experienced discrimination. Ruby Bridge's was discriminated against because of her skin color and Ruby was discriminated against because she was a girl.

In math we learned about Lone Star math. It will help us review math. We also learned about place value up to the hundreds. Today we made number webs using playing cards. Next week we will be learning place value up to the hundred thousands.

Have a great weekend! Remember: Book order is due Sept. 7th. For online ordering please send Ms. Pair a note!

We Made It!!

We have finally made it through the first week of school! It has been exciting, new, fun, and AWESOME! This week we participated in many different activities surrounding different attitude words. We focused on being respectful, principled, communicators, caring, and being risk takers.

Some of our favorite activities this week were:

- Passing notes in class: We communicated special things about ourselves by writing it down on paper and passing our papers around. We learned that you don't always have to talk to communicate.

- Bubble letters: After reading "Chrysanthemum" we wrote our names in bubble letters and inside each letter we drew something that represented us.

- Classroom library- we were excited about learning about our class library because there are a lot of books to read. There are many different genres to read and learn about.

- Started math with problem solving: It was fun to read and use the clues to answer the problem.

- Writing in journals- we started to write about our lives after we made Heart Maps where we added different things about our lives

- Decorating notebooks- We enjoyed getting a chance to be creative. It helped us by adding pictures of family because it made us think about those people.

- Imagination activity- "Not a Stick", "Not a Box"- After reading one of the book we were all risk takers by taking either and eraser, hockey puck, or cube and using our imagination to turn it into a new object. Our eraser turned into magic eraser, a phone, and a remote. The cube turned into a house, a box full of diamonds, and a dice. The hockey puck turned into a motorcycle tire, a football, and a hamburger.

It has been an enthusiastic week, we are looking forward to next week and our next blog post!

Before the BIG day!!

After talking to many students on Friday night, I realized that my summer vacation was rather unexciting compared to all my students. I heard many beach stories from South Padre, Galveston, Florida...etc and realized that I needed to do something fun too! I spent my last weekend visiting friends in Dallas. We went to the Dallas Aquarium on Saturday afternoon. It was a beautiful aquarium! If you have never been before, it is a big open space where birds and fly free and you see monkeys climbing the trees around you. What I found really cool were the manatees. They were HUGE! We were able to go down a couple of levels and look into the tank where they were kept. They would swim along the glass, almost like they were showing off to all of us observers. Another exhibit that I thought was really interesting was a tunnel that you could walk through that went through the shark tank. There were Hammerhead sharks and Sawfish. Here are some of the other interesting animals I saw:

They remind me of "Mr. Popper's Penguins"!

I love owls. This one is just beautiful.

He was in a big glass tank by himself. Scary!!

He was posing and playing around. He was definitely the entertainer in his cage!

I'm looking forward to seeing everyone tomorrow! I hope everyone had a fun and realxing last weekend of summer!

Back To School Night!

I know this is before the night starts, but while its on my mind, I want to post a few reminders from tonight before I forget!

1. Please fill out and return ALL paperwork on the first day (Tuesday)

2. The yellow cards and transportation (whole year and first day) forms are very important for me to have before the first day!

3. Have a wonderful and relaxing weekend. I am so excited for the new school year to start, as I know all of you are too!!

Thank you to everyone who showed up tonight! Also, if you are reading this... thank you for checking into our new technology, hopefully it proves helpful!

Ms. Pair :)

Looking forward to...

As I start back working in my classroom each year I start thinking about goals I would like to accomplish in my classroom or things that I am looking forward to. So here's a "Top Five" list of things that I am looking forward to this school year!

1. Meeting all my new students and learning each ones unique personality. Who will be the joke-ster? Who will be the "mom" of the class?

2. Using more technology in the classroom this year. I love working with the prometheans in our rooms and I don't know what I would do with out having that piece of technology to help engage my students in lessons!! Using a blog is new and I am really excited to see how the blog helps to keep everyone informed and updated on what we are doing this year.

3. A fresh start. Each year lends its self to change and "newness". After spending some quality time up at CHE my room received a makeover. Change is good!

4. CHE is in the process of becoming an IB school. We have been working since last summer on making the change. I have attended trainings last summer, this summer, and all through the school year. Our team has been working very hard on planning the "units" that are included in the IB program. This year we are starting to implement the IB (International Baccalaureate) units by teaching what we have planned so far. This is a big change from the teaching style I have been used to (teaching all of the subjects independently with integration) but I am excited to try out the new change (all subjects are integrated, for example, no more specific "reading" time) because it will bring positive results!

5. Being back in a routine!

Summer is almost over!

I can't believe that summertime is coming to an end so quickly. I am really looking forward to school starting again soon. I've been spending most of my summer relaxing, reading, and just hanging out with my friends and family so I am looking forward to getting back into a routine and having unpredictability in my days again.

I am starting this blog this year as a new tool to help students, parents, and myself stay connected and updated with what is happening in the school and classroom community. Myself or the students will be creating posts on here to keep you updated on our experiences through out the year. This is brand new for me and I am REALLY excited about starting it as something new!

Looking forward to August!