Mayberry-McFarland Weekly News

for the weeks of October 3 & 10, 2016

Due Dates / Upcoming Events

Monday, October 17- reading logs due (Almost everyone is now on board and meeting the minimum expectations of 4 x 25+ minutes.)

Tuesday, October 18 - Home Link due

Wednesday, October 19 - early release day / McFarlands have PE (swimming!)

Thursday, October 20 -  math box pages catch-up due

Friday, October 21 - Home Link due

Monday, October 24 - reading logs due

General News and Announcements

Please note that we start swimming in PE class this Wednesday!

I’m looking for sets of trivia cards, any topic -- general ones are even better!  We use them at dismissal time, and we’re getting too many repeat cards from the packs that I have.  If you have some in your basement or playroom that are collecting dust, please send them in.  I can return them if you want them back.

At the end of the summer I submitted a grant request to Donors Choose. This organization helps educators find funding for materials they would like to have in their classroom. If you would like to check on, and possible donate to my project, it is linked here.

Please note that students should focus their math facts practice on subtraction and multiplication.  We are scratching out addition on the planner sheets, as almost everyone has mastered those.  Please see Mrs. Mayberry’s web page (https://sites.google.com/a/msad51.org/sheila_mayberry/) for a variety of ways to practice.  Students should mark what they practice on the weekly homework planner sheet, and parents should be initialing that each time.  Thanks to those of you who are doing that regularly!

Students took the iReady math and reading tests this week.  This test replaces the STAR assessments we have used in previous years.  We are expecting the results, in conjunction with the results of classroom assessments, to help us form intervention groups based on students’ needs.  We will be analyzing the data in the coming weeks.

Thank you to those who have signed up for a parent/teacher conference to chat about your child’s start to the school year, progress so far, and goals for the remainder of the year.  You will meet with both Mrs. Mayberry and I, so we can share details from each academic subject area.  

Thank you so much to Mrs. Soucie, Mrs. Mohr, Mrs. Duina, and Mrs. MacArthur, who made the beautiful book bags for the McFarland and Mayberry readers!  The kids LOVE them, and it was the most exciting day of the year so far when they got to choose one for their own!

Reading Workshop

This week, our Reading Workshops took a hit due to a planned evacuation drill and the iReady testing.  Despite that, your child’s log will show that we did get some independent reading accomplished.  We’ll be back at it next week!

Writing Workshop

Students edited their narratives in “rounds” this week!  Of course, editing for a number of things in an entire writing piece all at once is tiring and overwhelming...exactly like a boxing match is tiring and overwhelming if fought all at one time.  So, we edited in rounds.  We put to use some of Mrs. Mayberry’s dictionary work from Theme last week, in addition to using other resources, such as class charts, our word wall, and Quickword Handbooks.  (I also added -- after the photo below was taken -- a Bonus Round 6: commas in a series [list] and commas in dialogue).  Students started writing their final drafts in class on Thursday.

Math

Last week we started the second unit in the Everyday Math program. This unit focuses primarily on multiplication facts and strategies to use when faced with an unknown multiplication fact. Students also have worked on identifying the factors for a given number less than 50 and determining the multiples for numbers 2-10.

This week students have learned how to find the area of a rectangle, which is yet another application for their multiplication skills. In addition, they learned about, and how to identify, prime and composite numbers.

Theme/Content

In social studies students completed their North America maps and have started in on a flip book project for landforms and bodies of water. This book will serve two purposes; first, as a study guide for an upcoming quiz and as a resource for the final cartography project in this unit.