Mrs. Jarrett's Journal

November 2008

Wow!  November snuck up so quickly that I haven't had a chance to stop in and update our newsletter.  I enjoyed meeting with all of the parents who came for a November conference.  It was a nice opportunity to sit down for a few minutes and discuss your child's progress.  Please don't hesitate to contact me at any time with questions, comments, or concerns.  I am here to help your child succeed! 

Special thanks to the families of Scott Olin, Sabrina Griffith, Callie Smith, Josh Poggioli, Reza Etemad-Moghadam, Taylor Horchar, Emily Kogler, Matthew Weigand and Jacob Zebron.  I was able to select some great new books for our classroom library with the gift certificates they purchased at the Scholastic Book Fair.

We had a great turn-out for our Fall party on October 30th.  A very special thank you to Mrs. Poggioli, Mrs. Kogler and Mrs. Davis who organized the games, crafts and treats.  I would also like to thank the parents who came to help out and have fun.  I look forward to seeing you at our Winter celebration on December 18th.

The October biography book projects were terrific!  We had some very interesting and creative presentations.  A November book project assignment was sent home on Monday.  This month the students will read a fiction chapter book and complete the directions for choosing a gift for the main character.  We will share these gifts in school on December 8th.  Please make sure to read over the directions with your child.  I will provide the index cards.  Nothing is to be purchased for this project.  All books will need to be brought to school and approved by me, so choose early!  Book projects are due December 8th.  This will be the last book report until January. 

I hope to see you next week for American Education Week.  Monday is Grandparents/all visitors and Wednesday is third grade's visitation day.  I will send home a copy of our schedule for Monday and Wednesday in the Thursday folder.

Math:

We tested unit 3 (Linear Measures and Area) today.  We will begin our next unit on multiplication and division on Monday.  Please continue to practice basic addition and subtraction facts with your child.  Knowing these facts will be critical as we move into multiplication and division.  Many students are still counting on their fingers and losing valuable points on the assessment because they cannot complete the facts in the time limit.

Reading:

We will finish theme 2 in the Harcourt anthology this week.  Our next theme is called Friends to Grow With.  All of the stories relate to the theme of friendship.  We are nearly finished our first two trade books and continue to read many different fiction and nonfiction selections.  We are working on identifying different nonfiction text structures.  Knowing how the author organizes the text can help us with our comprehension of the material.  

Writing:

We finished our first Writer's Workshop unit last week and began personal narrative writing this week.  Personal narratives are stories that come from our own experiences.  We are exploring the various formats of personal narratives and reading some terrific literature in this unit.  We will finish this unit right before the December holidays.  

Science:

We began our Mystery Powders unit last week.  This is a unit that introduces the steps of the scientific method and includes a lot of fun experiments that the students are really looking forward to trying.  Our goal is to finish this unit before Thanksgiving, so an assessment will probably be scheduled some time that week.  A study guide will be sent home before the assessment.  

Important Dates:

Nov. 13th - Planetarium visit (Southhampton Middle)

Nov. 17th - 21st - American Education Week

Nov. 21st - 1:00 dismissal

Nov. 26th - 1:30 dismissal

Nov. 27th - 28th - School closed for Thanksgiving holiday

Dec. 8th - Book project due