Week of January 25

Daily Student Health Screener:

Click here for a checklist of symptoms and situations to keep a focused eye on this year. The teachers are logging daily health checks, as well. We are doubling down on health and wellness in efforts to protect our ability to meet for in-person learning. Thank you for your cooperation on this.

Spring Conferences:

Conference time is quickly approaching! Our report cards will be sent home the week of March 8. Spring conferences are primarily done on an "as needed basis" for students needing additional academic, social or emotional support.

I have e-mailed any families that I feel would benefit from a spring conference "check-in." If you did not receive an e-mail from me, I do not feel as though a spring conference is needed (or we have already been in contact). As always, if you ever want to check in with me about your child's progress or have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to reach out. I will always reach out to you if anything out of the ordinary comes up with your child throughout the year.

Tech Fest Logo Contest:

All students are invited to design a logo for this year's Ren Baldwin Student Technology Festival! CLICK HERE for more information on this contest (I've also posted information for the students to reference in our Google Classroom). Entries are due by Friday 1/29.

Valentine's Day:

February 14th is approaching fast and, of course, things this year will be a little different. It just so happens that the 14th is on a Sunday this year and students do not have school on Friday the 12th or on Monday the 15th. So, hold off on the candy and packaged valentines, here is the plan...

During the week of February 8 - 11, our Positivity Project (P2) activities will be focused on "Love." Their definition of love is that you value close relationships with others and being close to people. The character strength of love represents the way we think, feel, and behave towards the people with whom we have close relationships.

Our class will have activities and lessons throughout the week that will take the place of the traditional card exchange. No need to send anything in from home, we will handle it all in-house.

Mrs. Bawks' Brown School Family Blog:

Please don't forget to take a peek at Mrs. Bawks' Brown School Family Blog each week. CLICK HERE to read it.

Important Upcoming Dates:

Thurs. 1/28 - 1/2 Days of school for Conferences (dismissal at 12:34pm)

Fri. 1/29 - 1/2 Days of school for Conferences (dismissal at 12:34pm)

Wed. 2/3 - Late Start - school begins at 9:45am

Friday 2/5 - Popcorn Friday!

Wed. 2/10 - Late Start - school begins at 9:45am

Fri. 2/12 - NO SCHOOL

Mon. 2/15 - NO SCHOOL

Wed. 2/17 - Late Start - school begins at 9:45am

Wed. 2/24 - Late Start - school begins at 9:45am

This week's learning:

Positivity Project (P2): This coming week we will be focusing on the character strength of "Other People Matter - Supporting Others" - When you see other people struggle, you support them if you can.

ELA: This week, we will continue to focus on identifying cause and effect in pictures and in passages. Students will be learning about, identifying and will be able to use the signal language for cause and effect. We will also be focusing on identifying cause and effect within pourquoi tales. Pourquoi [por-kwa] means "why" in French. Pourquoi tales are old legends told to explain why certain events happened. These tales often start in the past, e.g. A long, long time ago . . . and end when the explanation is complete. Pourquoi tales are most often concerned with animals and the natural world.

Epic has a large collection of Pourquoi tales and I have assigned the collection for students to explore this week. You can access the collection here (students can access Epic at home for free from 7am to 4pm - outside of those hours you would have to sign up for a paid subscription): https://www.getepic.com/collection/715315/pourquoi-tales

Students are familiar with how to log into Epic on their Chromebook but I am including additional information and instructions should you want them to use it on a different device or outside of the free usage time (click image below for a PDF):

Looking to help your child connect what they are learning in school at home? Click on the image below and check out the activities:

Writing: This week we are continuing our persuasive writing unit. This week we will be focusing on identifying our audience, creating a pro/con list and using a graphic organizer to plan and organize our persuasive essay.

I've heard that some of you may already be seeing the effects of our persuasive unit in the form of some persuasive letters and conversations!

Math: This week we are finishing up our fraction and decimal unit! On Monday, you will see the study guide come home and our test will follow on Tuesday. My plan is to begin unit 4 after the test on Tuesday. Unit 4 focuses on multi-digit multiplication - please continue to work on mastering single digit multiplication fact fluency at home each night (this can be done with flash cards, using an online program or any other method that words well for your child).

Monday: Unit 3 study guide

Tuesday: Unit 3 test and Lesson 4-1 - I can find a rule for solving multiplication problems involving multiples of 10.

Wednesday: Lesson 4-2 - I can make estimates and evaluate the reasonableness of my answers.

Thursday: No lesson due to 1/2 day of school

Friday: No lesson due to 1/2 day of school

Looking to extend your child's learning in math at home?

I highly recommend having them work on Khan Academy (we use this in class)! Students have access to the assignments that I've put onto Khan Academy for them (they use these during our math workshop time) and they can also work on their "course mastery." Khan Academy will continue to work them through 4th grade concepts and beyond (for those students who are ready to begin learning skills beyond the elementary level) and provides video explanations to help them work through the content. They also have courses to practice reading and language arts, computer programing (Pixar in a Box has historically been very popular with students in my classroom!), growth mindset, careers and much more!

We have also recently started to use the IXL diagnostics section and I will be sending home a diagnostic report at the end of the week that points out specific skills that your child is ready to learn and practice on IXL; we will be using this to differentiate learning in class during our math workshop time as well.

Science: This week your child will be creating a working model of a human eye! Using that model, we will discover the basics of how our eyes work and figure out some of the causes of vision problems.

One thing you can do to support your child’s curiosity about this topic is to have a discussion about any family members or friends who wear eyeglasses (or contact lenses). In our lesson, we will learn about why some people have blurry vision, but we did not discuss how some people have better near-vision (nearsightedness) while other people have better far-vision (farsightedness). This would make a great dinner table discussion!

Social Studies: This week we will begin learning about the human characteristics of the Unites States. Big ideas from this lesson are:

-Geographers use physical and human characteristics to describe what a place is like.

-Human characteristics of a place are man-made features.

-Human characteristics of a place can include cities, highways, bridges, and buildings.

-Human characteristics are often closely connected to physical characteristics. For example, cities are often located near bodies of water and farms are often located in prairies.

Homework: Homework each week consists of reading 20+ minutes at home (this can be a library book, magazine, newspaper, online book, etc) and practicing multiplication and division facts 1 through 12. Mastering multiplication and division facts is vital to our learning this year.

Students will also have a math home link page to work on most days of the week. I will always include the lessons we are working on in the blog each week so that you know when to work on each home link. These home links are not going to be turned back in, but I highly recommend that students work on them each week so that they can show you what they have worked on. I don't mind if students work a bit ahead in the packet; it is also ok if you miss a night and have to come back to that particular lesson on a different day. Times are unpredictable and I completely understand that you may have prior commitments on certain days of the week.

Photo Gallery!

Check out some photos of our learning this week: