September Happenings

Welcome back to school! These first four weeks have been great ones getting to know each student in the class and I thank each of you, as parents, for your support as well! Each month of the school year I will give a little update as to what we will be learning in each subject so that you will all be aware of what is going on in the classroom. Here is what is going on this month:

Math: We just finished learning about place value through the millions and patterns in multiplication. Our next unit will be on graphs. We will be learning about pictographs, line graphs, line plots, bar graphs, stem and leaf plots, and how to create and read them. Please point out these types of graphs in real life around you and your child and help them to understand the information on them.

If your child has taken home math assignments that have "Please Correct and Return" stamped on them, this is because their score on that particular paper was lower than 80%. This means that your child can redo the problems they missed on a separate piece of paper to show that they can do the problems. I will look at it and give them back half the points they missed if the problems are correct. If a math test is also 80% and below, students can correct the problems.

Reading: Your child should be reading 20 minutes every school night of the week, for a total of 100 minutes for an "A" grade on independent reading. It is the easiest to keep track of minutes by putting how many they read next to where you sign each night in your child's planner. Please help your child total these minutes up at the end of each month and sign in their planner that they read them. I collect all reading minutes at the end of each month. Also, please check to make sure your child is reading a book that is on their level of reading. If they are reading a book that is too hard for them, help them choose another one.

"Road to Success" is once again at our school this year, so in addition to collecting reading minutes each month, I will also be giving out tickets for a bike drawing (which will be done four times throughout the year) each month. For every five days read, a ticket will be given, however, if all seven days are read in a week, two tickets will be given for that week. I will be looking at each child's planner for this, so please make sure you are helping your child out by signing the minutes read next to where you sign each night for this.

Our first book report will be due in October before we go off track and will be on a realistic fiction book. I will be passing out information on that in the next couple of weeks. As of right now, students should just be reading a book of their choice (at least 100 pages) and doing at least two journal entries for that book in their reading journals. The journals will be due the end of September.

Science: We will be starting a unit on rocks and soil soon. We will be learning about the three types of rocks (igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic) and how to identify them. We will also be studying about the layers of soil (bedrock, subsoil, and topsoil) and how they are made.

We will also be going on a field trip to Dimple Dell Wrangler Park on September 28th with Mr. Nance, the Jordan School District Science Specialist, to do some hands-on science activities.

Social Studies: We are finishing up a unit on the geography of Utah by doing a salt dough map of Utah. We will be learning about the five indian tribes of Utah for our next unit.

Writing: We are learning about the writing process and writing a personal narrative while doing so. Students will learn how to write different genres of writing throughout the year and will improve their writing skills by applying the "Six Traits" of writing.