As the month of August begins to wind down, classroom learning opportunities continue to soar! The enthusiasm and love of learning really shows through in your students, and we are so excited for the year ahead. Despite the cloud cover on Monday, we were able to catch two amazing glimpses of the solar eclipse. Thank you to all of the families that provided supplies and/or support at home with the pinhole viewers. We shared those as well as the glasses to give everyone an opportunity to safely view the eclipse.Thanks also to the parents that were able to join us on that day. Your enthusiasm really spilled over to the students! We will continue our discussion of the moon this week as we break down the phases of the moon during its 29 day orbit. In ELA, we will continue to use the power of brainstorming as we prepare to write our first narrative essay. We will also continue with Fountas and Pinnell testing in the classroom to assess reading fluency and comprehension levels for each student.
As you have already heard, the fifth grade team has decided to deliver math and ELA instruction to homerooms rather than groups leveled by scores or ability. Now that we are beginning our first week with this new schedule, please don’t hesitate to reach out to any of us with questions or concerns. Mr. Barber’s email is kbarber@pccharterschool.org and Ms. Bonicontro’s email is abonicontro@pccharterschool.org.
Tomorrow, August 28th, is picture day. Please send your child with his/her picture form to school in the morning if you haven’t done so already. On Thursday morning, we will have our first Marketplace of the school year. Marketplace is a chance for students to sell or buy items throughout the gradeband. This money is either added or subtracted from their online bank accounts. Some items that have been sold in the past include homemade bracelets, unwanted trading cards or other small toys, origami, small fidgets, bookmarks, stickers, etc. These items should be homemade or found around the house, not bought specifically for Marketplace. Participation is completely optional. Please ask your child for more information about Marketplace or reach out to us with any questions. Thanks!
And finally… thanks for bearing with me… a note from Mr. Hershiser, 6th grade teacher:
Our classroom is currently involved in an engineering unit and we want second hand or old bicycles to use as part of our unit. We will use them to learn about simple machines and gears. Bicycles that are broken or no longer work are wonderful as well. Please send Mr. Hershiser communications if you have any bicycles to donate. After we have finished learning from these bicycles we are going to donate them to an organization so they can be passed on to people/ kids who need them.
Thank you,
Chris Hershiser