Friday
Happy Friday!
Don’t forget to let me know if your child will be attending our field trip. Responses are due on Tuesday! Please click this link to read our commitment letter.
Today we had our finale to anti-bully week. The students got to attend an assembly put on by 8th graders. The big take away from the assembly was to think of name calling like emptying a tube of toothpaste… it’s easy to let out all the toothpaste but impossible to put back in!
We also got to do a wonderful lesson with Ms. Naomi today! We visited 3 different habitats near our solo spots area and talked about the plants we saw and adaptations the plants have to survive.
Our first stop was the prairie. The students learned about plant adaptations like:
*Being flexible because it is very windy. Then they don’t break.
*Having large root systems to collect water, nutrients, and also to withstand being pulled up, eaten, or burned.
*Growing tiny or small leaves so that they don’t loose a lot of water through evaporation or have to use a lot of energy to grow and keep alive big leaves. The plants get a lot of sunlight so they don’t need to have big leaves to get the energy they need from the Sun.
Our second stop was the pond. The students learned about plant adaptations like:
*Being flexible because they have to withstand waves (lilypads) or wind (cattails).
*Having large flat leaves that can float and collect a lot of sunlight. (lilypads)
*Making thousands of seeds because so many of them will end up in places that are not ideal for growing. (cattails)
Our last stop was the forest. The students learned about plant adaptations like:
*Growing tall to get the most sunlight.
*Having thick bark to protect the plant.
*Having bigger leaves to collect more sunlight.
Students have brought their word work journals home again tonight to do their word sort again this weekend.
Have a beautiful weekend!
Thursday
Today we worked on finishing up our work with the meal worm life cycle. We didn’t quite finish, so we’ll be working on it more tomorrow (hopefully).
Word work groups started for all students today!! You should have gotten (or be getting in the next hour) a short email about your child’s group.
Please click this link to read our commitment letter for our first field trip!
And don’t forget… tomorrow is an early release! We’ll be doing a lesson outside with Naomi and watching the staff vs. student soccer game, so come dressed for being outdoors a good portion of our short day.
One last note! To save paper, Mrs. Barnett would like to send out information about a new club she is starting at school via email. I have attached the registration for her club to this email. Mrs. Barnett is starting a new club at PCCS called MATH GONE WILD. It’s where Math meets Mischief. Students will have fun while learning that math is everywhere around us! Some of the activities will include: Glow in the Dark Geometry, Zip Line Zoo and Bouncy Dice Explosion. The club will run from Monday Oct 19th – Monday, Dec 14th 3:45-4:45pm. Take a look at the attached flyer and if interested send in the paperwork to the school office.
Word Work Team Giant Panda:
Hello!
Your child’s work work group met for the first time today!
Your child was assessed on their understanding of a variety of spelling features and tested into a group that will be focusing on consonant digraphs. This first sort has students working on spelling the ch and sh sounds.
Today your child was given their word work journal. At the back of their journal is stapled a plastic bag that contains this week’s word sort and a sorting mat. For homework tonight please have your child sort their words onto their mat and then say the names of the words aloud. Please do not glue the words down tonight!
Word Work Team Chimpanzee
Hello!
Your child’s work work group met for the first time today!
Your child was assessed on their understanding of a variety of spelling features and put into groups according to these results. Your child and the others in the group tested so highly on our first assessment that we spent our first meeting completing another assessment of words with more difficult spelling patterns. The assessment will help us to better determine the correct place to begin this group in our word study curriculum.
Your child’s group has no homework tonight. 
Word Work Team Jaguar
Hello!
Your child’s work work group met for the first time today!
Your child was assessed on their understanding of a variety of spelling features and placed into a group that will be focusing on short u and long u. The short u pattern that the students are looking for should demonstrate the consonant-vowel-consonant pattern. The long u patterns we are focusing on are the -ew and -ue pattern.
The students worked on cutting and doing an initial sort of their words in our meeting today. Some of the oddball words were tricky for the students because they use our spelling pattern but say something different, like sew. There are 6 words for each of the spelling patterns and 3 oddballs (do, sew, truth).
Today your child was given their word work journal. At the back of their journal is stapled a plastic bag that contains this week’s word sort and a sorting mat. For homework tonight please have your child sort their words onto their mat and then say the names of the words aloud. Please do not glue the words down tonight! It is important for the students to read the words aloud to you because it helps them to hear and see the spelling patterns that we are working on. It also allows you to correct any mispronunciations.
Word Work Team Zebra
Your child’s work work group met for the first time today!
Your child was assessed on their understanding of a variety of spelling features and placed into a group that will be focusing on short and long a. The short a pattern that the students are looking for should demonstrate the consonant-vowel-consonant pattern. The long a pattern we are focusing on is the a-consonant-e pattern.
The students worked on cutting and doing an initial sort of their words in our meeting today. The students are working with a picture sort currently. It helps them to focus on the sounds they hear in the words instead of the letter. We don’t have a great copier, so some of the pictures are a bit difficult to interpret. Below is a list of our words and they can hopefully help you interpret the pictures.
short a:
bag
jack
crab
grass
hat
man
map
bat
long a:
skate
plate
rain
rake
frame
grapes
game
snake
oddball:
foot
Today your child was given their word work journal. At the back of their journal is stapled a plastic bag that contains this week’s word sort and a sorting mat. For homework tonight please have your child sort their words onto their mat and then say the names of the words aloud. Please do not glue the words down tonight! It is important for the students to say the words aloud to you because it helps them to hear the spelling patterns that we are working on. It also allows you to correct any mispronunciations.
Thank you for your assistance!
Word Work Team Flying Frog
Your child’s work work group met for the first time today!
Your child was assessed on their understanding of a variety of spelling features and placed into a group that will be focusing on short o. The short o pattern that the students are focusing on are -op, -ot, and -og.
I’ve included a list of the pictures/words below as they should be sorted in the event you need it.
-op words:
mop
hop
top
pop
-ot words:
pot
dot
hot
cot
-og words:
frog
hog
log
jog
Today your child was given their word work journal. At the back of their journal is stapled a plastic bag that contains this week’s word sort and a sorting mat. For homework tonight please have your child sort their words onto their mat and then say the names of the words aloud. Please do not glue the words down tonight! It is important for the students to read the words aloud to you because it helps them to hear and see the spelling patterns that we are working on. It also allows you to correct any mispronunciations.
Thank you for your assistance!
Tuesday
Today we had our Green Challenge assembly to learn about this month’s challenge: trash free lunches!
Two of our brave students participated in a trash free lunch fashion show and got to show off their reusable lunch bags. We saw many other fun containers and ways that people were able to reduce or eliminate trash from their lunches.
We know that many of you already pack trash-free lunches, and that’s wonderful… this month, we’ll learn more about the how’s and why’s, and we’ll see if we can improve our already-good lunch-time waste creation! Students who have trash-free lunches starting tomorrow and through the end of the month will be recognized at our next green challenge assembly in November!
Here are some fun facts to get you thinking about how and why Trash Free Lunches are important:
1. The average US household spends $85 per year on disposable bags. This means that even if some reusable containers are lost-and-not-found, you can still save money over using throw-away baggies.
2. School lunch garbage averages to over 67 lbs. per student per school year (US average)
3. About 3 million juice boxes are sold each year in the US. They cannot be recycled because the plastic, aluminum and paper can’t be separated. The juice also costs about 2-3 ¢per ounce more than comparable juice sold in larger bottles.
For some tips on how to go trash free with your lunches, visit http://www.wastefreelunches.org or http://www.reuseit.com/learn-more/buying-guides/5-steps-to-a-waste-free-lunch.
Go Trash Free!