Conference Schedule

The scheduler is closed.  There were still several unscheduled conferences, so I plugged them in where there were spaces.  If you can't come to the conference I scheduled, please call or e-mail and we will try to figure something out.

February 9 - 13

We will be celebrating Valentine's Day on Thursday the 12th since we are not in school on the 14th.  We will exchange Valentines on that day at 10:30.
We will have conferences on Wednesday and Thursday.  If you haven't already, please sign up for a conference as soon as possible (instructions are in the last post).  We have a full day of school on Wednesday, but we will have substitutes in the afternoon to allow us time for conferences.  We will also have substitutes on Thursday (a half-day of school).  Please, please, please talk with your child about how they should behave when we have a substitute, and what your expectations are for their behavior.  We have been having huge problems with substitute behavior, particularly on the Spanish side.  There is no school on Friday.
Here is what we will be working on in English this week:

• Categorical narrative (writing that is sequenced by events, rather than time): our topic is 'things to do in Logan.'
• phonics: special vowel combinations (didn't get to this last week - oops!)
• phonics: compound words (again, didn't get to it - oops!)
• phonics: voiced and unvoiced /th/
• phonics: digraphs
• subtraction with regrouping - more on top? or more on the floor?
• power hour/daily 5: continued practice to become better readers, comprehenders, and spellers

February 2 - 6

Conferences are coming up on February 11th and 12th.  Please schedule a conference time as soon as possible.  To schedule, go to bridgerelementary.weebly.com and select the Online Scheduler link.  On the scheduler page:

1. Choose your student's school from the drop down list and click "go."
2. Enter the school password (bears).
3. Enter your student's ID (it is their lunch number).
4. Verify your student's birth date.
5. A list of teachers will be displayed - check the box next to the name of each teacher you would like to meet with.
6. Select the conference time that works best for your schedule.
7. Once you have finished, confirm your appointment details and print your schedule.
8. WRITE DOWN YOUR CONFIRMATION NUMBER - YOU WILL NEED IT IF YOU NEED TO CANCEL YOUR APPOINTMENT.

Here is what we will be working on in English this week:

• continue with Response to Literature - using the maps we made last week to create sentences
• What If poem - read Shel Silverstein's and then make our own
• phonics: blends /dw/ and /tw/
• phonics: double s, f, z and plurals
• phonics: common word list #7 - some, her, would, make, like, him, into, time, has, look
• phonics: special vowel combinations - ll, ng, nk
• phonics: compound words
• subtraction poem (see below)
• 5 minute math timings
• math: double-digit subtraction with regrouping practice
• power hour/daily 5: continued practice to become better readers, comprehenders, and spellers

January 26 - 30

Here is what we will be working on in English class this week:

• response to literature: solids and liquids - teaching students how to pull information from text in order to write about it
• phonics: alphabetical order
• phonics: r-blends
• phonics: s-blends
• phonics: commas
• power hour/Daily 5: working on becoming better readers, comprehenders, and spellers
• Tuesday - leadership day.  We will have visitors from the Stephen Covey Leadership Symposium visiting our school to see the 7 Habits in action.

No school on Friday.  We will be preparing for the conferences coming up on Feb. 11th and 12th.

January 19 - 23

The red and blue classes will be flipping this week: red will start in the morning with Mrs. Wright, and blue will  begin with Ms. Navarro.
Here is what we will be working on in English this week:

• 7 Habits writing and art project: ways to be proactive
• phonics lesson 13: /q/, /z/, /c/, /k/, /i/
• phonics lesson 14: spelling with c and k
• phonics lesson 15: common word list #5 - there, their, use, an each, which, she, do, how, if
• phonics lesson 16: alphabetical order
• extending vocabulary strategy: use prior knowledge and context
• comprehension strategy: use text features
• Daily 5/Power Hour groups are changing to accommodate for the changed schedules for the red/blue classes

January 12 -16

Happy foggy Monday morning!  We have a short day on Friday, the 16th.  School will be dismissed at 12:00.  Here is what we will be working on in English this week:

• DIBELS testing on Thursday (to assess how well students are reading)
• Finishing up our chronological narrative - we still need to add details and write sentences
  
• phonics: common word list #3 - at, or, be, one, this, have, by, from, word
• phonics: t, v, w, x, y, and u
• phonics: punctuation
• phonics: common word list #4 - but, we, not, when, what, your, all, were, can, said
• accuracy strategy: skip the word, then go back
• accuracy strategy: trade a word, guess a word
• extending vocabulary strategy: use the dictionary
• Words Their Way assessment (to assess improvements in spelling skills)

January 5 - 9

Happy New Year!  We hope that everyone had a nice and restful winter break.  We will be jumping right back in to instruction in the run-up to our mid-year assessments.  Please remember that ALL students go outside for recess.  We do not keep children inside just because it is cold out.  So make sure to send them to school with coats, hats, gloves, and anything else you consider necessary to keep them warm while they get some outdoor break time.
Here is what we will be working on in English class this week:

• mid-year writing assessment: writing a narrative about making a snowman - we will be following the same process as we have for all the other narratives we have written.  What makes it an assessment is that they will need to do it with minimal help from me.
• phonics lesson 4: nonsense words
• phonics lesson 5: capitalization (proper nouns)
• phonics lesson 6: /h/, /j/, /l/, /m/, /e/ (short)
• phonics lesson 7: common words - he, was, for, on, are, as, with, his, they, I
• phonics lesson 8:  /n/, /p/, /r/, /s/, /o/ (short)
• New Year's Resolution activity
• math: continued practice using the standard algorithm for two- and three-digit addition
• comprehension strategy: compare and contrast
• expanding vocabulary strategy: use dictionaries, thesauruses, and glossaries as tools