Dear families,

 I can’t believe it is nearing the end of March already. I feel like we were just coming back from our winter vacation. I enjoyed having conferences with those of you who attended. During spring break, I took time for myself and enjoyed a trip to Sweden and Denmark to visit a good friend from college. Unfortunately, it was warmer here that week than it was there, so it was nice coming back, other than the 8 hour time difference.

 Now spring break has come and gone and we are back in action. The kids have worked to stay caught up and have also doing some additional projects on topics that interest them. They are also learning about many new things in lessons, reviewing concepts and getting ready for our battery of tests with the upcoming ITBS and MCAII testing.

 As of recent, the 4^th and 6^th graders have done some work with reptiles in biology. When we finished that study they have started to become ornithologists (people who study birds). Of course this keeps me on my toes because I want to ensure that each grade gets different follow-up work to make their experience different. The 5^th graders have completed their animal kingdom work, ending in mammals. They have now moved on learning about the fact that there are 5 Kingdoms that biologists have classified species into. They were amazed to hear that there are living things that are so tiny that you cannot even see them. This led to some great discussion about what makes something living, and how sometimes the smallest living things (bacteria) can be good for you. They didn’t realize that much of the food they eat actually contains bacteria in some way shape or form. So if your child is suddenly not eating, that’s the reason.

 In arithmetic, the students are progressing well. I took a look at what the kids were getting stuck on just after spring break and have moved people into different math groups in order to meet them where they need the additional work. One group is working with fractions right now. They reviewed adding and subtracting fractions and have now been working with multiplication of fractions. This group was challenged when they were multiplying the whole number by a fraction, as they had already mastered the reverse.  Another group is working with test tube division, which helps the child with long division. Several of them have begun to master dividing a large number by a one-digit divisor and have begun their work on dividing by a two-digit divisor, which has been a bit more difficult. Another group began their work with division, where the first step is researching their division facts using a material called the division board. This is a big work, but by the time they finish it they are ready to move on.  The final group is working with subtraction, in particularly how to subtract using borrowing from higher place values.  They have shown me recently that they are able to do this, with out the materials.

 Wednesdays, our culture days, have also brought some interesting lessons. The 4^th graders were looking at some of our earliest life, through the use of the timeline of life. They completed that unit and have now gone back to geography work. Last week we discussed how volcanoes work, and many of them went out to learn more about the structure of the volcano.   The 5^th graders became archaeologists for a while. They performed a simulated dig, to prepare them for our work with early humans. Last week, they had a lesson entitled The Long Black line, which represented all of the time of the earth and how humans only have been around for a tiny part of that history. Ask them about how long the line was! The 6^th graders went back to study how our earth work and we have focused on night and day, how time zones work and how daylight savings time works. They have been working on a project with that about if they could travel the world, where would they want to go, what would they want to do there and what time it is in that place compared to here. 

 In geometry, the 6^th graders have started to discover the formula for finding the area of the circle. They started off with learning how to find the circumference and have also looked at the relationship between the diameter and the circumference, which leads to the abstract formula. The 5^th graders have had several lessons on quadrilaterals and their properties and have now moved on to the study of polygons with more than 5 sides. The 4^th graders have been learning about angles and how we have adjacent and opposite angles. They were excited that they are able to use a new material for this work, which of course they will get to use for a huge portion of their geometry work that is coming up in the future.

 In grammar, the 5^th graders have had a review of all of our grammar symbols and learned several new symbols this year. They have now moved into a large verb study which will allow them to make them more aware of our English language.  The 4^th graders are still working on a large adjective study, learning that adjectives do more than just describe. You may want to ask them about some of the different uses of adjectives.  The 6^th graders have moved toward abstraction in terms of logical analysis. In fact, last week they were really excited because we got to add an additional material to what we’ve already been covering. Of course this was an old friend that they haven’t worked with this year.

 In literature and writing, the 5^th graders are finishing up their literature circle books. The group also had a taste of their next genre about myths, which the students will be doing some more writing about in the upcoming weeks. The 4^th graders are working on paragraphing skills, this is a slow process for them, but they are getting the hang of it.   The 6^th graders have been writing using their senses. They started off doing descriptive writing about things they could smell and have moved into writing about how things taste.

 We have also had several conversations as a class regarding bullying. Deputy Geiken came and spoke with us as a follow-up from his presentation in December. As a class, we also have talked about respect and showing respect to teachers, fellow classmates and our classroom materials. We are trying to make the children more aware of when they are displaying bullying behaviors, in order to reduce the frequency in the classroom.

 In the midst of all that, the kids have been getting ready for testing, whether they realize it or not. At this point I feel that they are fairly ready for this round of testing, but of course we will still be working on skills to help them improve even more.  Some of the students already did the practice booklets, which help the children become familiar with the test format. Remember that next week, the week of March 29, is the ITBS tests.  We will be doing the math portion on Monday, The reading portion on Tuesday and the Language portion on Thursday. Please make sure that your child is here if at all possible and make sure they get a good breakfast every day.  MCA testing will be at the end of April.

 Just a reminder that Audubon Center paperwork needs to be turned in for 5^th and 6^th graders who are planning to attend. 4^th grade parents and those not going watch for upcoming details regarding the students will be doing on April 14-16, when the 5^th and 6^th graders are not here.