March 19th, 2014
Class activities for Wednesday, March 19
Spelling: Students started making their Words to Learn lists from words missed on the last spelling test.
Cursive: Cursive workbook pp. 85-90 are due Friday.
Reading: Today was a reading and AR skills day.
Writing: We talked more about writing realistic and believable dialogue that sounds like real people talk.
Today was also drafting day for the novel project. Each student has a daily writing goal of 100-300 words, and your student should be about 80% complete so far. Ask your student or check StudentVue to see how much your student has done so far. The novel project is due Friday, March 28. Your student should be drafting at this point, with the goal of finishing the draft by Friday. Look below for more details.
Novel Writing Project 2014
The final piece of the 3rd Marking Period will be our final fiction project of the year. Students will write and publish a novel. Each student will write their own novel, with a word goal minimum of 1,000-3,000 words, based on their reading level (each student’s minimum writing goal is equal to their reading level multiplied by 500). The novels will be written in Google Docs (docs.mrhowd.com) to make use of the word count feature. Final novels will be uploaded to Lulu.com and published as paperback books, which can be purchased for reasonable prices. So yes, students will actually write and publish their own novels. This project is based on the National Novel Writing Month Young Writers program. Here are more details:
- Here are some novels written by former students:
- If friends and family would like to order a paperback version of the book, we will upload the final texts to Lulu.com. Most books will cost between $5 and $10.
- Half of this grade will be if students complete their own, personal word count goal.
Math: None today due to extra time with science. Homework is to work on MobyMax Math or Khan Academy for 15 minutes or more.
Science: We started planning the Space Fashion Show today (more details). The Space Fashion Show is our final project of our space unit. Students will work in groups to write a fashion show script that tells about the sun, moon, or earth. One student from each group will “model” a costume of the sun, moon, or earth. The Space Fashion Show is Thursday, March 27 at 2:oo. Family members are invited!
Homework is to continue to complete the activities from kit students brought home Tuesday from the energy assembly, to fill out the student booklet, and bring the booklet back by Friday.
Social Studies: We reviewed the levels (local, state, federal) and branches (executive, legislative, judicial) of the government, and tried to think of positions and jobs that the government does (here is what the students came up with).
- Yellow magnets: 0
- Orange magnets: 0
- Red magnets: 0
- STAR Awards: 0
- Magnets moved this week (goal: 9): 2
- Hours with no magnets (best: 73): 8
Check your student’s Personal and Social Growth grade online to see if your student moved their magnet.
Multiplication Madness
| W | L | PCT | GB | |
| Johnston | 5 | 0 | 1.00 | 0 |
| Moul | 2 | 2 | 0.50 | 2.5 |
| Bell | 2 | 3 | 0.40 | 3 |
| Watkins | 1 | 2 | 0.33 | 3 |
| Howd | 1 | 4 | 0.20 | 4 |
Practicing our multiplication facts has helped, but we need to keep practicing! To make the tournament, we can’t finish in last place.
Notes:
- See our St. Patrick’s Wearin’ o’ the Green pics here.
- Feb Factor Valentine’s Party pics.
- View the second marking period report card and third marking period progress report here.
- Visit our Links page: keep track of all the websites we use for learning, or try something new.
- Check out our class calendar to stay up-to-date.
- View grades, report cards, behavior, assignments, and attendance online.
Our Mission:
All students in Room 130 will do their best and get ready for 5th grade.
