March 26th, 2014
Class activities for Wednesday, March 26
Spelling: We practiced adding suffixes onto words, and remembered that words with silent e, the silent e is dropped for vowel suffixes.
Cursive: Cursive workbook pp. 95-98 are due Friday.
Reading: None today due to art.
Writing: Today was the first editing day for the novel project. Each student should have reached 100% of their project word count goal by now. 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 editing at this point. 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: The class started the Topic 7 test about multiplication and estimating products. Homework is to work on MobyMax Math or Khan Academy for 15 minutes or more.
Science: Students continued working on their Space Fashion Show scripts today (more details and a sample script). The Space Fashion Show is our final project of our space unit. Students are working in groups to write a fashion show script that tells about the sun, moon, or earth (click here to find your student’s group script). One student from each group will “model” a costume of the sun, moon, or earth. The Space Fashion Show is tomorrow, Thursday, March 27 at 2:oo. Family members are invited! Homework is to finish working on the script and costume; bring the costume tomorrow!
Social Studies: We finished talking about powers of the state and federal government, and students completed a MiniQuiz about this topic.
- Yellow magnets: 0
- Orange magnets: 0
- Red magnets: 0
- STAR Awards: 0
- Magnets moved this week (goal: 9): 0
- Hours with no magnets (best: 73): 32
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 | 7 | 0 | 1.00 | 0 |
| Moul | 3 | 2 | 0.60 | 3 |
| Bell | 2 | 4 | 0.33 | 4.5 |
| Watkins | 1 | 3 | 0.25 | 4.5 |
| Howd | 2 | 6 | 0.25 | 5.5 |
Here is our final record. We’ll have to wait and see what the other classes do with their games to see if we get in the tournament; the top four teams advance. Keep practicing!
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.
