Week+26

Newsletter for Week of Mar. 17th, 2014 ** W eek in Review **

This week we have been working on our mini-unit on teeth and dental health. Boy, do the children have numerous details to share. Our standards direct us to learn about animal teeth as well. Later in the week we will begin our next unit which will incorporate map study skills. The children will be taught the term "geography" as learning where places are and what they look like. We will be learning the names of the cardinal directions, 7 continents and the 4 oceans just for starters and then we will proceed into learning a bit of the Japanese and Italian cultures. **Thank you** so very much to everyone who attended our annual Shamrock evening. **Thank you** to so many of of our parents that had a very strong impact upon this years event. Your numerous hours of sharing your time and talents are truly appreciated by the entire school community. The children LOVED the Shamrock Teachers' Raffle. When the names were announced by Mr. Patterson their fingers were crossed, they screamed for their friends and siblings, and they were sitting on the edge of their seats. We loved the Irish Dancers performance on Thursday afternoon and our Alexa was wonderful!

**Reading** Even though Spring seems so far away and even though we are beginning to be tired of the snow, our selection next week will be "Stormy Weather". We will continue to work on r-controlled vowels. This week we are featuring "or" made by //oar// and //ore.// We will be comparing and contrasting the different weather systems by using a venn diagram once again. Next week we will be introducing the terms "antonym and synonyms" as we compare and contrast words and we will work with the digraph "ea" as a short e sound.

Vocabulary for "Stormy Weather" breeze...commotion...conditions...forecast...tranquil ...extreme...predict...great...sound know...their...warm...storm...for...born...cork...horn...corn...fork...pork

**Religion** This week we will be practicing for our liturgy on Wednesday, at 8:30 a.m.. You are more than welcome toattend and sit with us. Practice is becoming easier because the children know what to expect. On Thursday we will begin our next chapter on the Mass......perfect timing. We will take an extensive tour of the church at that time. = = = Math = We have worked on fact families and telling time. Fact families will cement the importance of how addition and subtraction relate to each other. 3+4=7 then 4+3=7 reviews the commutative property we learned earlier this year. We will see how subtraction relates to addition by using the same numbers in the equations of 7-3=4 and 7-4=3 and seeing how just the three numbers of 3, 4, and 7 are used for this entire fact family. In practicing telling time, we are working on an analog clock. The children and I have been enjoying my two favorite sites -- [| Stop the Clock] and later [|Bang on Time]. We have displayed them on our SMARTboard not only in our morning routine, but also in our math groupings. Telling time is a concept based on readiness. **Practice is so very important.** We need to make sure we can count hours and half hours of time.

related facts...addition equations...subtraction equations...minute hand...hour hand...half past...digital time...analog clock...half hour
 * Vocabulary for Fact Families and Time **

**Riddles of the Week**

Sham-rock The letter "w" **Important Dates** Mar. 17th...................Celebrating St. Patrick's Day Mar. 19th...................Class Mass, join us Mar. 19th...................Chancery Give Back Mar. 21st..................."[|Feed My Starving Children]", Lenten QuarterChallenge Mar. 21st...................Pizza Hut Lunch, no hot lunch offered Mar. 25th...................Papa Murphy's Give Back Mar. 26th...................3rd quarter ends Mar. 28th...................3rd quarter report cards go home Mar. 31st...................Spring [|Chess Club] sign-up Mar. 31st...................Group Picture Day Apr. 4th......................First Friday, out of uniform Apr. 11th....................[|Cousins Sub] orders due Apr. 12th-21st...........Spring Break May 5th.....................Begin Spring Map testing
 * What kind of music do leprechauns listen to?**
 * What will you always find at the end of a rainbow?**