Monday, November 14

 Hi parents,

We had a great day today - it's always hard to say how the first day back after a long weekend will go, but this one was top notch. 

In the morning, we continued to work on Wish Tree dioramas, and I'm happy to report that most students are either finished, or just adding some final details. They're looking awesome! I'm hoping we can keep them around until conferences because I think they'll be fun for the students to share.

Speaking of conferences, we also worked on our 'Snack Writing', which will be shared at conferences. This time around was a lot more successful. I challenged the students to write about eating their snack as if it were a short story. They broke the simple process of eating into 5 or 6 hyper-detailed sentences. That seemed to work a lot better than just asking them to describe the snack. I think this group of students prefers creative writing and needs to be tricked into doing expository writing. This is a writing activity you could try at home!

We revisited addition today, and talked about the upcoming subtraction quiz on Thursday, November 17. I've decided to throw a couple of addition questions into the mix too just to make sure students are paying attention and are able to apply strategies efficiently.

There will also be a subtraction word problem on the quiz.

We played Pillow Polo in gym, did Daily LA, practiced spelling, and read Trapped in Transylvania.

Have a nice night!

Zac