Week of March 21st

 Happy Friday! Woohoo! Hopefully you were able to enjoy the little taste of spring that we had this week! ☀

Please fill out this survey before conferences if you haven't already! It'll be very helpful to guide our conversation and make sure we discuss what you and your child feel is a priority! Thank you!

We had a blast at 1,000 Islands on Tuesday learning all about maple syrup production! A very special thank you to Mrs. Larson, Mr. Hoppe, & Mrs. Kreisman for chaperoning! Here's some fun photos from our field trip!

If you haven't turned in your child's permission slip for Madison by Monday, please know that they then must bring a cold lunch. I have to submit the hot lunch request on Monday in order to have hot lunches prepared for the trip. Please contact me with any questions.

Upcoming Events:

Tuesday, March 22nd: Parent Teacher Conferences

Thursday, March 24th: Parent Teacher Conferences

Friday, March 25th: Half Day of School 

Tuesday, March 29th: ELA Forward Testing  This has been rescheduled for the first week in April.

Wednesday, March 30th: ELA Forward Testing This has been rescheduled for the first week in April.

Thursday, March 31st: 4th Grade Field Trip to Madison

Curriculum Updates:

Reading: We are continuing to prepare ourselves for the Forward test. Students are reading and responding to different passages. This past week we focused on Narrative Nonfiction. Students are continuing to take practice tests based on various standards on iReady. If a student scores 50% or below, we meet in a small group/one-on-one and discuss their answers. Doing this isn't to shame or make the kiddos feel bad, it's simply so they can catch their errors before it actually counts. When working through their incorrect answers in small groups, I end with, "What did you learn about yourself as a test taker?" This prompts the kiddos to almost give themselves a tip. To remember these tips, we've created reading and writing "tip" sheets where students decorate them with test taking tips. These sheets then were tapped to their Forward folder to help remind them of how they need to improve! It would be very helpful if whenever you see these test results come home, if you could take a moment and walk through them with your child. Any extra discussion/exposure to these questions will really benefit them!

Math: We are making a dent in Unit 7. Students just took their first quick quiz on Thursday! As a class we did pretty well. This week it seems especially hard for students to compare fractions that have different denominators. We will continue to work on this to make sure all the mathematicians in the classroom are confident in this!

Writing: We are working hard at understanding how to compose a short and extended writing response question for the Forward. We've spent a lot of time making sure we understand what the question is asking first, and then being able to answer accurately. Short responses tend to be easier for kiddos, so we are really trying to make that jump into writing longer with greater evidence. This is a lot of work for the students, but they are really pushing through and working hard. I'm very proud of them!

I hope you have a fantastic weekend! 😎

Carly Burris