Yesterday in class the students carefully analyzed a celery plant to see how water is absorbed through the stem. Students observed the change at 2 minute intervals for 30 minutes and then again at 24 hours later. We learned so much about how water travels through the tubes of a plant through the celery experiment. It was a great day for learning! 

Photo taken by Karen.

 Photo taken by Zachary.

Happy Hump Day! We are half through a busy week. This morning in math we continued to work on subtracting large numbers. Students are learning to "decompose" or borrow from the digit to the left in order to subtract. Most students are getting this skill, but they are occasionally making small mistakes that is causing them to get the problem incorrect. We are encouraging students to work on "checking their solution" by adding the digits to get the large number. They will also be expected to "check their solution" on the Final Module assessment, which will be in a few more weeks. For our Social Studies lesson, we learned about where the United States is located compared to other geographic features (south of Canada, north of Mexico, etc) and we created examples of human and physical features. 

The students have worked hard this morning. In math, we used our reading skills (yes, reading!) to understand what the word problem was asking. Then we created tape diagrams to solve the standard addition problem. It was a little confusing at first, but the students are getting it. We will continue with this more tomorrow. In Science, the students finished their group work posters on the parts and functions of plants. They are prepared for our gallery walk to tomorrow. And, we even discussed the process of photosynthesis. This afternoon we will learn about common and proper nouns, review our vocabulary words, and discuss the reading "Justin and the Best Biscuits in the World." Have a wonderful day! 

Feliz Lunes! That is Spanish for Happy Monday! Today in Language Arts, we "spiced" things up a little bit with some "salsa" words. Students learned the difference between overused words such as fun, said, walked, and many more. While enjoying a snack of salsa and chips, the students got their creative juices flowing to create a new list of sizzling words. 

In Science, we started our new unit on Plants. We will reviewing the different parts of a plant, roots, stems, leaves and flowers. We also started our new unit in reading in which all stories connect to the theme of 'Something in Common'. Tomorrow is our Math Mid-Module Assessment. Please help your child to review and prepare for this assessment. Thank you! 

Today the students worked hard all morning long. We finished our math problem set and exit ticket in our own classroom. We also read the children's book Ox-Cart Man by Donald Hall as we became economists looking at the role of producers, consumers, as well as capital goods and natural resources. I passed out the review sheet for our unit test over Living Things. We also finished reading "Seal Journey" and further discussed the main idea and supporting details. Students loved playing Spelling Basketball this afternoon. We finished the day by completing our October Fluency activity for writing. Tomorrow is the Fun Run. Students are encouraged to wear Hevel Spirit clothing or Disney themed attire.