Friday, October 5th

Next week we have PE on Monday and Thursday.

Dear Parents,

Thank you to those of you who have signed up for parent teacher conferences. Conferences are scheduled for Tuesday, October 16th and Thursday, October 18th. I am looking forward to sharing your child's progress and setting some goals for this year. If for some reason these dates do not work for your schedule, please let me know so we can arrange another time to meet. It is important that I communicate with all my families during conference time.  Your child is welcome to come to the conference.

Please be sure to check your child’s Friday folder today for a permission slip for our first field trip to the Denver Zoo. This trip will be a great support to our Life Cycles science unit. We will be going on October 25th. If you are interested in helping us with this trip, please check the box on the permission slip and make sure that your volunteer documents are in order with the office. If you have any questions about that, please let me know or contact Mary in the office (720-561-8600 or mary.bunge@bvsd.org). I need all permission slips and money for the trip in by October 22nd. If you have a financial difficulty please let me know as soon as possible. Thank you!

Curriculum Update:

We had our first unit math test this week, which I will share with you during parent teacher conferences.  On a whole, the class did very well! We will start math dashes next week. Math dashes are short quizzes testing students recall of multiplication and division facts. Students will take a dash almost each day until they complete all of them. When they are finished with all quizzes, they will get an ice cream sandwich!. At this point, many students are still using their fingers to count up by numbers to multiply and divide, and this is appropriate for this time of year.  Students should have their multiplication and division facts 1-10 memorized by the end of the school year. Please have them continue to study every day! It is so important to build a strong foundation in math for the upcoming years ahead.

We are working on publishing our first piece of writing- a personal narrative paragraph. These will be on display in the hallway, and we will use this first writing as a baseline for growth throughout the year. Our next writing unit is informational writing.

We completed our first social studies unit, Community and Local Government, and started our plant and animal life cycles unit.  Through the generous support of our PTA, we will be able to supplement this unit with the in-school Thorne Nature and Science program.  They will be working with our students on the next three Tuesdays!

We are also working on a health and safety unit through a project based learning platform.  Students learned about the importance of breakfast, sleep, exercise, hand washing, and fire and bike safety.  They were also introduced to the five food groups and the risks of smoking. Each student will work with a small group to create a project that teaches our classroom more about a health and safety topic that they feel strongly about. Please ask your child about what they are working on.

Homework for next week:

• ReadingPlus or iReady lessons at least once per week.

• Check in with your child about their Mystery State assignment.  Help your child practice their Dictado sentence. This should be written in their homework notebook each week.
• Practice math X and / facts 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 9, and 10. 10 minutes daily

Mark Your Calendar:

Monday, October 8th-Coffee at Kohl 8:30-9:30 (Focus-CMAS Assessment Data)

Friday, October 12th-Teacher Professional Development Day-No School for Students

Tuesday, October 16th and Thursday, October 18th-Parent Teacher Conferences

Have a fantastic weekend!

Sincerely,

Mrs. Aisha Galt