Happy Wednesday! I just wanted to let you know that I am soooooo enjoying working with your kids this year! They keep me on my toes and make me laugh almost daily! ❤❤❤

Calendar Dates:

Oct. 6- Spirit Day

Oct. 13- No School/ PD Day for Teachers

Oct. 20- Spirit Day

Oct. 25- Book Reports Due

Oct. 30-Nov. 2- Parent Teacher Conferences

Thank you! I got some wipes for the classroom! Will definitely take more if you are at the store! 

Religion- The 5th graders did a wonderful job leading the Rosary today!  I am so proud of them!  We are going to be stepping away from the book for  bit. We are going to focus on the Rosary. They will have two prayers to memorize. They are getting copies to take home on Thursday! Feel free to practice that with them at home. I told them they will keep saying it to me until they pass so this isn't a one shot deal. We are also going to focus on the different Mysteries of the Rosary and what part of Jesus and Mary's lives are being depicted. 

Math- This second chapter is short! They are nearing the end! I think they could be testing again next week, but that isn't a guarantee yet with the schedule. 

Spirit Day- This Friday is a Spirit Day! They might actually want to wear sweatpants with the predicted temperatures! $1 for sweats and/or a hat. 

Reading- This week they are reading two stories. One is realistic fiction. It is just a segment from The Secret Garden. I told the 5th graders this book is considered a classic! I wish they had given us more than 5 pages to read from the book. The other story is a play. So this week we are learning about the story elements - character, setting, plot, resolution. We are also talking about the literary elements of a play and what dialogue means.  We worked more on Figurative Language as well. I created a little cheat sheet to remind them of the different kinds- personification, idioms, similies, hyperboles, and metaphors. They glued this in the interactive notebook so that they can go and refer to it when we are working in class or on a test. On Tuesday, we really focused on personification. On Thursday, we are talking more about idioms which are my favorite!  They will have their spelling test on Friday. They will also take their Friday cold read test. These are slowly getting better each time. I think they are getting a better handle on what is expected in the short answer questions, but some are still writing one sentence and that just doesn't cover it. 

This new series covers so much in a week's time that I feel bad so that is why you might see a lot of extra worksheets in their folders with a D.T. (Did Together) on them. We do them together because I just don't like overwhelming them with all the work to do alone. Some of it they do with a partner or small group. In grammar this week they are working on making nouns plural. I told them in this case spelling will matter! 

FAST Scores- in your child's folder you will find their Fall Reading and Math scores. If your child is needing interventions we have already sent that paper home to you. I started this week working with some kids in both areas. 

Book Reports are due on October 25. I have a few who have already done some of their project work here at school! 

I hope everyone has a great weekend! I am driving to Waterloo again. I am participating in a Breast Cancer Walk for my sister-in-law's sister. We were all roommates in college at UNI! Tracy was diagnosed this past summer and is receiving treatment currently. 

God Bless, 

Miss Surma