Your kids did an outstanding job today cleaning up the school grounds. The 5th graders took care of the fence line in the alley and around to Father's house. Oh my!!! There were so many leaves!!! Way to go, 5th graders!!!!

Dear Parents,  Happy Thursday! I hope you are having a great week! 

Clean-Up Day- Tomorrow (Friday) we will be taking the kids outside to clean the school grounds. They can wear sweatpants if they wish. We'd like them to bring rakes and work gloves if they have them. Please make sure your family's name is on the rake. 

Lap-A-Thon- is set for April 24. I put the fundraising envelope in your child's folder a couple of weeks ago. Those need to be returned by Friday, April 24. Please return them even if your child didn't raise any money.  They should wear shorts or sweatpants that day for the run. I told them they can have their headphones that time to listen to music while they run or walk. They should also have a water bottle. I do sometimes suggest a second pair of shoes because sometimes the ones they run/walk in get muddy. 


Math- This week they learned to plot fractions on a number line that they had to create. They also worked on identifying whether a story problem had extra or missing information before they solved it. We are going to begin working on equivalent fractions on Friday. 

Language Arts- This week's story was a nonfiction piece about how animals travel. We learned that bats work off of echoes. They can tell how fat or juicy an insect is based on the echo! Their spelling words have to deal with the prefixes -con, -com, pre, and -pro.

Religion- We will be celebrating the Seder Meal today with the school.The 5th graders help set that up every year! This is one of my favorite activities that we do in our school. I love all of us getting together to share this meal and remembering what the Jews went through and what Jesus did for us.  On Friday, we will do the Stations of the Cross in the chapel. There will also be a short prayer service at the end of the day. 

I hope everyone has a BLESSED Easter! My mom and I are heading to Waterloo to celebrate it with my brother and sister and their families. Another sister of mine is driving in from PA to be there too. It should be a busy, but fun weekend! 
God Bless, Miss Surma

Hello Parents, 
I hope you are all having a great week! I like the weather much better this week! We should be finishing up with Iowa Assessments today! The kids did a great job of staying focused during the testing. We should get results back in May. I will let you know.

Emails-- I know the school has been having issues and I thought I was exempt. I am not. I know I have sent out some emails--to family and they haven't received them. If you are emailing me and I am not responding, please let me know!!! Write a note in your child's assignment book. I will look into it! 

"The Video" will be watched this Friday!!!!! Some of them are nervous about it. I keep telling them that they will be fine and it will be painless. :)

Religion-They were able to go to reconciliation on Tuesday. Next week during religion I try to focus on it being Holy Week. We will go to the chapel on Good Friday and pray the Stations of the Cross...to remind them of the long walk he took that day and what how he sacrificed his life for us. As a school we will be taking part in the Seder Meal on Thursday. I will be showing the 5th graders the movie The Ten Commandments.  This also shows them how the Jews were freed and celebrated with the Seder Meal before their journey in the desert. 

Math-- We are working on fractions. This week we spent time changing improper fractions to mixed numbers and vice versa. They also used Benchmark fractions to estimate about how much of a shape was colored in. We used common fractions like 1/4, 1/2,1/3, 2/3, 3/4 and 1 whole. 

Language Arts- Next week we will be back to a normal routine. They will have a spelling test on Monday and again on Friday. They will still have vocabulary words. Their book will be more like a magazine. It has a lot of pictures with short stories or articles. It just depends on the topic. This week they are working in groups writing a story about how their character(s) came to school to discover their teacher is missing! The ones I have read are very cute. 

I hope everyone has a great weekend! I am going to go home to Doon to pick up my mom. She is going to stay with me for the next 3 weeks so that she can go to Waterloo for Easter and a First Communion later this month! Enjoy the nice weather!
God Bless, Miss Surma

Hello Parents, 
I hope you are having a nice week! Hopefully those warm temperatures will make a return!  

Math- I was pretty pleased with the test scores overall. I promised them at the beginning of chapter 3 that by the time we were done, they would all know how to divide! I think they proved that. Some areas are still tricky, but I think part of that is making sure we are really paying attention to our work and knowing our facts. During their free time, some are using a deck of cards and playing Multiplication War--just like the War card game, but they have to multiply the two cards correctly before getting to keep them. We also started our fractions chapter with a bag of Skittles on Tuesday. They were writing fractions based on the number in their bag and the colors. I think the first thing is to remember the difference between your numerator and denominator. 

Language Arts- They are taking their unit test this week. I did assign their next book report. Some are still looking for books to read. They don't seem to like what the library has to offer, so they will need to look elsewhere. They NEED a book by next Wednesday. I just want to make sure they have plenty of time to read the book and take notes before they create their project. I gave them a handout with their 3 choices. These are due May 9, 2014. 

Religion- We are focusing on the sacrament of reconciliation right now. This is actually perfect timing because next week they will get the chance to go to reconciliation with Fr. Halbur. 

Iowa Assessments starts on Monday. Some suggestions to make it easier on your child...get a good night's sleep, eat a good breakfast, and breathe! :) They will take some breaks throughout the morning. They won't miss their specials. We will only test in the mornings. Our afternoon schedules will be mixed up, so they will have to be flexible. I am still going to try and get some math and religion in. We will also do some switching so they can still get in science and social studies too, but it won't be every day. 

Young Writer's Conference- Wednesday, April 9, 2014. We won't be testing at all on Wednesday. It is also an early out. Those 3 students attending the conference will need to get their homework on Tuesday. They will need a sack lunch and drink on Wednesday as well. Mrs. Sickels will be sending a letter and permission slip. 

The following 5th graders will be attending this year's Young Writer's Conference at Graceland in Lamoni: Samantha Dunphy, Jackson Kinsella, and Katelyn Adair. Mrs. Sickels will be taking them this year. I am sure she will be sending you more information soon. They will be gone on Wednesday, April 9 2014. That is an early out for the school, but these kids will be home later that afternoon. They will need a sack lunch and drink that day! It's usually a fun day!

Hello Parents, 
I hope everyone had a great time on spring break! I enjoyed my time in Doon with my mom and family.  Now we have about 9 weeks of school left! My mom told me, "You have a lot to do in a little amount of time!" YES!!!!!

Language Arts- This week are reading Lewis and Clark. It is a historical nonfiction piece. Their story comes from the journal they wrote during their trip. In the end they traveled 8,000 miles! Amazing! I think we all agreed that we weren't sure if we could've handled those conditions. We are also working on contractions in grammar. The spelling list is about adding suffixes. Next week we will be working on the unit test. I will also discuss the final book report project next week. 

Dollars for Scholars- They are being given the opportunity again to write to win the savings bond. They will start this today with me. This is a project I like to have them work on at school. We brainstorm our given topic first looking for possible things to include in the essay. 

Math- They will be testing over this chapter on Friday. On Monday, we will do any needed corrections. I believe on Tuesday we will begin the chapter on fractions. If you're helping your child study for the test, they best thing would be to focus on dividing decimals by a two digit number. If they are dividing money, they need to remember to round their answer to the nearest hundredth or penny. The biggest problems I see right now are that they may not copy the problem down correctly, their multiplying is off, or when they subtract they get too big of a remainder and then just keep going. When it comes to the test, I won't be able to tell them where their mistake is, but I will have them walk me through the work to see if they find their own error. 

Today and Friday are the first two days of raising money for the seminary in Nigeria. They were given a paper on Wednesday with the items and prices. 

I hope everyone has a great weekend! It sounds like Sunday's temperatures are going to be wonderful!!! Next time you stop at school, make sure to check out the new alley street sign. Father Halbur blessed it as mass and it was hung shortly after. 

God Bless, Miss Surma

Hello Parents! Well, I would say the auction was a success last Saturday! The 5th grade basket was bought 9 times making a total of $4900! It was simply amazing to watch it get bought and sold so many times. I was in complete awe!! I think Mrs. Sickels was too! We both shed some tears that night. It was an emotional, but giving night! Thank you to everyone!

Language Arts- This week we read a story called Vaqueros: America's First Cowboys. It showed us the history of the cowboy. It all stems back to Christopher Columbus! We had to work on pronouncing some Spanish words. Thank goodness for pronunciation keys! We even learned where the term "buckaroo" came from--do you know??? When Americans tried to say "Vaqueros", it came out "bukera". Later it became buckaroo. I didn't know that! In grammar we are working on using commonly confused words such as: can/may, effect/affect, their, there,they're, lie/lay and more! They have been really trying to say, "May I go to the bathroom?" instead of  "Can I go to the bathroom?"  We also worked on proverbs and adages again. I am afraid this might be a dying concept. Some had never heard the saying: People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. 
 I do plan on covering another story next week even though we have only 4 days. That means there will be a spelling test and a test over the story on Thursday before break. I am hoping it will turn out better than our Christmas tests, but I want to keep them focused as much as I can before break.

Mass-- We have our mass next week Wednesday! You are more than welcome to join us!

Math- This week they are working on dividing larger numbers as well as having zeroes in their quotient. Today we are working on dividing decimals. This will add an interesting twist I am sure. The hardest part for them this week seems to be remembering there could be another number they have to bring down before they can call it finished! They also need to pay attention to the number they get after they do their subtraction. Some of the remainders are too big!

Religion- They are testing today over Chapter 6. This chapter focused on the Sacraments of Christian Initiation and their symbols. We will be looking at Lent next!

Make sure you check out your conference schedule so you remember what day and what time you will be visiting with me! There will be a book fair during conferences as well. Don't forget to set your clocks ahead! Have a good weekend!
God Bless, Miss Surma