Our Highlights for the Week:
Flag Folding Program
A very special thank you to Skip Sweeney and the veterans from the Smithfield American Legion. These fine gentlemen came to Winsor to deliver a special flag etiquette program for our Grade Five students, instilling the values of freedom and respect. These kinds of community connections enhance the experiences of our students and create a sense of belonging. We look forward to seeing the veterans again at our Veteran's Day Assembly, coming in November.
Keeping Up With Kindergarten
It was another busy week here in Kindergarten. Students are starting to settle in and know what is expected during our school day!
This week in Reader’s Workshop, Mrs. Lakeway’s class was introduced to their Literacy Center Routine. Students will soon start Guided Reading and will be working with a teacher, along with working independently in a center.They set up their poetry notebooks and book boxes, played a letter game, practiced handwriting, and reviewed their sight words. Ms. Staruch’s class started a new unit where we are reading and learning about animal homes. This week we started to do a close read of the story Where is Home, Little Pip? by Karma Wilson. We have been discussing what is happening in the story and also have learned about who the characters are and what the setting is.
During our Math workshop, we have been doing a lot of hands on activities reviewing our numbers 1-5. We have practiced our counting strategies that we will be applying to higher numbers later in the year. We have been making numbers 1-5 in different ways. Did you know 5 can be a 2 and a 3. Ask your child how to make different combinations of numbers!
During Writer’s Workshop, we have encouraged our little authors to use a combination of drawing and writing to get their story ideas on paper. This week’s FCAs (Focus Correction Areas) were focusing on using 4 realistic colors in their drawing, and adding 3 labels. Some students are writing words and some are writing the beginning sounds of a word. (And some are writing random letters :-) That is ok at this point in kindergarten. We are exposing all children to what writing is! Bravo for all of their hard work!
This week’s/last week’s FUNdation’s letters were: lowercase m, n, i & u
This week’s/last week’s sight words were: you, me, look, am, the, it
Learning and Fun in Grade One!
It was wonderful seeing so many new and familiar faces at Open House. We enjoyed meeting all our new families and look forward to a year filled with much learning, laughter, and love in grade 1. Hopefully, you were as proud and pleased with your child's work as we are.
Did you realize that our students in grade one have green thumbs? Well, they sure do! The rye grass and alfalfa lawns were growing like crazy. Our first grade scientists compared their plants last week and this week we mowed the lawns and wrote in our scientist’s notebooks about what happened to the lawns after we mowed them. It was very surprising -so be sure to ask them what happened.
In Math, we have completed our unit on addition to 10. The children have learned different ways to add - horizontally and vertically, along with problem solving. Unit 2 will be Subtraction to 10. A great idea to enhance your child’s learning of addition to ten would be to use flashcards a few times a week. This will aid in fluency and computation.
*A reminder - all field trip permission slips and CASH donations of $8 are due on Thursday, October 10th. Chaperones will be picked by lottery on that day. All chaperones must have a BCI check and be VIP trained.
Enjoy your first full Fall weekend - it's going to feel like summer!
What's New in Grade Two
Another busy week in grade two!
As strong readers and writers, we focused on visualizing scenes in our heads based on the strong word choice within various text.
We brainstormed several adjectives to use in our own writing that will help our audience paint a picture in their head.
In addition, our Blazer Fresh friends from gonoodle.com taught us where commas are used. Specifically, we talked about separating adjectives with commas, using them correctly when writing letters and when listing things in a sentence. Next week, we are going to learn more about commas and how they are used in many, many different ways.
As mathematicians, we are working on mastering our "10s Friends", doubles facts, near doubles facts, and skip counting. Automaticity with these basic facts is imperative for to attack more challenging problems. Please remind your second grader to practice their fact fluency daily. Practicing in the car, with flashcards, math games, or online apps are a great way to ensure mastery.
In addition to practicing math facts, students should be reading nightly at home for at least 15 minutes.
It was great to meet you at Open House last week. If you did not sign up for a Parent Teacher Conference (December 5th), please email your child's teacher.
Thrills in Third
It has been another exciting week in 3rd grade! We introduced the activity portion of our morning meeting. Ask your child which activity was their favorite from this week. We are continuing to build our math skills by practicing place value and addition patterns. Dialogue has been a big part of our writing block. We are practicing punctuating it and using it in our writing. We are continuing to build our reading stamina and learning about what good readers do. In Science, we started our first unit on seeds. Ask your child what they know so far about different types of seeds. Have a wonderful weekend!
Learning More in Grade 4
It is hard to believe we are ending our fifth week of school already! It didn’t seem like the first week of fall, it was much more like summer!!
Students are continuing to read with more stamina in fourth grade! This week we focused more on the characters in the books we are reading. We talked about the main characters and minor ones. We also discussed the difference between first person and third person. They are becoming better readers every day!
The children have been learning about geography in social studies. They have been thinking about geographers and the kind of questions they might ask. Geographers study the earth, and they have also been talking about earth materials in science. They have been discussing rocks, and they way they go through physical weathering. Ask them about the experiments they have done!
In math, we continued reviewing addition and subtraction. They have been adding 6 or 7 digit numbers and estimating to see if their answer is reasonable or not. We are working to improve their knowledge of math facts. Please have them practice their facts at home!!!
Everyone has settled in and we are off and running!!
The Fabulous Five
In reading workshop this week, we were introduced to our reader’s notebooks where we held onto our thinking about reading. We also reviewed the use of sticky notes and how they help track our thinking as we read. Ask your child about the different strategies readers use when they are reading a text. For example, one strategy we worked on with a partner was called, “Clear it Up.” The students applied this strategy when they encountered confusing parts in the story. While using this strategy, they also learned how to return back to the text like detectives and were ready to revise their thinking based on evidence in the text. It was so amazing to observe the conversations the students were having about the text after they went back to the text to revise their thinking!!
Our new math unit focuses on building number sense as we explore strategies to multiply whole numbers. The students reviewed the difference between prime and composite numbers and learned that every composite number can be written as a product of prime factors. This is called the prime factorization of a number. They also learned that exponents can be used to express prime factorization.
Our science investigations have us studying shadows and how the length and direction of a shadow depends on the Sun’s position in the sky. They have learned that the shadows change during the day because the position of the Sun changes in the sky as the Earth rotates around the stationary Sun.
In social studies, we reviewed the seven continents, the five oceans, the northern/southern hemispheres, and the equator. Students were required to locate places on a digital map using the map tools such as a map key and a map scale. We also discussed the five themes of geography. Ask your child to explain each theme using the acronym My Hand Really Likes Pizza(Movement, Human Environment Interaction, Regions, Location, and Place) and to give an example of each theme.
Our focus in writing workshop has been on writing a well written paragraph. We worked on the basic characteristics of writing a good paragraph such as: clarity and focus, well developed main idea, organization, use of specific details, rich and well chosen vocabulary, and mechanics and usage.
Art News
Hi Everybody,
Happy Fall! We are off to a terrific start in art and design!
Kindergarten students are exploring elements of art and principles of design. First graders are learning about the Russian Artist, Wassily Kandinsky and are being inspired by music for their first abstract project. Second grade students are looking at various artists' self portraits as they begin the process of creating their own. Third graders are being inspired by Georgia O'Keeffe and The Boyle Family as they zoom in on nature and create abstract self portraits of the palms of their hands. Fourth Grade Students are exploring the categories of drawing and why artists draw and make art. Our fifth grade students are learning about different kinds of campaigns and are creating "Kindness Campaign" posters to be hung around the school as part of a school wide campaign to make WIlliam Winsor a more accepting, kind, and positive place.
We tend to get very messy in Art, so please be aware of when your child has Art Class this year and encourage them to wear clothes that can get dirty on that day.
Please find updates on what projects we are working on and photos of students at work on our Art and Design at OCRS and WIlliam Winsor Facebook Page.
I have also started an instagram account called art.design.withmissburrows where I will be posting more finished and in progress artwork.
If you do not want your child to appear on the facebook page, please let me know.
As always, if you have any questions or concerns, feel free to email me at lburrows@smithfield-ps.org.
Music Update
Winsor has been buzzing with the wonderful sounds of music this year! Here is a little summary of what each grade has been working on in Music Class this month: Kindergarten has been doing a wonderful job practicing echo songs, and demonstrating steady beat. First graders have been singing Bow Wow Wow to discover what a beat of silence in music is, and love to play our cup game, Hiccup Buttercup. Grade 2 is already diving into the pitches of our scale, and are singing using solfa syllables and the corresponding hand signs. Third graders are super excited to get their hands on their brand-new recorders next week! We’ve been preparing for recorder playing by reviewing notes on the treble clef. Fourth graders just completed “How to Play the Recorder” guides for the third graders, to support these beginners on their recorder journeys! Last, but certainly not least, our fifth graders have started Band this past week! I am beyond thrilled to witness their excitement about their new instruments. I can’t wait to see what kind of music we will be making together this year! We’re off to a noteworthy start!
Enjoy the weekend! Thank you for being our partners in education.