Classroom Update - Week of September 9th

Upcoming Events / Reminders:

• Quarter 1 Interims went home on Friday, August 30th. Please sign/initial their interim and return it back to school with your child. If you would like a copy of this interim, please let me know and I will make a copy for you.

• Field trip permission slips were sent home, please return as soon as possible.

• Guest Illustrator, Christopher Eliopoulos, the illustrator of the Ordinary People Change the World series, will be visiting MES on September 12th for 3rd and 4th grade students.

• This week we will conduct our first Lock Down drill for the year. These are times that provide staff and students practice and understanding of procedures.

• Morrisville is helping the Krishnan Family Foundation raise awareness and donate band-aids for this special cause. This Cary based family lost their 4 yr old daughter to cancer last year and their 11 year son is being treated for colon cancer at UNC/ Boston’s Children's Hospital. Let's show Mustang support by brining colorful, kid friendly band-aids to school to be donated to local children's hospitals!

• The PTA Reflections registration has begun. If you are interested, you can find out more information about the Reflections program by clicking on the following link - http://www.wakepta.org/reflections-2019-20.html.

Track Out Day for Quarter One is Friday, September 27th.

• Mark your calendars for Fall Festival. It will be held on Friday, September 27th from 6-9PM. A flyer with more information will be sent home in Tuesday Folders, tomorrow.

• Hurricane Make Up Days:

• Thursday, 9/5 – Make up day Saturday, November 16

• Friday, 9/6 – Make up day Saturday, December 7

• On these days, the building will open at 8:45am, instruction begins at 9:15am and dismissal starts at 12:45pm. Breakfast will be served on these days, but not lunch. Please make sure to provide your child with a snack or two on these days.

E.L. Education:

This week the students will be working on finishing their second proof paragraph for their literary essay on what inspires their expert poet and then finishing their paper with a conclusion that clearly wraps up their essay. They will work on utilizing revising and editing techniques to ensure that each paragraph has the "Fab Five" and that they have used proper spelling, punctuation, and grammar. They will especially work at making sure that they are using commas and quotation marks correctly when using quotes from a text. They will end the week by publishing their paper by taking it to final copy. This essay will serve as their End of Unit Assessment for Unit 2. Next week, the students will move on to writing their own original poem and reflecting on what inspired them to write.

How to Help Your Child at Home:

• Tell me more about some of the background information that you learned about your poet.

• What do you think inspired your poet to write? What evidence of this do you find in his/her poems?

• Have your child share with you the rules that we follow when quoting lines from a text?

Math:

Today, the students took their area & perimeter assessment that was originally scheduled for last Thursday. Tomorrow, the students will start their next unit, which will target place value. The students will focus on reading numbers, writing them out in written form, and drawing (using base 10 drawings) to 999,999. It is important that the students understand that each place value is 10 times the place value before it. For example, the hundreds place is 10 times the tens place. They will also work on comparing large numbers using <, >, or =. The students will take an assessment on these concepts early next week.

How to Help Your Child at Home: ​

• How would you read the following number: 2,548,394?

• Show me how to make a base ten drawing of the number 4,596.

• How are the 8’s in the number 8,888 similar and different?

Science:

This quarter we will be learning about landforms and how the earth changes through slow and rapid processes. The students will study the formation of rivers, and learn how they change the earth. We will create a class flow map showing these steps. Next, they will learn how the slow processes of weathering, erosion, and deposition change the earth. All students are recording the phases of the moon each night. If the moon is not visible, the students may use moongiant.com. The unit test will be Wednesday, 9/25/19. By Thursday of this week, students will begin to have notes they can review to prepare for the test. The test will include landforms and fossils. It will not include moon phases.