3rd, 4th and 5th Grade Newsletter
September 8, 2009

Classroom Economy
We will be starting a classroom economy this week and our classroom currency will be called, “Bear Bucks!” Students will earn a salary by performing their jobs as students. There will be fines and bills that will need to be paid and bonus bucks that can be earned. While participating in our classroom economy students will be practicing math skills as well as learning more about economics. More information will come home tomorrow with your child.

Saxon Math
We started our new Saxon Math Curriculum last week! You will see some pages in your child’s Red Folder today. We start with a Power-Up worksheet which gives students daily practice on their math facts as well as a few other warm-up activities. It is like stretching before running the mile! Then, we begin the daily assignment—which includes a new concept. I rotate through the different grade levels to teach the new concept while the students are working on their assignments. Often, new concepts will be introduced at our Morning Meetings and we will discuss them as a group.

When correcting math assignments I give students a “grade” of a percentage correct. If a student does not get at least 80% of an assignment correct I ask them to re-do the problems they got wrong and return the assignment to me. These re-do assignments will come home in your child’s Red Folder. If I feel that a student needs more practice with a concept I will re-teach the concept in class and give the student a chance to re-do the assignment in class.

Technology and Book Reports
We will be creating book video book reports during technology! Each child should bring a book to school by Monday, September 14th that they have recently finished reading. Please contact me if this is a problem.

Glenn’s Ditch
We will be taking a field trip to Glen’s Ditch on Friday afternoon to begin to develop our year-long scientific study. Stay tuned for more details about this study!

Book Orders
Book orders were due today! I will wait to order until tomorrow since we did not have school yesterday. (I forgot about the three-day weekend when I set the due date!) Don’t forget that every dollar that is spent earns points for our class to spend on more books for the classroom!

Paragraph a Week
The paragraph assignment this week is”Capitalization Crazy.” Please see the attached assignment sheet.

Word of the Week: molecule
Each week a word will be given for students to define and use in a sentence. These words will be from books we are reading or vocabulary from things we are studying. Students should write the definitions and sentences on an index card (or something similar in size). They can be illustrated too! These definitions and sentences will be displayed on a word wall in the classroom. The “Word of the Week” is an optional assignment.