Important Dates & Reminders

• December 2-6, 2024: Book Fair
• December 4, 2024: Literacy Night
• December 23, 2024 - January 3, 2025: No School (Winter Break)

What are we learning?

Language Arts

• We are in Unit 3 of our language arts skills. The students are reading different texts about the different levels of government in the U.S. to accomplish those skills. They will be assessed on the following skills at the end of Unit 3:
  • Describing the Problem/Solution Structure of a Text
  • Explaining Events or Ideas in a Problem/Solution Text
  • Interpreting Information Presented Visually (sidebars, charts, photos)
  • Drawing Inferences
  • Integrating Information from Two Texts
  • Using Context Clues to Determine the Meaning of Words and Phrases
  • Answering a Discussion-Based Question (DBQ) in Written Form
  • Using Modal Auxiliaries to Express Possibilities
  • Forming and Using the Present Progressive Tense
  • Using Commas and Quotations Marks to Mark Direct Speech/Quotations from a Text

Math

• The students are in their first Multiplication and Division unit. The focus of this unit provides students with foundational knowledge and skills that will be needed for more advanced work with multiplication and division. Students will work on building fluency with multiplication facts through 12 x 12 and the corresponding division facts by exploring strategies for deriving facts. In context students will estimate, represent, solve, and justify single step and multistep problems (two-digit by one-digit and three-digit by one digit) multiplication problems.
• Students are also expected to apply addition and multiplication properties to think flexibly in order to choose appropriate strategies to solve problems accurately and efficiently. Students will apply their understanding of addition, subtraction, and multiplication when engaging with increasing and decreasing patterns.

Science

• The first two quarters of the school year are focused on Virginia ecosystems. The students have taken an assessment on lessons 1-6 and an assessment on lessons 1-11. They will take a final science assessment on VA ecosystems after lesson 17.

Health

• The students will begin their next health unit the week of December 9, 2024. This unit will have lessons about:
  • Alcohol, Tobacco, and Other Drugs
  • Human Growth and Development
  • Emotional and Social Health
• A parent meeting will be held prior to these lessons to provide additional information about these topics. Information about this meeting will be provided at a later date. 
• An opt-out form has already been sent home in Thursday folders. Please return this to school if you do not want your child to attend these lessons.

Questions to ask your child at home.

• Can you use a modal auxiliary verb to explain what you want to do?
  • Examples: We should go to Five Below on Saturday. We must have ice cream after dinner.
• What’s a problem that happened in your favorite tv show? How did they solve it?
• What are your math facts for the 6s and 7s?