Week of 10/18

Hope you have enjoyed your beautiful weekend! Yay for Fall Break this week!  Since the week will be a short week, we will be changing things up a little bit! Here is what's ahead:

Reading - This will be the final week to complete our leveled books.  Many of the children have finished their stories and are working on or have completed their story skeletons (book reports).  The due date for the story to be completed is October 25th. The due date for story skeleton completion is October 29th. Please ask your child if he/she is done with his/her story.  These stories have been quite a challenge for some of the children.  A few of them have really struggled, not because it has been too difficult of a book (I made sure it was on their level), but because it's their first long chapter book.  Most have risen to the challenge though! I'm super proud of them!!!  We will be doing more leveled books in the future. 

Math - multiplication practice

Spelling - no spelling this week

English - creative writing


Science - Biomes


Spanish - Our last lesson of this unit will be on Monday. We will have a test on Wednesday. I will send home a study guide on Monday.


We will be doing special learning centers this week as well! They should be a lot of fun! We will be covering art standards, math, science, and history.


Please don't forget to send a pumpkin to school tomorrow......Monday. Thanks so much for all you do to help your child succeed!!





Take a look at our fantastic 5 Pocket People!

 I am super proud of my newest kiddos to pass their 12's!!  Great job Jack, Jaycee, Roy, Matt, Hayden, Alexia, Kendrick, Lexi, Shelby O, Cayti, Sydney, and Cooper!!

 Oops.....I didn't mean to mix him in with the kids....he didn't actually pass his 12's, but isn't he a cutie! He is a bear to represent Glenwood Grizzlies and Corderman's Cubs painted by our very own Matt! Thanks Matt for representing our class in the pumpkin decorating contest! You did an awesome job!

FYI

*IMPORTANT*

The Edible Animal Cell Project due date has changed.

After thinking it over, I feel that I could have planned the timing of the Edible Animal Cell Project a little better.  The first reason is that we just had a big homework project due 1 week ago and I usually like to space things out a little better. The biggest reason, however, is that most of the children will want to use candy to represent their cell parts. Candy can get expensive when you have to buy several different kinds, so I thought what better time to have the project due, then to do it after Halloween when most of the children will have plenty of candy at their disposal!  The new due date will be Friday, November 5. Please save the information that I sent home with you for use later. Thank you!


Mrs. Corderman

Pictures!

Briley is rocking out at mulitplication!  She is the 4th to pass tests through her 12's! Yay Briley!

 I took some shots of the kids with their birds they sewed with their own hands! I'm so proud of them because this was a somewhat challenging project for many of them!  Now I ask myself......will I do this project again?  I don't know about that....it was quite challenging for me to sew with 24 - 9 and 10 year olds!  We made it through though...lol!  The character lesson in all of this is first of all perseverance!  Next, is just like our birds, we are all unique and special individuals........all worthy and beautiful!!

 Last, but certainly not least, is Ellie!  She is rocking at multiplication too!  She came in 5th place in passing tests through 12's!  Great finish Ellie!!

Week of 10/11/10

Hi Families!  Hope you have enjoyed your weekend! I have GREAT news!!  My owl grant has been fully funded!!!! Yay! I had some anonymous donors, some donors that I don't even know, and then the Build-a-Bear Foundation finished it off with a donation! Wow! I am so excited!  What is really neat about this is that it will tell the children that they matter, that their education is important, that people they don't even know want to invest in them! Thanks to all of you who voted for my project! I appreciate it so much!

Here is what is on the agenda this week:

Reading - The children will work on finishing their leveled novels this week on an individual basis.  We've worked in literature circle groups for 2 weeks, but now I want them to finish up on their own.  I will still have them meet to discuss their books though.  When they are done, they will be doing a fun book report project called Story Skeletons!  This is not a homework assignment.  We will be working on them in class.  We will also add short reading passages with comprehension questions to our morning work.  The passages will be science related on the topic of animal adaptations.

English - Adjectives, daily morning English review

Spelling - Sounds of "i"   List 5 will be up on spellingcity.com on Monday.  Our Friday ended up so busy, we completely forgot to take our "O" spelling enrichment test! :o So sorry.  I will give this test on Tuesday, and we will do the next enrichment list, listed after "O" words on Friday.

Math - Balancing equations, review of equations, expressions, function machines, and other previously learned skills  We will have a test on Thursday.  I will send home a study guide on Wednesday.

Social Studies - We will finish up our Oklahoma Symbols book and take a quiz on it.  We will also learn how to read a road map of Oklahoma.  This will be the last of social studies for awhile, while we concentrate on science.

Science - Animals and Biomes  I will be sending home a homework project this week that will be due next Monday, October 18th.  The project will be to create an edible animal cell.  I will send home the specifics tomorrow.  This is a super fun project, and especially fun when we get to eat them!

I want to BRAG about the children's 5 Pocket Biographies!  Wow!  They are exceptional!!  I am so super impressed by how creative they are!  We have had so many compliments on them.  The children, I think, have been proud of themselves and they should be!  Success breeds success......you should have seen the smiles on their faces when they brought them in......warms my heart!  I also want to BRAG about the Oklahoma History test results!! Wow!  They rocked the classroom with their scores!  You should be so proud of them because they know their stuff!! Did you know all the answers?  I would venture to say....no, you've slept a lot since you had to know this information.  :)  I'm sure they were excited they knew some things mom and/or dad didn't know! 

The week after this week is Fall Break week.  Since it is a short week, we will not be doing things like usual.  We will be having learning centers for those 3 days along with other things, but the children will need to bring a pumpkin to school for those learning centers.  The pumpkin can be as small as an apple or as large has they can carry.  Please have the pumpkin to school by October 18th.  The children can bring the pumpkin early if they want, since the animal cell is due that day too.  

Please remember Fall Fun Day is this Wednesday.  It should be a fun evening!  Also, please remember to vote for our school playground at http://www.powerabrightfuture.com/.  You will need to register first, but you can vote everyday.  Search by: Glenwood  There will be 3 Glenwood projects, but you can tell which one is ours by the picture of our playground. This would be incredibly beneficial to your child, so please take the time to vote. Thanks!

Book orders are due on October 14th.  You can postdate the check for October 20th. 

Saving Fred footage!

Week of 10/4

Hi Families! Hasn't the weather been beautiful?! Hope you're getting outside some to enjoy it!  My son could live outside if I let him! :)

I will be gone on Monday to take my son to his pediatric eye specialist, but will be back on Tuesday.

Reading - We will continue our leveled literature circle groups working to find main ideas throughout their stories as well as identifying parts of speech in text.

English - We will finish up verb recognition and start identifying adjectives.  We also continue to do a daily English review in our morning work.

Spelling - List 4....sounds of "e"  I will put the list up on spellingcity.com on Tuesday.  Last week we forgot about spelling enrichment until Thursday.  I still had a few that wanted to do it anyway, but this week, just know the list is entitled "o enrichment words" on spellingcity.com.  One night is usually not enough time to study these harder words.

Math - Expressions, Addition properties, Equations, Finding rules in patterns  We will also continue to do our daily math review as well.

Social Studies - Oklahoma symbols, Great Depression and Dust Bowl Days     We will be creating a study guide on Wednesday for our Oklahoma History Test.  The test will be on Friday.  This is the children's first major test.  They will  probably need to study both on Wednesday and Thursday evenings for it. We have talked quite a bit about the history in class and will continue to do so, but nothing helps more than follow-up at home. 

*****Don't forget that the 5 Pocket People Biographies are due on Tuesday!***** I have had 2 already turned in that were phenomonal!! I can't wait to see the rest!

The Scrip orders are due on Tuesday by noon.  I was mistaken in my earlier post thinking they were due this past Friday.  There is still time to turn it in! :)

On November 9th, our class will be visiting the Cherokee Strip Museum and Turkey Creek School.  The children will get to spend a day as a typical student in 1910.  This is a very special and fun field trip for the kids!  Most of the children dress up as pioneer children.  The boys either wear jeans and a button up shirt, sometimes with suspenders, or overalls.  The girls wear an old fashioned (floral or calico print) dress usually past the knees, many wear a bonnet as well. Some of the girls wear an apron as part of their dress too. It is definitely NOT mandatory to dress pioneer style, but encouraged.  I wanted to give you plenty of notice so that you had time to find something or make something.  Sometimes, I've had parents find things at thrift stores or they have borrowed something from someone.  I've also had a few lucky ones that either knew how to sew or knew someone that did.  I will send home a more detailed letter about the trip in a couple of weeks.

Don't forget that parent-teacher conferences are on Tuesday and Thursday afternoon/evenings.  Hopefully, you have written down your time.

The children took home a fundraiser packet on Friday.  We are all working hard to raise enough money to put in a new playground for our school.  The goal for this fundraiser is for everyone to sell 4 items.  I realize if you have more than one child doing this fundraiser, that's harder to do, but please, if you can, try to participate in this worthy cause! :)

Thanks for being such awesome, involved parents, and most importantly, for sharing your beautiful children with me!

Here are your cuties "Saving Fred"! This was a science experiment we conducted on Friday! Fun!

 The newest student to Rock at Multiplication! Ben passed his 12's this week! Yeah Ben!

Week of September 27th

Hi Families! I can't believe that it is already going to be October this coming Friday! Wow! We sure had fun this week watching Because of Winn Dixie on Thursday and having our Apple Day on Friday.  I was amazed when we watched Winn Dixie at how many details the children could pick out that were different between the story and the movie.  I love it!  Everyone brought their apple for Apple Day! Yeah! I am so proud of the kids! We had a good time and hopefully they learned a lot!  We had stations where I worked with one group at a time.  They included: finding their apples' weight in grams and ounces, finding their apples' circumference and height in both centimeters and inches, apple taste testing, and using the scientific method to determine whether an apple would sink or float. I read a tall tale called Johnny Appleseed and we topped off our day eating homemade applesause with our kindergarten buddies! Fun! Thanks to Jumbos for donating apples to our class for our applesauce and taste testing! I really appreciate it!!


This week looks like this:


Reading - We will be enjoying our literature circles again this week.  The skills we will be concentrating on are fluency and finding the main ideas of each chapter.


English - Verbs.....I will also give the children highlighter tape to highlight verbs in their literature circle books.


Spelling - List 3(sounds of  'a') This week I will make sure I add the list to spellingcity.com.  Sorry I failed to do that last week...it completely slipped my mind! (I think I may be losing a little of my mind parenting a teenager and a toddler at the same time......I can't believe the similarities! Ha!) I will also start spelling enrichment this week and will add that list as well.  Spelling enrichment, remember, is completely optional, but I really encourage it for those that find our regular spelling list unchallenging. :)


Math - Estimating sums and differences, adding and subtracting 4 digit numbers, and subtracting across zeros


Social Studies - Native American Removal, Civil War, moving West, land runs and cattle drives.....We will also make a clay artifact typical of the earliest people of Oklahoma...the Spiro Mound people. I also sent a homework project home with the children on Thursday.  This assignment is due on October 5th.  It is both a social studies grade and a reading grade.  It is called a 5 Pocket Person.  Make sure to ask your child for the directions I sent home describing the project. 


Please continue to vote on our limeadesforlearning.com grant......remember to click on Find a Project and search by keyword: owl.........it's called "Hands on Learning right from the Owl's Mouth".  Thanks!


***Also, don't forget about the Scrip Gift Card Program.  Orders are due October 1st.  This is a great and easy way to support your school! It's money you already spend anyway.  For instance, I spend a few hundred dollars at Walmart each month, so I will just buy the Scrip Gift Card to Walmart.  I will pay with it when I shop and money will go back to Glenwood.  My family eats out sometimes, so I will buy a $25 Scrip Gift Card to Chilis.  It's money that I will spend anyway and Chilis will give some back to Glenwood.  I encourage you to take a look at this program if you haven't done so yet.  It is such an awesome way to help our school.  Believe me, with all the budget cuts lately, every dollar helps!


Take a look at our 2 kiddos who have passed their multiplication tests through 12's!! Kayla came in first with Brennan a close behind second!! Good job kids!!  We have several more headed to their 12's possibly this week!! 

REMINDERS

Don't forget to bring your apple tomorrow if you haven't brought one yet.  Also, please, please vote for our owl project.  Directions for voting are on the previous post.  Thanks so much!