Welcome to another wonderful week.
Last week we had a great time at the Historical Museum learning all about Dearborn’s past. It was an enjoyable morning and students seemed to enjoy and learn quite a bit!

This week:

3rd grade MSTEP Wednesday and Thursday: Students will be tested on English Language Arts. Please be sure your child gets a good night’s rest and eats a hearty breakfast, snack and lunch that day:)

Field trip money to the Ann Arbor Hands on Museum can start coming in: Deadline is May 2nd:)

Spelling: knives, leaves, children, teeth, wives, wolves, scarves, geese, loaves, got, get, these, them, those:)

Science/Writing/English Language Arts:

Grammar: Review the prep dog site to review nouns, pronouns, subject verb antecedent.
Language: Use the MINTS acronym to review capitalization and punctuation: M: months, I always capitalize I, N names, T Titles, S Starts of sentences.

Writing: Use the Science text to compare/contrast observable characteristics of animals.

REading: REad carefully to find the important facts, definitions, and details in order to compare/contrast animals.

Math: 2nd grade: 2nd graders will take Unit 7 test and begin Unit 8 on fractions.
3rd grade: 3rd graders are working on the geometry chapter which covers polygons, quadrangles, angles, vertices, etc.

Social Studies: We will begin to talk about renewable vs. nonrenewable resources.

Volunteers: I am always in need of volunteers! Please let me know if and when you would be available and we would love to have you!

Have a great week!

Sincerely,
Gina Parana

Good afternoon everyone. I hope everyone had a great weeekend! It looked like all the families had a great time running in the Martian Marathon!

This week’s activities:

Spelling: the le ending: tickle, puddle, able, bubble, riddle, giggle, middle, table, muddle plus 5 cold words like cuddle, etc.

Math: Continuation of building fluency with addition, subtraction, mulitplication, division.
3rd graders are starting a new chapter on geometry.

Reading/Writing/ and the other subjects will be updated next week.
Homework:
Continue to read at home each night for 20 minutes and thank you for those logging their minutes and turning it in:)
Some students are bringing books home each night and some are reading on Myon which is fine too.

Spelling Homework: Practice on your own.

Math Homework: Math homework will continue to be a home link or math journal pages if students don’t finish the math journal pages in school.

Testing dates will be coming up soon. Please be sure your child is present on those days, gets a good night sleep the night before, and eats a good breakfast:)

April 18th: NWEA Reading section at 1:00.
April 22nd: Make up testing for those who were absent on 4/18.
April 27: 1:00: ELA MStep testing.
April 28: 10:00 Ela Mstep testing.
April 29: 10:15: NWEA Language testing.
May 3: Math 10:00 and 1:00. (MStep)

Have a great week!

Sincerely,
Gina Parana

April 4, 2016

Dear Families,

I hope everyone had a wonderful week of off school! I had a great time exploring Mexico with my family.
Now, we are back to learning this week and before we know it, June will be here!

Spelling this week: stairs, fair, airplane, pair, explore, repair, store, upstairs, ignore, affair, anymore.

Language Arts: We will use the “Compare, contrast” strategy as we read to tell how things are similar and different.
We will also begin to study the quatrain poems as we read and write poetry this week.
Nouns, adjectives, adverbs, and verbs will be reviewed.

Math: 2nd graders will begin Unit 7 which builds upon counting, addition, subtraction, multiplication, some division facts.
3rd graders will take Unit 5 test and begin studying geometry concepts.

Science: We will be observiing the properties of living things.

Social Studies will be an exploration of economics from now until the end of the card marking.

Homework: Read for 20 minutes each night either with a book brought home from school, from home, or read on myon.
Math: Home link page, math journal page, or practice on moby max.

PBIS Reward Celebration: This Wednesday we will have our PBIS Reward Assembly celebrating the month of March.

Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns:) Have a great week!

Sincerely,
Gina Parana

Upcoming Events:

Tuesday, March 15, 10:30: Book fair.

Thursday, March 17, 6:15: Music Concert for Lower Elementary and 3rd grade.

Friday, March 18th, 5:30: Bingo for Books. We hope you can all attend. It will be a fun night for all.

Academics this week:

Spelling, 2nd grade: clown, growl, crown, brown, howl, loud, cloud, sound, round, howl, house.

Spelling 3rd grade: Drop the y and ier or ies. there, earlier, cashier, anywhere, flier, where, carrier, copier, interfere, crier, drier.

Writer’s Workshop and Daily 5:
We will be incorporating Science, where we are learning about animals, their characteristics, special features, etc. We will then write a nonfiction articles with headings, subheadings, captions, diagrams, etc. Everything we will learn in Daily 5, reading instruction (What headings are, organizing facts into categories with 3-5 sentences per heading, bold type print, etc) we will incorporate into our writing.
Grammar: prefixes, suffixes, drop the y and add ies or ier, irregular verbs, and such.
Foundations: Work on proper capitalization and punctuation.

Social Studies; 3rd graders had a great time in Lansing this past Thursday as they traveled to Lansing. They experienced the three branches of government as they visited a court room and learned about the judicial branch. They saw the governors office and learned about his role in government as well as the House and the Senate. We then visited a Science museum, and a historical museum. Very fun and exciting!
2nd graders took an online quiz covering the History of Dearborn and all did a great job. Some students really take their time and do well. But those that rush don’t do as well. It’s important for students to take their time on these computerized quizzes or tests such as NWEA testing.

Homework:
We have homework every day so thank you for making sure your child does their homework. Sometimes, it is easy enough for them to complete on their own. SOmetimes though, they may need assistance from a parent.
Math homework as you are aware is a homelink every night as well as a math fluency paper.
REading is every night for 20 minutes:)
Spelling practice is to practice the words any way you’d like.

So I hope everyone enjoys their week and we hope to see you at all of the upcoming events at school this upcoming week:)

I am in need of parent volunteers this week if anyone is available. You are always welcome.

Sincerely,
Gina Parana

Welcome to another week:

Some changes this week:

Gym on Tuesday instead of Thursday. Wear your gym shoes:)

Reading logs for March is REading Month competition is due every Friday:)

3rd grade field trip to Lansing is this Thursday. Details will follow this Tuesday:)

Spelling: 3rd grade: hire, earth, learn, retire, early, fire, heard, earn, tire, fear

2nd grade: or and ar chunk: part, park, sort, horse, short, start, dark, fort, more, jar

Writing/Science: This week we will integrate our Science with Writer’s Workshop as we draft our informational piece on a living thing that we are learning in science.

Social Studies: 2nd graders will review landforms as they use clay to make mountains, valleys, etc.
3rd grade Social Studies comes alive as we visit our state capitol and learn all about our government.

Math: 2nd grade begins to explore multiplication while also reviewing subtraction facts.
3rd grade is working on multiplication, division, and fractions.
Thank you for keeping up with the homework.

Daily 5 Reading: We are exploring nonfiction reading as we use text features to help us to understand the text.

Thank you for everything!

We are running low on pencils:) If you could send a few sharpened pencils in with your child to use that would be great:)

Have a great week:)

Sincerely,
Mrs. Parana

Welcome to a new week!

We will have our PBIS Behavioral Celebration this week either Monday or Friday. We will let you know when it will be!

Field Trip to Lansing for 3rd graders is next week! Such an educational experience for the kids!

This week:

Spelling: “are” chunk: care, stare, fare, bare, share, spare, aware, hare, mare.

Daily 5/REading: EAch Friday, 3rd graders will be going to the computer lab to practice for the MStep. The MStep is a lengthy test that 3rd graders will be taking in the spring. They will not only be expected to read and answer comprehension questions, but be able to use computer skills to highlight important information, cross things out, move things around, etc. STudents did a great job this past Friday.
So much of our mini lessons centers around comprehension, inferring, and finding evidence in the text that supports our beliefs.
Continue to keep reading for 20 minutes each day at home. Thank you as well for taking the time to record what your child is reading and the amount of minutes they have read.

Writing: This week we will begin our informational unit on living things. We will do a research project on a living thing of our choice. Last week, we finished our opinion writing about whether we would save an ant or not. Students needed to come up with an introduction, opinion statement, 3 reasons, and a conclusion. Much of the writing we do stays in school in a binder that is shared in May with family, teachers, and Ms. Rauch. Hopefully parents can make it in May to read all of our wonderful writing!

Science and Social Studies remain the same as last week:)

Parent volunteers are always needed so please let me know if you would like to volunteer this week:)

Sincerely,
Gina Parana

Welcome to a new week!

This week we have the following:

Spelling: Homophones: there, their, they’re, where, wear, bored, board, plane, plain, flour, flower, some, sum.

Writing/Science: We will begin our informational writing where we will research facts about living things as we are reading from our book and the internet.

Math: 3rd grade will take their test Wednesday and begin learning/reviewing multiplication, division, shapes, and story problems.

Social Studies: We will continue learning about state government and local government.

REading: Review nonficton text features, homophones, possessive nouns, contractions, similes and metaphors:)

As always, feel free to contactt me anytime!

Have a great week!

Sincerely,
Gina Parana

This week is a 4 day week!

Wednesday, February 10, 2016: Late Start

Midwinter break Friday, Feb 12th and Monday, February 15th.

Thursday, February 11th: 9-10:30: Come to Nowlin School for “Drop Everything and Learn Daily 5 With Your Child.”

Thursday, February 11th: Exchange Valentine’s with friends from 2:50-3:20.

Spelling: Homophones:
aunt, ant, blew, blue, eight, ate, waste, waist, made, maid, weight, wait, past, passed.
Students can have this 4 day week plus the next week to practice.
Spelling Homework for these words are:
1. Write the word in a sentence. Underline the spelling word.
2. After writing the word in a sentence find all the nouns and write noun above it.
3. Find all the verbs and write verb above it.
4. Find all the adjectives and write adjective above it.
Of course, these activities can be spread out over mulitple days and due on Thursday, February 18th.

Daily 5/Reading:
Informational: Use main ideas and details in nonfiction text.
Narrative: Use idioms to expand vocabulary in reading and writing. Understand homophones, that they are words that are pronounced the same but have different spellings and meanings.
Foundations: Use proper capitalization and punctuation.

Writer’s Workshop: Most students have finished their realistic fiction pieces and we have put the writing in our writing portfolio for parents to see at the end of the year. Now, we will apply what we are leaning in Daily 5 to writing Tall Tales! Maybe we can get those out in the hall when we are done!

Social Studies: WE are learning so much about how our federal and state government works! STudents are getting excited to go to Lansing in March (3rd graders only).

Science: We will begin our unit on plants and other living things.

Math: 2nd graders took their Unit 5 test on Friday and those should be returned soon. They will begin Unit 6 which covers adding and subtracting within 100 and story problems.
3rd graders are working on fractions while at the same time building fluency with multiplication and division.

I hope everyone has a great week!

Sincerely,
Gina Parana

Good evening,

Our 2/3 Split Classroom will be having their bake sale this Friday after school.
We are in need of volunteers and bakers for this bake sale.
All proceeds from the bake sale go to supplies or other necessary items that we can use in our classroom.
Please come and help out if you can whether it is to volunteer or bake items!
Please get in touch with out homeroom mom’s, Mrs. Dobry and Mrs. Schmidt and let them know if you can help!

Thank You,
Mrs. Parana

Welcome to another week!

We had our PBIS Reward Assembly last week. Great job to all that were able to attend!

Also, thank you to everyone who sent coloring books, crayons, etc for the children at our local hospital. Our class was in the lead as of last week.

We are also collecting cases of water for the citizens of Flint.

Report Cards: Teachers spent most of Friday afternoon working on report cards. They will be going home sometime next week. Please let me know if you have any questions about it.

Other events coming up: Parents mark your calendars for Thursday, February 10 from 9:00-11:30 for “Drop Everything and REad With Your Child”. The morning will be devoted to parents coming in to their child’s classroom to see how a typical language arts morning works. You can view the mini lessons and see how your child practices reading, writing, and word work. A note will soon be coming home about it.

Valentine’s Day:
This upcoming week: The same day as “Drop Everything and REad to Your Child”, we will exchange Valentines. We will save the last part of the day for passing and reading our Valentines to friends. Then we may watch a movie or something of that sort. We have 20 kids in the classroom.
Abdallah
Shahd
Jacob
Ayden
Calum
Steven
Arya
Alexis
Madelyn
Andrew
DeAuna
Lucas
Gracie
Kylee
Onzei
Mahmoud
Sam
Lucas
Carlos
Isabella

Spelling words: wrist, write, wrap, knife, knot, know, knew, knee, writing, wreck

Science: We will be studying plants and other living things.

Social Studies: STudents are very excited as we learn about Michigan’s government. 3rd graders will be going to visit the capitol in March which they are very excited about. Thank you for turning in all permission slips in a timely fashion!

Math: 2nd graders are studying geometry this week. They are learning all about polygons: shapes that have straight lines and must connect. Vertices are points where 2 line segments meet. They are also learning about edges which are straight line segments. A review will be coming home this week.
3rd graders are still practicing multiplication and division as they enter their new chapter on fractions. I am very proud of their progress. A great way to build fluency with these facts is to have your child practice on mobymax.com at home.

REading/Daily 5: This week we will practice the strategy of inferring. Inferring is when a reader uses the pictures, or other clues the author gives and their background knowledge to comprehend what isn’t said in the text. For example, if a character slowly drags their feet with their head down, we can infer that the character is sad. Practice this strategy at home. It is a more difficult strategy to apply.
Grammar: We will be studying conjunctions, simple and complex sentences, and multiple meaning words.
Language: We will be practicing proper capitalization and punctuation in our writing.

Writer’s Workshop: This week we will finish our realistic fiction stories and begin a new unit on tall tales. Tall tales are

Homework: Thank you for taking the time to write what your child is reading each night. The only way to improve is to read each night for 20 minutes and ask your child some comeprehension questions. Myon.com is a great place to go to read if your child forgets a good fit book. I would have them do 20 minutes and then some explaining of what their story was about, what other title would fit for that story, what the characters were like, etc.
We also have math every night. I have added a math fluency paper for both grades to help them build those facts that they need to know.

Have a great week and please contact me via dojo or the blog if you have any questions.

Sincerely,
Gina Parana