STEM, Similes, and creative Scripting

Miss. Lindsay here! I am amazed at how quickly February has flown by. Spring fever has already hit with many 60 degree days and next Wednesday will mark the beginning of March.

Science
You may have noticed your kiddos tucking bubble wrap, cardboard, styrofoam cups, and other assorted "insulators" into their backpacks this week. That is because we have been working on a STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics... We are focused on science!) project to create the best insulator for 1 cup of boiling water in a paper cup. All of the students have worked collaboratively to make one another's projects the very best! After our "insulating champs" have been crowned, we will be moving on to new and exciting concepts next week.

Language Arts
Word Study
This week's list consists of words that are all synonyms of laugh and cry. The students will be challenged to integrate what we have learned in reading and create sentences with the words using similes. Additionally, there will be a focus on spelling, synonyms/antonyms, and creating their own definitions of the words! The words for the week can be found here.

Reading
As we continue our poetry unit, we have begun to focus on figurative language -- similes, metaphors, alliteration, personification, idioms, onomatopoeias, and hyperboles. Poets use figurative language to make their poems more interesting. As we learn figurative language, we have begun to identify where poets have stuck it into their writing. It is quite fun! Next week, we will work on mood, theme, and tone within poetry as well as spend time on PARCC test preparation.

Writing
The kids have used what they learned in reading to write poems in writing. So far, we have written simile, metaphor, and alliteration poems with onomatopoeia poems on the way! Poetry's creative mean allows the students to think differently about what they want to write and how they want to write it. For example, students chose colors to write about for their metaphor poems and applied many emotions to the color they chose.

Next week we will continue to write creatively through the poetry process!

Math
Last week the students flexed their brain muscles and breezed through Chapter 8! We have begun Chapter 9 (converting fractions to decimals), the last chapter involving fractions! This chapter only involves converting fractions with a base of 10 (1/10, 1/100, 1/100, etc.). Check out this Khan Academy video for a nice strategy on how to convert fractions to decimals!

Upcoming Events
Our calendar is very exciting next week! Take a look:

• 3/2/17: Pajama Day (to celebrate Dr. Seuss's birthday)
• 3/2/17: EARLY DISMISSAL @ 12:30PM
• 3/2/17: OPEN HOUSE! @ 6PM-7:30PM
• 3/3/17: No School -- Teacher's Institute Day
• 3/17/17: End of 3rd Quarter

If you have any questions or concerns, you can contact me at mllindsay@eiu.edu or Mr. Holmes.