I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving Break, and now we have only 4 weeks until the Winter holidays.  It will be a busy month as we will focus on our Explorer research using the IIM (Independent Investigative Method) to organize our information.  It is also the perfect opportunity to apply our Expository Writing skills!

This week's learning includes:

Math- In Math, we continue with Unit 4. Our focus this week is measurement. We will look at metric unit of length, personal references for metric length, and measuring in millimeters.

Reading- In reading we are moving on to sequence. It’s important for students to realize and understand the importance of steps and story details being in correct sequence. There will be several hands on activities done throughout the week to reinforce this skill, as well as a grade on some sequencing work.

Writing – We are still working on Expository writing pieces. Our focus this week is to write stronger and more detailed sentences throughout our piece and not just put boring, redundant sentences in the piece. We will also look at word referents as a way to avoid repetition. For example, instead of saying tiger over and over you could say, This striped feline…” Our grammar focus is plural nouns.

Science- We focus on animal survival this week, including adaptations and how they enable organisms to survive in their environments.  There will be some fun, interactive lessons done to drive home this topic.

Social Studies- Exploration! We begin our planner on the explorers as soon as we return from break. We will launch the planner by discussing why many explorers initially set out (Fame, fortune, faith). We will also begin individual research of our chosen explorer using the IIM method that was introduced during the government planner.