Two weeks have gone by and a lot of things have happened. The students have been working hard on measurement conversion, and addition and subtraction using the standard algorithm. During reading, we have started working on team building activities through literacy circles, where each student has a specific role to fulfill. Students choose a book from a curated collection on Epic, and then each of the four members works on either asking questions, summarizing, describing the characters or finding interesting vocabulary and definitions. The group monitor makes sure each member reads the book, stays on task and does his/her work properly. After all the members have completed their paper, they all take turns sharing and then the whole group rotates the roles and starts over with a new book. The kids have been fantastic and they seem to enjoy the process. They have been very responsible with their tasks and have practiced their Spanish skills all the way.
During writing the students have continued working on their poems, adding "list poems" to their notebooks. The classroom anthology currently has about 85 poems and will be soon published for your view. Finally during science, we have kept on exploring how sound waves travel, using a balloon to perceive the vibrations of the human voice. And in Social Studies, students have been working on a book on Primary Sources, again working in a group and with each group presenting on a chapter to the rest of the class. I would say collaboration is a word that could define these two weeks.
On another note, we had to say farewell to our Spanish Cultural Assistant, Elba, as she worked with us last week for the last time. We have been so lucky to have her here during this school year. We are going to miss her very much, but we will stay in touch for sure.
Take a look at these two weeks slide show!

This week the students have been working on subtraction strategies and practicing subtraction with the standard algorithm. Additionally, we have worked with figuring out the perimeter of some polygons, and adding decimeters to our charts. Finally today, the students have put all their math skills to work, when they had so solve some math puzzles for a fun escape room. During reading, the students have been working on a couple of books, asking and answering questions, summarizing and practicing new vocabulary. During writing, the students have been working on creating their own funny poems, backward poems and tongue twisters. And in science, the students have been learning all about what is sound, and making a fun experiment with the old fashion method of attaching a string to two paper cups. And for a little quiet reading time, we are now in the library enjoying some interesting books, and relaxing in the comfortable chairs. Take a look!

For the past two weeks we have been working on understanding and practicing different strategies for addition and subtraction, especially the traditional algorithms. The students have become very proficient and love to solve complicated equations. You can almost see the numbers floating around their heads! During reading, we have continued reading books on Epic connected to the science standards, asking and answering questions, looking for evidence in the stories, describing photographs, and learning new and interesting vocabulary. Ask your child what "laderas", "cañones" or "agua dulce" mean. For writing, we had continued our adventure through poetry, learning about similes and metaphors and trying our hand at our own poems. The students have created poems using metaphors, comparing a color to a thing, an event, an action and a feeling. We have also started using Kenn Nesbitt's website "Poetry for Kids"  that has a rhyming dictionary, along with interesting lessons to learn to write funny poems. Stay tuned for future publications. During Science, we have continued learning more about the birth of rocks, with the lesson titled "Erosion, Natural Hazards and Engineering", where students had to come up with ideas about how to protect their house from a landslide. After learning about the reasons and consequences of landslides, the students brainstormed ideas on how to protect their house situated at the base of a mountain. All ideas were accepted, and after all the brainstorming, the students chose one of those to design their solution. In the pictures below you can see the students presenting their engineering design to the class. Finally, during Social Studies, we have continued learning about the work of archaeologists, and the importance of learning about the history of our ancestors through the artifacts they left behind.
On a side note, some students have been going to first grade classes to read with a couple of students during our growth mindset time.
Take a look at this week's slideshow!

This week during math, we have found different numbers on a mat of 10,000 squares. Something that might seem pretty daunting, has become so easy for our students. Together we have also created a bigger mat of 1,000,000 squares, that we will use to chart bigger numbers. Yes, we are working on saying larger numbers, rounding them to the nearest ten, hundred and thousand, adding and subtracting them. During Work Places, our students have had lots of fun playing a couple of games, "Target to 1,000", and "Add, Round and Compare". Ask your child about these fun games.
During reading, students have been working independently, reading a book about "Los Pueblos Indígenas", commenting on what they see in the pictures, and summarizing the contents of the story. We have also started a book titled "Introducción a los Accidentes Geográficos", connecting with the science lesson on Erosion and Deposition. During writing, we have continued learning about the different literary devices for poetry, such as rhyme, rhythm, repetition, alliteration, assonance and onomatopoeia, making a bookmark to use as a handy tool during our partner read of poetry books. During science, we have completed the lesson on "Will a mountain last forever?", anchoring with the first activity on the fossils. And finally, during Social Studies, we have continued reviewing the theories about the first inhabitants of North America.
There will be no pictures this week, I guess we have been so busy that I have completely forgot to snap a few pictures :(
​Have a great weekend!

This week in Math, we have been closing up the unit on fractions and decimals, working on a pre-test with a partner, reviewing and evaluating our answers to assess what skills we still need to work on, and completing a post-assessment independently. During reading, we are making connections to our learning in Science by reading a book on volcanoes in Spanish, asking questions, finding evidence in the story to respond, tuning into interesting words, and summarizing what we read. During science, we have continued our learning on weathering and erosion by making an experiment that explains what happens to rocks that are tumbled down a hill. In the experiment we have used sugar cubes with sharp edges, colored the edges of one of the cubes with marker, kept another cube as a control group, and shaken the the first colored cube and a few other inside of a container for 5x40 times, checking what happens to the cubes after every count. During writing, we have started a unit on poetry, first learning about the meaning of poetry, then writing a few poems on our poetry notebooks and reflecting on them. And during Social Studies, we have started looking into contrasting theories about the origins of the First Peoples of North America. Take a look at this week's short slide show!

This week in our class, the students have been busy catching up and finishing up work. In math, we have finished the chapter on fractions and decimals, and today they have been working with a partner on a pre-assessment to analyze the results next week before the independent post-assessment. That way the students will have a chance to understand their successes and areas of challenge, and learn what they can do to overcome those little gaps in their learning. During reading, we have finished learning about personal narrative in Spanish, and alternatively, we have been working on reading all about volcanoes in small guided reading groups and as a whole group class, learning important vocabulary like "cenizas", "polvo", "laderas", "erupcionar", to have a deeper comprehension during our science practice in the afternoon. Since Mystery Science has created the choice of listening to the videos in Spanish, we have increased our time in Spanish as well. But that hasn't been the only fun part, check out the slide show to see your children experimenting with two different types of "lava", thick and thin lava, learning about which one comes from a cone volcano, and which one from a shield volcano. This week we have also made the connection to the anchor lesson that we started a few weeks ago, to figure out how a group of prehistoric animals died, and how their body structures were preserved in the form or fossils. Also, the students have been sharpening their multiplication facts with Xtra math, and kept on getting more puzzles in STMath. And finally, I am happy to announce that some students have published their personal narrative pieces, that you can access in the "author's showcase" page of this website. The rest of the pieces will be published soon, so stay tuned!
​Have a fantastic weekend!

Two productive weeks are coming to an end. During our math blocks we have been making progress with fractions, and started our journey in understanding decimals. How would you write and say parts of one hundred in Spanish? My students have learned the difference between "centésimas" and "décimas", and how to relate that to money.  During our investigations, the students have been using ten base blocks, dimes and pennies to show quantities smaller than one whole, also comparing them to the right fraction expressions. During Number Corner, the students have been also investigating different types of lines, different types of angles, and how to understand story problems. Using the strategy of "numberless problems", the students get to investigate the story that the problem shows, without getting caught in doing something with the numbers right away, because the numbers are blacked out. Then, discussions are generated, what is happening in the story?, what is the problem asking?, what type of equations we might be able to use and why? Once the students get a good understanding of the story, it is time to show the numbers and do the equations. The conversations generated are very engaging and interesting, some students even start to use pictures to explain the story, like real mathematicians do!
During reading block, we have continued learning about personal narrative, identifying how authors show their feelings in their stories, learning how we should quote and paraphrase when we are responding to reading, and describing the reactions of the characters to events in the story to understand how the characters evolve. 
On writing, we have been working on narrowing our focus to a very small event, zooming in to describe it with detail, and we have been learning the difference between "telling" and "showing",  practicing imagining small details to use in our writing, like how to describe feeling excited, or scared, describing the setting, writing our thinking process in that moment, and adding dialogue whenever we think about what the people in our story was saying at that moment.
On read aloud day, we read "All Are Welcome" by Alexandra Penfold, as a school wide event, and during 100 day, students created number lines with 100/4 and 100/2, and worked on other activities of their choice.
Take a look at this week's pictures!

This week in our classroom:
In math we have been working with adding and comparing fractions and finding equivalent fractions. During number corner, we have continued finding the area in square units of different geometric shapes, and adding three quarters of a dollar at a time to find the final amount of money. We have also been working on multi-step division number problems.
In Reading, we have been talking about how authors connect the beginning and the end of their stories, how the characters create contrast in the narrative, and how figurative and descriptive language makes the reading richer and more interesting.
In writing, we have been organizing the sequence of our stories to have a clear picture of what we want to talk about. And in Science we have had a great surprise since Mystery Science videos are now completely in Spanish!!! We have been learning about whether a volcano could pop up in our back yard, and have found the volcanos in a World Map that make the Ring of Fire.
During this week students have also been been taking the iReady test in both English Language Arts and Math, although we will need another day next week to get it finished.
And finally we have celebrated kindness week with fun outfits and reading a bunch of books on kindness and good manners.
Take a look at this week's slideshow. The kids are having a blast playing board games!
Have a cozy snowy weekend! Hopefully nobody will lose power :)

This week during Math, we have been learning a lot about fractions, like equivalent fractions, improper fractions and mixed numbers, adding fractions with the same denominator and with different denominator. We have played games and used manipulatives to see how many objects make a fraction of a group.
During Spanish reading, we have been learning about the audience, understanding that authors think about the people that will be reading their books, and make sure their vocabulary and topics are appropriate for that audience. We have also learned about the sequence of the story, and how the author expresses their feelings in the voice of their characters. Since those are the same lessons that we are going to apply to our personal narrative writing, looking at what other authors are doing can guide us in our writing.
In Writing we have been exploring how to stretch our narration, so that we don't reveal all the important information first, but start building up tension in the story to keep the attention of the reader.
And on Science, we have started a new unit titled The Birth of Rocks, with an anchor phenomenon about an interesting fossil site in Nebraska. 
Finally, we have been decorating our door for Kindness Week with the message "Kindness is a Universal Language", and we will be doing the following activities next week:
Kindness Spirit Week
 Monday, January 24 : Kicking off Kindness: Wear crazy socks or mismatched shoes
Tuesday, January 25:  “Be the Sunshine on Someone’s Cloudy Day” - Wear bright colors
Wednesday, January 26: Hats off to kindness - Wear a hat to school 
Thursday, January 27:  Team Kindness: Wear your favorite sport gear or  school colors
 Friday, January 28:  Dream” of Kindness - pajama day (Because it has been a while since my students had a reward for their behavior, I think this would be a good time to do something fun, so with the fourth grade teachers, we have decided to do a board game and bring your special snack day for the afternoon)
Throughout the Kindness Challenge week of January 24 - 28 we will be collecting items for the Food Pantry, see the flyer here for more information.
Take a look at this week's slideshow and at our Kindness Door.
Have a great weekend!

as aThis week during Math students have been introduced to fractions, dividing strips of papers, paper pizzas and dollars into different pieces and amounts to share. 
Then, for the most part, we have been working on finishing up the informational pieces, and participating in a fun engineering project. During this STEM project, the students had to build a structure resembling a Holiday Tree, using gum drops and toothpicks. Let's say that the hardest part of the project was resisting the urge to eat the gumdrops :). 
On Wednesday the students brought in their Party in a Box boxes and voted for the most creative and the most colorful, and picked a number that corresponded to the number of the gift they would get. A lot of creativity and cheer was shared this day. We were also visited by the Nipmuc Jazz Band and Chorus that entertained us with a beautiful performance of  Christmas songs, and finally today, our fourth graders are getting the chance to be the ones on the "stage" (separated three feet apart in the gym floor) and perform for the rest of the school, one grade at a time.
Also this week we've had a special visitor, my Goddaughter Emma is studying in a boarding school in Woodstock, Connecticut, as an exchange students, and is spending the Christmas break with us. She is a sophomore there and her holiday break started this week already, so she has come with me to school to help out in the class. Needless to say that my students have flocked to her! She has been of great help this week and I am happy that my students have been able to speak in Spanish with her. Elba has also been able to return this week as well!
I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of you for being so kind, generous and supportive. I absolutely adore all the generous and thoughtful gifts I have received. Thank you so much, you are so kind! Take a look a this week's slideshow.
Have a great holiday break and enjoy some rest and relaxation. See you in 2022!