Week of December 6th, 2021

This week during Math we have been taking a look at the variety of multiplication strategies that we have learned so far, and we have introduced division with remainders. We read the book "A Remainder of One" buy Elinor J. Pinczes that illustrates the fact that a little soldier bug is always left out when his squadron of 25 makes formations of 2, 3 and 4 lines, until finally he comes to the realization that making 5 rows of 5 is the perfect formation that makes the organized and tidy queen really happy. The students created the different formations with 25 tiles before I could reveal that there was always a remainder of one, so it was a fantastic introduction of the concept of division with remainders. On the days after we worked on division problems with remainders and what to do with those remainders, as sometimes they could be split even further if we were talking about dollar amounts, slices of pizza, and other times we needed to provide extra containers for those remainders, like extra cars for children going to a swimming competition, or extra pages for trading cards.
During Reading Workshops to conclude the lessons learned about informational reading, the students are completing a book report on one informational book of their choice, that the will also have to either present to the whole class in person, or create a video of that presentation just for me if presenting in front of the class sounds intimidating to them. The written book report covers questions about the different characteristics of informational text.
During Writing Workshop I've had a chance to finalize a first full round of student/teacher interviews to help with the edition of my students' informational pieces that are coming along very nicely. Students have also worked on adding an introduction and editing punctuation and spelling.
And during Social Studies, students have worked on finalizing their physical and political maps of America that will be soon ready for display.
Finally on Thursday we went to collaborate and mentor Kindergarteners in Sra. Ibañez's class to help them create chains with patterns of two color beads to count by twos and fives. Not surprisingly, this collaboration is becoming a favorite for both grades. Mrs. Gallagher paid us a visit and was really impressed with the quality of mentorship of my students. 
Take a look at this week's slideshow.