High Ability Update

We did not have first grade language arts this week.

Time for a check-up! We're at a checkpoint in our HA math curriculum, so students completed their check-ups. One might call them tests/assessments. We will be moving on to congruency soon.

Homework due Monday: Read Chapters 14 & 15. We read part of chapter 14 in class, so they actually need to start reading on page 108 and read through chapter 15.

Our main character is evolving, so we discussed the changing character traits. Changing character traits are new to the students, so we really stop & analyze that in this novel study. I love watching their concentration faces as they contemplate the character. The setting of this story changes too. Our main character finds himself with problems and no solutions. For example, he lied helpless on the ocean floor and again in the garbage dump. We have characters entering and leaving the story. Our recent reading had a minor character that is unimportant to the story. The students find it fascinating that in a story where other character introductions are pivotal, there was a new character that wasn't crucial to the story. We updated our timeline in our binders. I'd say reading about Edward's miraculous journey is a miraculous journey for us:)

We did more contextual addition and subtraction problems that require students to interpret each problem, make an organized list, and use algebraic thinking to figure out the answer. Most of the students did very well at this. We had a couple students that felt some of the steps were unnecessary, skipped steps, and then became frustrated they could not arrive at the correct answers. Some students are still realizing the work in here requires perseverance. I am a stickler for following directions. The math we did this week required attention to detail and directions. The numbers themselves were small and manageable, but making sure the answers fit in the perimeters of the problems was not easy. We strain our brains in here. We need to work on having the grit to work through math problems that are hard. As always, I encourage students to ask questions when they do not understand something.

After discussing the defining aspects of fairy tale with more detail than last week, I began reading another fairy tale to the class that was previously unknown to them. As instructed, the students were pointing out fairy tale characteristics while I read Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. It's great they are getting comfortable with this, because we will soon be starting our fairy tale projects:)

We did not have third grade math this week.

We continued working on our Miss Moneybags mystery. We worked with a handful of clues to figure out the beneficiaries' inheritances from the first will and arrival times to the mansion. The students are engaged and eager to solve the mystery. This will continue next week.

I passed back the students' graded check-ups. We discussed every question and answer. The students took their check-ups home. With the little time we had left, we worked on long division.

Email: kapeterson@duneland.k12.in.us
Location: Jackson Elementary School, North 400 East, Valparaiso, IN, USA
Phone: 219-983-3680