Fritz the Dog

We are finishing our year in language arts with an author's study of Chris Van Allsburg! Chris Van Allsburg is famous for such titles as Jumanji and The Polar Express, which have both been made into notable movies. He is known for "leaking his stories onto the pages" both through the words and his world famous illustrations, making inferences a key part of understanding his stories. We are finishing our study of The Wretched Stone and it is completely playing with our imaginations! We have created a classroom tree and are about to create a classroom book based on the book The Mysteries of Harris Burdick. We are having a blast and loving the imaginative stories!

One of the parts we've enjoyed the most about our study is finding "Fritz the Dog" in every single story Chris Van Allsburg writes. Some are especially tricky to find! If anyone has a dog who looks like "Fritz the Dog" (or just has a dog of any kind) above and would like to help our class with a TOP SECRET adventure, contact me right away! It would include the dog coming to school during an afternoon!

MCA roundup week #1

Great job 5th grade! Reading MCA IIIs have just finished and all of your hard work paid off! I saw students using our "Secret Strategy," looking for evidence to support your answers, reading each passage twice, and double checking your answers carefully. I am proud of you and hope that you get to see that you passed the goal of a higher test score this year!

Next week and the week following, we will have two days of computer-based math MCA IIIs on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Remember to bring a calculator, head phones (many students are still without headphones-needed for the computer-based test! Please bring by TOMORROW!), and #2 pencils (not mechanical pencils). Get plenty of rest, a healthy breakfast and lunch.

Parents, we test at 1:45 in the afternoon, so next week would not be an ideal time to schedule picking your child up early for any reason!

Hoppy Spring Break!

I hope you all enjoy the *brief* break in the action. I will be gone next week through Wednesday, so if you call my room and cannot get ahold of me, that is why. We have a terrific guest teacher during this time-a well-seasoned veteran! And they will be making an adorable motivational bulletin board for our upcoming MCA tests! We've been working so hard to prepare for testing that we'll give ourselves a little pep talk!

I will not post this week's grades until next week so more students can turn in their late work :) They know who they are as I already wrote their names on the board. Enjoy extra time spent with your family! I'm so thankful for each of your children in our class and am already beginning to miss them as I think of next year! Agh! This is all going too quickly!