Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday!! I hope all of you are having a great day! WOW! May is here. The kids are gearing up for summer to be here and it shows. I keep stressing we still have about 3-4 weeks left to work really hard and get ready for 5th grade. Please be sure to stay on top of them about homework and projects
Language Arts- This week we are reading a story called The Fun They Had. It is a science fiction story about school in the year 2157 compared to school now. No books in the future. It is all digital. The book words run across your screen at the bottom like the news channels have at bottom of screen. They are discussing books and how funny it is that they are printed on paper and the words do not move. We have talked about capitalizing titles in movies, books, and newspaper articles. We worked on appropriate punctuation at the end of sentences and the 4 main kinds of sentences. I introduced Greek word parts therm and meter. Also Latin word parts aud and fac. Tomorrow is the end of the week and this is the last week of stories we are doing this year. We will be working on some writing activities until the end of the year and also a fun book. Make sure the kids study their vocabulary and spelling words for tomorrow!
Book Report - The kids have a book report due on Monday. Please be sure to help them finish up their books and get the project done. I have allowed some DEAR time here at school when I can that forces them to read here. Some of the students have worked on their summaries, vocab words, and top of the box here at school and I have printed it for them. Some have had me help with figuring our vocab words and finding pictures that might match their characters. I am willing to help in any way I can. Some are still struggling to get the book read. Please check on your student's progress.
Math - I think we are finally at the point of moving forward in our chapter. Division has been a struggle for this group. The funny thing is, they caught on to the other strategies and have hard a very hard time catching on to the process of the standard algorithm. Well, today we will finish up the last lesson in the chapter and it looks like Monday we will work on the chapter review, the test about Wednesday. There should be some major improvements from the pretest for sure. A lot of kids didn't have a clue what to do. Seeing the learning will be great! We will then move on into a chapter on Fractions. We may not get to take another test by the end of the year but we will work hard on learning what we can about fractions before they leave me. Hard to believe we are at the end!
Social Studies - We had a great discussion on Wednesday. We read a lesson about how the Civil War effected the Southeast. First we skimmed the surface on what the Civil War was fighting about, the we talked about the destruction to the South that happened. We also read a little bit about the reconstruction period. When it was and what happened during that time. then We ended talking about the Civil Rights Movement and Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rosa Parks. The kids asked GREAT questions and were very inquisitive about that time in history. We talked a lot about he confederate states and the flag. We talked about the flag being a symbol of history and a specific time in the United States, but I did talk about how that flag can be offensive to some people. Students were very in tune to this. I was really impressed with the discussion we had. We even spent extra time on Social Studies today because the participation and questioning was so wonderful. Tomorrow I plan to introduce the Midwest States.
Lap-a-thon - This event was held this morning! Everyone did a great job running! I was very impressed with how hard they worked! Pat on the back to all my great 4th graders!
I hope all of you have a wonderful weekend! My daughter at Iowa State comes home today. Summer has started for her. So weird thinking that her first year of college is done. It will be nice to have everyone in the same house again for a while!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, May 4, 2017
Thursday, April 27, 2017
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday!! I feel like this has been a short week also with our field trip mixed into the week. We are headed to the end of the road. Only like 23 days left of school. Lots of things start happening for your students. Thank goodness dance is over, but softball/baseball, soccer and other things begin to kick into high gear. Please remind your students school comes first. We still need to be getting our work done for school even though we are busy at night or it is just too nice to be inside. I feel I have given a lot of late slips out recently. We are almost done but not quite. I will be sad to see your kids go, I have have really enjoyed them this year!
Language Arts - This week we read a story called Owen & Mzee. It is a story about a very odd friendship. The friendship is between a very old Aldabra turtle and a baby hippopotamus. It is a very good story about rescue and adaptation. The Hippo is stranded alone after a Tsunami destroys his pod. They rescue him and take him to a shelter area and put him in with Mzee the turtle. They become fast friends. It is really a sweet story. We have worked on the suffixes -ly and -ed. We worked on comma rules in grammar. We looked at words in a series, city and state, date and year, and speaking directly to someone. These are good reminders because 4th graders struggle with most of these when writing. Tomorrow is test day! Be sure to study your spelling words and vocabulary words.
Math - We have been so busy working on BizTown Math that we walked away from division for a while. I reviewed division with them today and many have forgotten how to do it. Tomorrow I plan to reteach division to them and have them work on some more problems. They have 4-5 problems to do for homework today. Most are finished. We are near the end of our chapter so we will finish it and take a test. After this chapter we are going to go into fractions. We will discuss what fractions are and what they look like. A lot of them are all ready working on fractions in ST Math. Some of the activities they are doing in ST Math are very challenging. It is great to see them work with a group of kids who try to problem solve together to get their answers. I even find some of the levels very challenging.
Social Studies - We have finished our interactive notebook for the Southeast region and will begin work on the MIdwest states. We are going to start reading the really important facts about each region so we can move forward. I told the kids there wouldn't be any more tests over chapters but we would do tests over the maps to get them ready for the end of the year test. Next week we will take a test over just locating the Southeast states and listing the capitals with it. Again the next region will be the Midwest. We will learn important facts about this region and work on locating them on map. We will also continue to put the states in our interactive notebooks.
BizTown - We had a lot of fun on this field trip. Thank you for all the volunteers that went with us. Your child worked very hard all day and made comments about all the things they needed to accomplish is such a small amount of time. Our day is shorter than those kids in Des Moines because we have that hour drive time. We will work on trying to extend our day a little the next time we go. This year I worked in the bookstore. It was a lot of work because it was to have 4 employees and only had 2. We had a ton of stuff to do. It was great to only have St. Malachy students and not another school with us. I feel our kids benefited greatly from that. I tried to explain to the kids we were doing 8 hours of work on a 3 1/2 hours. We are very fortunate to have this activity. Such great life lessons here and we are covering financial literacy!
I hope all of you have a great weekend! I will be gone Monday afternoon. I am going to Dr. with one of my daughters to see about a cyst in her wrist. Hopefully they will just drain it right there in the office, otherwise we will be scheduling surgery. Pray for a simple fix!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Thursday!! I feel like this has been a short week also with our field trip mixed into the week. We are headed to the end of the road. Only like 23 days left of school. Lots of things start happening for your students. Thank goodness dance is over, but softball/baseball, soccer and other things begin to kick into high gear. Please remind your students school comes first. We still need to be getting our work done for school even though we are busy at night or it is just too nice to be inside. I feel I have given a lot of late slips out recently. We are almost done but not quite. I will be sad to see your kids go, I have have really enjoyed them this year!
Language Arts - This week we read a story called Owen & Mzee. It is a story about a very odd friendship. The friendship is between a very old Aldabra turtle and a baby hippopotamus. It is a very good story about rescue and adaptation. The Hippo is stranded alone after a Tsunami destroys his pod. They rescue him and take him to a shelter area and put him in with Mzee the turtle. They become fast friends. It is really a sweet story. We have worked on the suffixes -ly and -ed. We worked on comma rules in grammar. We looked at words in a series, city and state, date and year, and speaking directly to someone. These are good reminders because 4th graders struggle with most of these when writing. Tomorrow is test day! Be sure to study your spelling words and vocabulary words.
Math - We have been so busy working on BizTown Math that we walked away from division for a while. I reviewed division with them today and many have forgotten how to do it. Tomorrow I plan to reteach division to them and have them work on some more problems. They have 4-5 problems to do for homework today. Most are finished. We are near the end of our chapter so we will finish it and take a test. After this chapter we are going to go into fractions. We will discuss what fractions are and what they look like. A lot of them are all ready working on fractions in ST Math. Some of the activities they are doing in ST Math are very challenging. It is great to see them work with a group of kids who try to problem solve together to get their answers. I even find some of the levels very challenging.
Social Studies - We have finished our interactive notebook for the Southeast region and will begin work on the MIdwest states. We are going to start reading the really important facts about each region so we can move forward. I told the kids there wouldn't be any more tests over chapters but we would do tests over the maps to get them ready for the end of the year test. Next week we will take a test over just locating the Southeast states and listing the capitals with it. Again the next region will be the Midwest. We will learn important facts about this region and work on locating them on map. We will also continue to put the states in our interactive notebooks.
BizTown - We had a lot of fun on this field trip. Thank you for all the volunteers that went with us. Your child worked very hard all day and made comments about all the things they needed to accomplish is such a small amount of time. Our day is shorter than those kids in Des Moines because we have that hour drive time. We will work on trying to extend our day a little the next time we go. This year I worked in the bookstore. It was a lot of work because it was to have 4 employees and only had 2. We had a ton of stuff to do. It was great to only have St. Malachy students and not another school with us. I feel our kids benefited greatly from that. I tried to explain to the kids we were doing 8 hours of work on a 3 1/2 hours. We are very fortunate to have this activity. Such great life lessons here and we are covering financial literacy!
I hope all of you have a great weekend! I will be gone Monday afternoon. I am going to Dr. with one of my daughters to see about a cyst in her wrist. Hopefully they will just drain it right there in the office, otherwise we will be scheduling surgery. Pray for a simple fix!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, April 13, 2017
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday! Today is to be a beautiful day!! I am so happy it is nice. We have our Sedar Meal at noon then our Cross Walk this afternoon. I am so glad it will be nice for our walk to the church. It is a great Holy Thursday celebration for St. Malachy today!
Language Arts - We did not do a story this week. There were only 3 full days we could have covered a story then would have had to finish it next Thursday and Friday. I didn't feel we could do the story justice by doing it that way. We filled the time with other activities. One day we played Spill and Spell as a class to practice our spelling and have a little friendly competition. One day they wrote letters to Editor or a story about something from school to put into the magazine at BizTown. I also had them type them onto google docs. They also had a new book report assigned to them that will be due in May.
Math-We have spent the week working on the standard algorithm or regrouping strategy for Division. This one always takes me a while because it has so many steps to the process. Even though I put the process of steps on the board and teach them a little chant, they still lose track of where they are in the process and what to do next. The more we practice this the better they will get. Next week we will work more on this strategy. Any practice at home they can do would be great. Ask them to show you the chant we have.
Social Studies- They are completing chapter 6 today by taking a test. We will be moving quickly through the other regions due to running out of time. The year is dwindling down quickly. I will pick items in chapter 7 to cover that I fell need to be and we will work on capitols. Then we will go to Midwest and so on. Projects will be coming due in about a week so please check with your children on how they are doing with that.
Biz Town- This week they received their job assignments. Mrs. Surma and I spent a few hours on Sunday night going over their interviews. We decided that we needed to take into account our knowledge of each child's interests and capabilities when choosing their jobs. There we jobs that the no one had applied for, so some may not have gotten a job that was one of their choices. I feel they handled the new well. I am sure that day they will have so much fun they will forget that they are doing a job they didn't want to do. This week they got together with the people they are going to be working with and had to create a name for their business. They also had to write up ads to be done for the magazine and radio in Biz Town. The CEO/CFOs had to fill out forms for the bank. They will also be writing some short articles that will be included in the Biz Town magazine!
When we go, they will need a sack lunch and drink. They will also need to wear mass day attire. They are going to work!
Clean-Up Day- The school will be cleaning up our school property on Friday, April 21. We are asking your kids to bring a rake to school that day if they have one! Make sure your family name is on it somewhere. If they have work gloves, they can bring those too. We will be raking along the fence and by Father Halbur's house.
Iowa Assessment scores are going home today. Please look in your child's folder for their results.
I hope everyone enjoys their nice Easter Break. I am looking forward to the teacher's trip to St. Louis! I hope to learn some new things to bring back with me to try in my room!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Thursday! Today is to be a beautiful day!! I am so happy it is nice. We have our Sedar Meal at noon then our Cross Walk this afternoon. I am so glad it will be nice for our walk to the church. It is a great Holy Thursday celebration for St. Malachy today!
Language Arts - We did not do a story this week. There were only 3 full days we could have covered a story then would have had to finish it next Thursday and Friday. I didn't feel we could do the story justice by doing it that way. We filled the time with other activities. One day we played Spill and Spell as a class to practice our spelling and have a little friendly competition. One day they wrote letters to Editor or a story about something from school to put into the magazine at BizTown. I also had them type them onto google docs. They also had a new book report assigned to them that will be due in May.
Math-We have spent the week working on the standard algorithm or regrouping strategy for Division. This one always takes me a while because it has so many steps to the process. Even though I put the process of steps on the board and teach them a little chant, they still lose track of where they are in the process and what to do next. The more we practice this the better they will get. Next week we will work more on this strategy. Any practice at home they can do would be great. Ask them to show you the chant we have.
Social Studies- They are completing chapter 6 today by taking a test. We will be moving quickly through the other regions due to running out of time. The year is dwindling down quickly. I will pick items in chapter 7 to cover that I fell need to be and we will work on capitols. Then we will go to Midwest and so on. Projects will be coming due in about a week so please check with your children on how they are doing with that.
Biz Town- This week they received their job assignments. Mrs. Surma and I spent a few hours on Sunday night going over their interviews. We decided that we needed to take into account our knowledge of each child's interests and capabilities when choosing their jobs. There we jobs that the no one had applied for, so some may not have gotten a job that was one of their choices. I feel they handled the new well. I am sure that day they will have so much fun they will forget that they are doing a job they didn't want to do. This week they got together with the people they are going to be working with and had to create a name for their business. They also had to write up ads to be done for the magazine and radio in Biz Town. The CEO/CFOs had to fill out forms for the bank. They will also be writing some short articles that will be included in the Biz Town magazine!
When we go, they will need a sack lunch and drink. They will also need to wear mass day attire. They are going to work!
Clean-Up Day- The school will be cleaning up our school property on Friday, April 21. We are asking your kids to bring a rake to school that day if they have one! Make sure your family name is on it somewhere. If they have work gloves, they can bring those too. We will be raking along the fence and by Father Halbur's house.
Iowa Assessment scores are going home today. Please look in your child's folder for their results.
I hope everyone enjoys their nice Easter Break. I am looking forward to the teacher's trip to St. Louis! I hope to learn some new things to bring back with me to try in my room!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, April 6, 2017
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday!! This has sure been a short week for me! Monday was a day of professional development for the teachers. They spent the morning doing volunteer work at the Food Pantry. They cleaned all shelving and mopped floors! In the afternoon they were working on teacher things as a group! I missed this day due to my Grandma's funeral. It was 10:30 in the morning. The afternoon was spent with family. Wednesday I was at a technology conference in Des Moines. I attended 4 different sessions. I walked away with some great things to begin to look at for the classroom. Some can happen right now, others need to be further investigated before we try to implement them. So I will have taught 3 days this week which makes it feel really short! I will say I was told by the students they had a good day Wednesday but they miss me when I am not here. That made me smile and feel pretty special. Thanks again for sharing your wonderful children with me!
Language Arts - This week we read a story called The Ever-Living Tree. It is informational text on the California Redwoods. It is a story that shows us the longevity of the trees. They connect the life of the tree to events taking place all over the world. Here are examples from the book of all the things that took place while this one Redwood was growing: Alexander the Great, Great Wall of China being built, Augustus Ceasar, Kingdoms in Africa, Marco Polo, Christopher Columbus, Mayflower and the Pilgrims, Revolutionary War, building of railroad, and men walking on the moon. That covers hundreds of years!! This is an interesting story but I am not sure the kids are as interested in it as I am. In Grammar we were reviewing ending punctuation and capitalization. We also talked about prefixes; pre-. inter-, and ex. Tomorrow is our end of the week test. Be sure your student is studying their spelling words and vocabulary words that are found in their notebooks this week.
Math- We have learned and expanded on repeated subtraction and partial quotient. Next week we will finish the division chapter by learning the regrouping strategy which is the standard algorithm that you and I learned in school. That is the last strategy to learn in this chapter. Most students have all ready seen this strategy when working on ST Math. This has been a great help when teaching it to the kids because they begin to really see what they have been doing in ST Math. It also makes it to where my part in the teaching doesn't take quite as long with them because they are familiar with it all ready.
Social Studies - We will be finishing up chapter 6 next week and testing next Thursday. This is our first chapter over the Southeast states. I will give them maps tomorrow to start practicing the Southeast Region. They will need to label the map with these states. Tomorrow morning during Social Studies we will be do an activity where the students run through a quick practice interview with partners. This will get them ready for their job interviews tomorrow afternoon.
Biz Town - We have filled out job applications and picked 3 jobs they want to apply for. The job interviews will take place Friday afternoon. We have asked a couple of parents from 4th and 5th grade to help us out. We asked parents who weren't attending Biz Town. We are also going to have the the 4th grade parents interview the 5th graders, and the 4th graders will be interviewed by the 5th grade parents. We are just trying to make it more realistic for the kids. There is a good chance they won't know their future employer so we wanted to keep it as close to real as possible. Ms. Surma and I will make final job decisions and let the kids know some time next week.
Dollars for Scholars Essay - Your children have written an essay called "What Education Means to Me". This essay is for a contest put on by the Dollars for Scholars group. The students put their students ID numbers on the essays and I have passed them around to three teachers in this building. Those teachers were to read the essays and choose their top 3 choices to be sent on to the main competition. They have no idea who wrote what paper since we used student ID numbers. The top three essays will be sent on to the committee to be judged and a top essay chosen. The person who wins receives a $50 savings bond. One person in this room will win! The top three essays chosen by teachers are...Josephine Bolinger, Taylor Smith, and Sasha Wurster. Congratulations Girls!!! We will find out the winner in the middle of May.
I hope everyone has a great weekend!! Get out and enjoy the sun! Seems like we have forgotten what that was like!!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Thursday!! This has sure been a short week for me! Monday was a day of professional development for the teachers. They spent the morning doing volunteer work at the Food Pantry. They cleaned all shelving and mopped floors! In the afternoon they were working on teacher things as a group! I missed this day due to my Grandma's funeral. It was 10:30 in the morning. The afternoon was spent with family. Wednesday I was at a technology conference in Des Moines. I attended 4 different sessions. I walked away with some great things to begin to look at for the classroom. Some can happen right now, others need to be further investigated before we try to implement them. So I will have taught 3 days this week which makes it feel really short! I will say I was told by the students they had a good day Wednesday but they miss me when I am not here. That made me smile and feel pretty special. Thanks again for sharing your wonderful children with me!
Language Arts - This week we read a story called The Ever-Living Tree. It is informational text on the California Redwoods. It is a story that shows us the longevity of the trees. They connect the life of the tree to events taking place all over the world. Here are examples from the book of all the things that took place while this one Redwood was growing: Alexander the Great, Great Wall of China being built, Augustus Ceasar, Kingdoms in Africa, Marco Polo, Christopher Columbus, Mayflower and the Pilgrims, Revolutionary War, building of railroad, and men walking on the moon. That covers hundreds of years!! This is an interesting story but I am not sure the kids are as interested in it as I am. In Grammar we were reviewing ending punctuation and capitalization. We also talked about prefixes; pre-. inter-, and ex. Tomorrow is our end of the week test. Be sure your student is studying their spelling words and vocabulary words that are found in their notebooks this week.
Math- We have learned and expanded on repeated subtraction and partial quotient. Next week we will finish the division chapter by learning the regrouping strategy which is the standard algorithm that you and I learned in school. That is the last strategy to learn in this chapter. Most students have all ready seen this strategy when working on ST Math. This has been a great help when teaching it to the kids because they begin to really see what they have been doing in ST Math. It also makes it to where my part in the teaching doesn't take quite as long with them because they are familiar with it all ready.
Social Studies - We will be finishing up chapter 6 next week and testing next Thursday. This is our first chapter over the Southeast states. I will give them maps tomorrow to start practicing the Southeast Region. They will need to label the map with these states. Tomorrow morning during Social Studies we will be do an activity where the students run through a quick practice interview with partners. This will get them ready for their job interviews tomorrow afternoon.
Biz Town - We have filled out job applications and picked 3 jobs they want to apply for. The job interviews will take place Friday afternoon. We have asked a couple of parents from 4th and 5th grade to help us out. We asked parents who weren't attending Biz Town. We are also going to have the the 4th grade parents interview the 5th graders, and the 4th graders will be interviewed by the 5th grade parents. We are just trying to make it more realistic for the kids. There is a good chance they won't know their future employer so we wanted to keep it as close to real as possible. Ms. Surma and I will make final job decisions and let the kids know some time next week.
Dollars for Scholars Essay - Your children have written an essay called "What Education Means to Me". This essay is for a contest put on by the Dollars for Scholars group. The students put their students ID numbers on the essays and I have passed them around to three teachers in this building. Those teachers were to read the essays and choose their top 3 choices to be sent on to the main competition. They have no idea who wrote what paper since we used student ID numbers. The top three essays will be sent on to the committee to be judged and a top essay chosen. The person who wins receives a $50 savings bond. One person in this room will win! The top three essays chosen by teachers are...Josephine Bolinger, Taylor Smith, and Sasha Wurster. Congratulations Girls!!! We will find out the winner in the middle of May.
I hope everyone has a great weekend!! Get out and enjoy the sun! Seems like we have forgotten what that was like!!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, March 30, 2017
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday!! I hope everyone had a very enjoyable Spring Break! I know my family sure did. We went to Dallas, Texas to stay with my cousin and her family. We had a great time. The weather was 80-90 each day. We enjoyed relaxing by the pool and reading books, shopping, playing with virtual reality, and eating different places Iowa does not offer. We went to a fondue restaurant which was quite an experience.
The students all seemed to come back tan and relaxed from their break. The first few days were great!! They were glad to be hear and were quiet and paid attention. They are still doing a great job, just a little more chatty than the first two days. We have put in some good work time this week and will continue until the end of the year. We have a lot to accomplish before 5th grade!
Language Arts - This week we read a story called I Could Do That! This is a biography about Esther Morris. She was a women who believed women should have the right to vote. She was the person who made it happen in the state of Wyoming. Wyoming was the first state to give women the right to vote. This happened about 51 years before women were granted the right to vote by the U. S. Government. We even looked her up on the computer and learned more information about her. We have talked about contractions and negative words this week in grammar. We learned to not use two negative words in the same sentence. We talked about ways to change sentences with 2 negatives to make it correct. We also read a small story on the constitution. I reminded us that the government was made up of 2 branches and that citizens have rights and responsibilities. I love this story and I may have triggered an idea for some of the girls in the room, who seemed interested in Esther. Next year they will need to read a biography book and do a report. This is a person they may want to find a book about.
Math - This week we completed our mid-chapter review. We also started the job readiness section for BizTown and will soon be applying for jobs. Today we will begin the next lesson in the chapter which is on using repeated subtraction and multiples to find quotients. We will probably spend a couple days on this lesson. The last half of this chapter will get a little heavy and I want to be sure they are understanding the content before I move forward. Please remember, if you are struggling with helping your student at home, I am available in the mornings before school to help them. This will also keep them from getting any late slips because they didn't understand what they were doing.
Social Studies- We are in the 2nd lesson of chapter 6 on the Southeast states. We talked about the climate of Florida, we talked about the Florida Keys, and we talked about Hurricanes a little bit. The students have their assignment dates for their projects. They have about 4-6 weeks to work on them. Some students have brought in their poste rboard for me to trace their state on. That is only if they are doing a poster or a person. We will be doing BizTown activities on Fridays during Social studies. With our days off in April this field trip will come upon us pretty quickly.
BizTown - We have been working on BizTown, we are working on the Job Readiness section. We talked about interests the students have and skills they need to have. I talked a lot about me and how I came to be a teacher. I talked about all my interests and the skills I need to do my job. We talked about jobs being "people jobs', "ideas jobs", "things jobs", and "data jobs. People jobs are jobs that have you working with people, idea jobs involve coming up with new ideas or thinking about solutions to complex problems, thing jobs are poeple who like to work with things such as machines or tools. They enjoy making, fixing or building things, and working outdoors. The data job involves working with numbers and information. People who like solving math problems and working on gathering information are good at these jobs. The students will be introduced to the jobs available at BizTown. They will choose their top 3 choices of jobs when filling out the application. Students will then be put through an interview process. There will be a panel of people making the decision on who gets what jobs. The kids are very excited for this process.
April 3rd - Just a reminder that there is NO school on Monday, April 3rd. It is an inservice day for the teachers.
As most of you have probably all ready heard, I lost my last grandparent on Monday evening. Grandma was 94 and lived a good full long life. she has been without my grandpa for over 30 years. It was time for our to join him. I had family away so funeral arrangements will be made today. I will most likely be attending a funeral Monday instead of professional development. Worse case scenario is I would be gone Tuesday for the funeral instead. I will know for sure tonight.
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Thursday!! I hope everyone had a very enjoyable Spring Break! I know my family sure did. We went to Dallas, Texas to stay with my cousin and her family. We had a great time. The weather was 80-90 each day. We enjoyed relaxing by the pool and reading books, shopping, playing with virtual reality, and eating different places Iowa does not offer. We went to a fondue restaurant which was quite an experience.
The students all seemed to come back tan and relaxed from their break. The first few days were great!! They were glad to be hear and were quiet and paid attention. They are still doing a great job, just a little more chatty than the first two days. We have put in some good work time this week and will continue until the end of the year. We have a lot to accomplish before 5th grade!
Language Arts - This week we read a story called I Could Do That! This is a biography about Esther Morris. She was a women who believed women should have the right to vote. She was the person who made it happen in the state of Wyoming. Wyoming was the first state to give women the right to vote. This happened about 51 years before women were granted the right to vote by the U. S. Government. We even looked her up on the computer and learned more information about her. We have talked about contractions and negative words this week in grammar. We learned to not use two negative words in the same sentence. We talked about ways to change sentences with 2 negatives to make it correct. We also read a small story on the constitution. I reminded us that the government was made up of 2 branches and that citizens have rights and responsibilities. I love this story and I may have triggered an idea for some of the girls in the room, who seemed interested in Esther. Next year they will need to read a biography book and do a report. This is a person they may want to find a book about.
Math - This week we completed our mid-chapter review. We also started the job readiness section for BizTown and will soon be applying for jobs. Today we will begin the next lesson in the chapter which is on using repeated subtraction and multiples to find quotients. We will probably spend a couple days on this lesson. The last half of this chapter will get a little heavy and I want to be sure they are understanding the content before I move forward. Please remember, if you are struggling with helping your student at home, I am available in the mornings before school to help them. This will also keep them from getting any late slips because they didn't understand what they were doing.
Social Studies- We are in the 2nd lesson of chapter 6 on the Southeast states. We talked about the climate of Florida, we talked about the Florida Keys, and we talked about Hurricanes a little bit. The students have their assignment dates for their projects. They have about 4-6 weeks to work on them. Some students have brought in their poste rboard for me to trace their state on. That is only if they are doing a poster or a person. We will be doing BizTown activities on Fridays during Social studies. With our days off in April this field trip will come upon us pretty quickly.
BizTown - We have been working on BizTown, we are working on the Job Readiness section. We talked about interests the students have and skills they need to have. I talked a lot about me and how I came to be a teacher. I talked about all my interests and the skills I need to do my job. We talked about jobs being "people jobs', "ideas jobs", "things jobs", and "data jobs. People jobs are jobs that have you working with people, idea jobs involve coming up with new ideas or thinking about solutions to complex problems, thing jobs are poeple who like to work with things such as machines or tools. They enjoy making, fixing or building things, and working outdoors. The data job involves working with numbers and information. People who like solving math problems and working on gathering information are good at these jobs. The students will be introduced to the jobs available at BizTown. They will choose their top 3 choices of jobs when filling out the application. Students will then be put through an interview process. There will be a panel of people making the decision on who gets what jobs. The kids are very excited for this process.
April 3rd - Just a reminder that there is NO school on Monday, April 3rd. It is an inservice day for the teachers.
As most of you have probably all ready heard, I lost my last grandparent on Monday evening. Grandma was 94 and lived a good full long life. she has been without my grandpa for over 30 years. It was time for our to join him. I had family away so funeral arrangements will be made today. I will most likely be attending a funeral Monday instead of professional development. Worse case scenario is I would be gone Tuesday for the funeral instead. I will know for sure tonight.
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, March 9, 2017
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday!! I am not sure I have much to share this week. It has been a big week of testing! Iowa Assessments are under our belts!! Tomorrow we will be completing one more thing for the Iowa Assessments and then taking a CRS test. Please see below for that. I can't wait to get scores back and see their growth from last year.
Language Arts - We have spent our language arts time on Iowa Assessment this week. Wednesday we didn't do any testing so we started writing our Dollars for Scholars Essay. This is an essay contest put on by the Dollars for Scholars group here in Creston. The students are writing an essay called "What Education Means to Me". This essay will be written solely at school. The essay is due tomorrow. I will help them to edit their essays by checking spelling only. I will not change their words. This essay should be based on their thoughts, no matter how they put them down on paper. After we have edited them we will then learn how to use Googledocs. The students will type their essay in and share it with me so I can print it out. The student names will not be on the essays and they are then give to 3 teacher in the building to pick their favorite three. When the top three have been chosen, those 3 will go on to the Dollars For Scholars group where they will judge them and pick a#1 essay. One person in this room is guaranteed a $50.00 savings bond. This is so exciting!!
Math - This week we have been doing math this week. We have done ST Math and BizTown math. This week in BizTown we have learned about banks and what they have to offer, we are learning to write deposit slips, and checks and keep track of them in a check register. Some are really struggling with their registers! We practiced writing checks and filling out a check register today. We have also talked about "bad" checks or bouncing a check. They are having fun learning adult things but have a hard time wanting to listen. We do some game playing with BizTown and when we do a lot of them don't want to calm down to come back to the lesson. I have warned them that I would stop playing the games if they couldn't come back to the lesson. I hope they figure out that I am serious.
Social Studies - We have not done much of this subject this week. We have been testing so much. We have finished a lesson and done a worksheet on it. I have assigned another state to be put into their notebooks. We will be sure it gets glued into our notebooks. Next week we will definitely choose our next state project. We may get to it on Friday but if not for sure on Monday or Tuesday.
CRS Testing - This is called the Constructed Response Supplement Test. It is a reading test and is used as our 2nd assessment for reading. The students will be reading a non fiction story and answering 8 questions. They can go back and find the answers in the text of the story. We will be taking this test also.
REMINDER!! WE WILL BE IN SCHOOL TOMORROW!! The public school is not having school so there are no buses running. Please be sure you have made arrangements.
Conferences! Also please remember conferences are next Thursday. I have just have one or two that have not signed up. Please be sure to get that done. Thank you!
I hope you all have a great weekend! SNOW!! UGH!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Thursday!! I am not sure I have much to share this week. It has been a big week of testing! Iowa Assessments are under our belts!! Tomorrow we will be completing one more thing for the Iowa Assessments and then taking a CRS test. Please see below for that. I can't wait to get scores back and see their growth from last year.
Language Arts - We have spent our language arts time on Iowa Assessment this week. Wednesday we didn't do any testing so we started writing our Dollars for Scholars Essay. This is an essay contest put on by the Dollars for Scholars group here in Creston. The students are writing an essay called "What Education Means to Me". This essay will be written solely at school. The essay is due tomorrow. I will help them to edit their essays by checking spelling only. I will not change their words. This essay should be based on their thoughts, no matter how they put them down on paper. After we have edited them we will then learn how to use Googledocs. The students will type their essay in and share it with me so I can print it out. The student names will not be on the essays and they are then give to 3 teacher in the building to pick their favorite three. When the top three have been chosen, those 3 will go on to the Dollars For Scholars group where they will judge them and pick a#1 essay. One person in this room is guaranteed a $50.00 savings bond. This is so exciting!!
Math - This week we have been doing math this week. We have done ST Math and BizTown math. This week in BizTown we have learned about banks and what they have to offer, we are learning to write deposit slips, and checks and keep track of them in a check register. Some are really struggling with their registers! We practiced writing checks and filling out a check register today. We have also talked about "bad" checks or bouncing a check. They are having fun learning adult things but have a hard time wanting to listen. We do some game playing with BizTown and when we do a lot of them don't want to calm down to come back to the lesson. I have warned them that I would stop playing the games if they couldn't come back to the lesson. I hope they figure out that I am serious.
Social Studies - We have not done much of this subject this week. We have been testing so much. We have finished a lesson and done a worksheet on it. I have assigned another state to be put into their notebooks. We will be sure it gets glued into our notebooks. Next week we will definitely choose our next state project. We may get to it on Friday but if not for sure on Monday or Tuesday.
CRS Testing - This is called the Constructed Response Supplement Test. It is a reading test and is used as our 2nd assessment for reading. The students will be reading a non fiction story and answering 8 questions. They can go back and find the answers in the text of the story. We will be taking this test also.
REMINDER!! WE WILL BE IN SCHOOL TOMORROW!! The public school is not having school so there are no buses running. Please be sure you have made arrangements.
Conferences! Also please remember conferences are next Thursday. I have just have one or two that have not signed up. Please be sure to get that done. Thank you!
I hope you all have a great weekend! SNOW!! UGH!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, March 2, 2017
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday!! The weekend is here and it is the St. Malachy Gala and Auction!!! Such a fun time of year! I really enjoy our auction. We have some great items to put up for auction this year!! I hope all of you are planning to attend. Tickets are $35 per person and can be purchased in the school office if you haven't all ready picked yours up! I hope to see all of you there!
March 10th - This is next Friday and is a day that the public school doesn't have school but we do! So therefore, you must get your child to school and from school that day, due to no buses!
Shorts- Yes, according to the dress code shorts are allowed in March but I would hope that you would not let your child wear them on cold days. We go outside for recess and will still do so even if it is cold and kids are wearing shorts. That 20 minutes will be very long if they are freezing cause they are in shorts. I told the kids I was very proud of them for not wearing shorts today. It was too cold. They all thought it was nuts to wear them today. I am glad to know they will be smart about it. Just because we can doesn't mean we should.
Language Arts - This week we did not read a story, we were taking the Unit 4 Assessment. You will receive results from week 20 and the Unit assessment next week. This week we have completed the unit test, made donuts for the entire school, and shared book reports that were due on Wednesday. It has been a busy week for Language Arts.
Math - We are all ready up to lesson 5 in division. We have been focusing on estimating quotients. We started by using a multiplication table to do the work, then moved away from using that to using compatible numbers. We also investigated remainders. We used several different counters to help us play around with division and see remainders. This activity has them visually seeing division and the remainders they may have. It was fun because they "played" with items and they learn because they see it in action. In the 2nd half of the chapter we will begin to use the different strategies for division.
Social Studies - We finished the unit on the Northeast Region. We are now moving onto the Southeast Region. If your child struggled with labeling the northeast states and naming the capitals, they need to continue to practice because we are moving on to the next region. They will now need to work on studying this region. Now that we have more of a routine on the Interactive notebooks we will move quickly through this chapter. We need to or we won't get all the regions covered.
JA BizTown - The 4th and 5th graders will be attending JA BizTown as their field trip this year. We will be going on Tuesday, April 25th. This is a great experience for your kiddos. It is fun day but a huge learning experience. Here is a little overview about it:
Junior Achievement USA empowers young people to own their economic success. Since its founding in 1919, JA has contributed to the business and economic education of more that 100 million young people in the United States and throughout the world.
JA's programs span the K-12 educational spectrum. The programs help students assess their personal skills, interests, and values; understand the economic benefits of education; explore career options; learn job-hunting skills; respect and understand business ethics; and practice personal and business financial management. Junior Achievement's Capstone Programs introduce studnts to the principal characteristics of a market economy and the roles that consumers and producers play in the free enterprise system.
Junior Achievement used hands-on experiences to help young people understand the economics of life. IN partnership with educators and business, JA brings the real world to students, opening their minds to their potential.
This is a great day for the kids to experience. I will be preparing them for their big day. We will do some financial literacy during math and some items about philanthropy during social studies. They will learn how to get paid, how to use a check book and write a check, and why taxes are removed from their checks. They will have to apply for jobs and interview. They will be given a job they must fulfill that day. The kids actually run the town. We have adults that will be working in each business to help guide the kids if needed. Ms. Surma and I have all the volunteers we need for that day all ready.
I wanted to let you know a little bit about BizTown before I get started teaching it to the students. I hope to see all of you at the Gala and Auction this weekend. Enjoy the weather!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Thursday!! The weekend is here and it is the St. Malachy Gala and Auction!!! Such a fun time of year! I really enjoy our auction. We have some great items to put up for auction this year!! I hope all of you are planning to attend. Tickets are $35 per person and can be purchased in the school office if you haven't all ready picked yours up! I hope to see all of you there!
March 10th - This is next Friday and is a day that the public school doesn't have school but we do! So therefore, you must get your child to school and from school that day, due to no buses!
Shorts- Yes, according to the dress code shorts are allowed in March but I would hope that you would not let your child wear them on cold days. We go outside for recess and will still do so even if it is cold and kids are wearing shorts. That 20 minutes will be very long if they are freezing cause they are in shorts. I told the kids I was very proud of them for not wearing shorts today. It was too cold. They all thought it was nuts to wear them today. I am glad to know they will be smart about it. Just because we can doesn't mean we should.
Language Arts - This week we did not read a story, we were taking the Unit 4 Assessment. You will receive results from week 20 and the Unit assessment next week. This week we have completed the unit test, made donuts for the entire school, and shared book reports that were due on Wednesday. It has been a busy week for Language Arts.
Math - We are all ready up to lesson 5 in division. We have been focusing on estimating quotients. We started by using a multiplication table to do the work, then moved away from using that to using compatible numbers. We also investigated remainders. We used several different counters to help us play around with division and see remainders. This activity has them visually seeing division and the remainders they may have. It was fun because they "played" with items and they learn because they see it in action. In the 2nd half of the chapter we will begin to use the different strategies for division.
Social Studies - We finished the unit on the Northeast Region. We are now moving onto the Southeast Region. If your child struggled with labeling the northeast states and naming the capitals, they need to continue to practice because we are moving on to the next region. They will now need to work on studying this region. Now that we have more of a routine on the Interactive notebooks we will move quickly through this chapter. We need to or we won't get all the regions covered.
JA BizTown - The 4th and 5th graders will be attending JA BizTown as their field trip this year. We will be going on Tuesday, April 25th. This is a great experience for your kiddos. It is fun day but a huge learning experience. Here is a little overview about it:
Junior Achievement USA empowers young people to own their economic success. Since its founding in 1919, JA has contributed to the business and economic education of more that 100 million young people in the United States and throughout the world.
JA's programs span the K-12 educational spectrum. The programs help students assess their personal skills, interests, and values; understand the economic benefits of education; explore career options; learn job-hunting skills; respect and understand business ethics; and practice personal and business financial management. Junior Achievement's Capstone Programs introduce studnts to the principal characteristics of a market economy and the roles that consumers and producers play in the free enterprise system.
Junior Achievement used hands-on experiences to help young people understand the economics of life. IN partnership with educators and business, JA brings the real world to students, opening their minds to their potential.
This is a great day for the kids to experience. I will be preparing them for their big day. We will do some financial literacy during math and some items about philanthropy during social studies. They will learn how to get paid, how to use a check book and write a check, and why taxes are removed from their checks. They will have to apply for jobs and interview. They will be given a job they must fulfill that day. The kids actually run the town. We have adults that will be working in each business to help guide the kids if needed. Ms. Surma and I have all the volunteers we need for that day all ready.
I wanted to let you know a little bit about BizTown before I get started teaching it to the students. I hope to see all of you at the Gala and Auction this weekend. Enjoy the weather!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
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