Dear Parents,

     Happy Thursday!  This will be a short blog this week.  I have been at home all week.  I was just being precautionary with cold symptoms.  Come to find out I am positive for COVID.  I don't have many symptoms but losing taste and smell are the big ones and I have lost those.  My return date would be November 25th. So I will back in the classroom after Thanksgiving.  I have been teaching some classes from home which has been fun.  I feel like I am still there and a part of class if I can do that.  Today I bowed out of Language arts due to getting my test results and having to talk to public health.  This is all so very crazy!!

Language Arts - This week is the last story in Unit 2.  It is called Jose! Born to Dance.  This was a story that we enjoyed the first time but not really anytime after that.  It is about a famous dancer Jose Limon.  He is a real person and it tells his life story about what he went through to finally decide to become a dancer.  In grammar this week we are learning about pronouns.  We learned the subject and object pronouns, and also reflexive and demonstrative pronouns.  The vocabulary strategy this week was shades of meaning.  It is talking about synonyms having different shades of meaning.  If you think of the word big, you have lots of synonyms: huge, large, enormous, gigantic.  They are synonyms but we have a different picture of how big something is based on the word we use.  Students will need to be sure to practice their spelling words and vocabulary words tonight.  The end of the week test will be tomorrow.

Math -  This week they learned the regrouping strategy for multiplication which is the strategy you were all taught growing up.  Yesterday we focused on double-digit numbers times a single digit.  Today we moved up to digits in the hundreds and thousands.  We are almost finished with this chapter which is great!  The next chapter moves into double digits so we get even harder.  They are all doing very well.

Social Studies -  They have completed a test this week.  It has been  a crazy week to test and we went about it very differently but we made it through.  We will be beginning the next chapter today.  They will be putting another state into their interactive notebooks also.  Next week we are doing a Geography Bee.  We usually do this every year.  It is a national event.  The national event was cancelled due to COVID so we are holding our own at St. Malachy.  I will hold a mock geobee on Monday with them that I will be online conducting.  Then on Tuesday we will do the real thing.  It will take place in the morning.  I will run them through 7 rounds of questions.  I will get together with the other teachers 5-8 and we will compare our results and come up with a top ten.  Those top ten students will compete in the Championship round that we usually hold in December.  It is normally done differently but we are adjusting this year to follow our COVID rules. It will be fun!

This had totally been a crazy week for all of us!  I would like to hope this could all come to an end soon.  Pray for a vaccine and pray for those people who are not doing the right thing.  We have to stop the spread and we will only do it if we all just do what is right and asked of us.  Stay safe and everyone feel better!!

God Bless,

Mrs. Sickels 

Dear Parents,

     Happy Thursday!  I hope everyone is having a great week!   Boy the numbers for COVID are sure on the rise. I hope all of you are doing your part in keeping everyone safe.  I am very thankful we are still in school face-to-face.  If for any reason that changes we have made a plan.  We will shorten the hours of the school day.  The students will get the same amount of lessons and instruction but we will just be online a limited amount of time.  We are prepared if the need arises to go online.  It is getting tiring not going places and seeing people.  One of the twins has had it.  She was pretty sick actually for being young.  Definitely not asymptomatic.  The other twin was exposed, has had to quarantine, no symptoms and tested negative but still could not go back to student teaching.  I am wearing a mask in the room all the time. I take small breaks at my desk or remove it if the kids can't understand what I am trying to get across, which depends on what mask I am wearing that day.  Sometimes I even forget to take it off for a break when the kids are not in the room.  Crazy the things we just adjust to.

Language Arts -  This week we are reading a very funny story called Dear Mr. Winston.  It is about a girl who takes a snake into a library cause she wants to know what kind of a snake it is.  The book she needs is a reference book and can not be taken out of the library.  She sneaks the snake in.  The librarian is petrified of snakes. He catches her with the snake and faints and breaks out in a rash.  He taken by ambulance to hospital.  The girls is writing an apology but is sure to point out her parents are making her and she always makes it out to be the librarian's own fault.  It is fun to read.  We are working on compound and complex sentences this week in grammar.  It is kind of hard stuff. I had to teach what a dependent clause is.  The vocabulary strategy is over antonyms which they are pretty good at since we do them weekly with the vocabulary words.  Please be sure they study for their spelling post test and vocabulary packet.

Math -  We have completed half the chapter!  The kids worked on a Mid-Chapter Checkpoint.  This is a long chapter!  We are actually about 10 days ahead of where I normally am, so that is good. The kids do a very good job of listening and really trying to understand the concept.  I try to really pump them up before the lesson starts so I have their attention. I think they think that is fun.  Then we go to work.  The second half of the chapter does not seem so bad but I will teach them the standard algorithm of multiplication. Yes that is what you learned but they will not find it as easy as the strategies we are using now.  I may have to take 3 days to teach this concept, which is normal and just fine.  I hope to be testing over chapter 2 either right before Thanksgiving or right after.

Social Studies - They began learning their States and Capitals song today. I apologize now, they will drive you crazy singing it.  Especially this class because they sing all the time!!  They have a copy of the words so they can practice at home.  Again I am sorry.  You can find the song on Youtube.  It is called the States and Capital song by Macho Nacho.   We will practice it everyday now.  They will also be starting a study guide on Thursday.  I plan to check it on Friday and then the test will be Monday.  They can start practicing their vocabulary words now.  They have notecards in their expanded file they can use to study.  We will soon begin to work on Map tests.  This is where they have to take a test over the Northeast Region.  I will give them a blank map of the region and they have to label it with the states and capitals.  We will learn the geography of the U.S. a region at a time and then at the end of the year they take an end of the year test over all 50 states and capitals.

Christmas Program -  The filming for the Christmas program will be held on Monday, November 23rd.  We would like your child to come dressed in their Christmas best!  Whatever they would have worn to a normal Christmas program. Thanks!  I will remind you next week also!  Just wanted you to have time to find those Christmas dresses!

Spirit Day!-  Tomorrow the 13th is a spirit day.  The weather is just right for wearing sweatpants!  Get out those dollars and participate.

Absent - I will be absent Thursday afternoon.  I am attending a college visit with Molly.  We are visiting Iowa State!  We have had it planned then cancelled and almost cancelled this one.  We are going to get it done and over with.  It is just a half day thing.  There is not much contact and masks are required.  The main thing is the tour of campus.  Let's see I attended there, plus I toured with both the other girls separately and now I am doing it again.  Sometimes I think I could give a better tour!   I will also be absent next Wednesday all day due to Molly competing at State Dance with the Peppers.  I don't like to be gone at all but I also can't miss my lasts with my youngest!  Believe it when people say "Time Flies"!

I hope everyone stays safe and healthy!

God Bless,

Mrs. Sickels

Dear Parents,

     Happy Thursday!  I hope everyone is enjoying the weather this week. Sounds like next week will be chilly again.  We have been lucky to have what we have.  It is hard to believe we are in November all ready.  For me, this year is close to the end.  It is always that way after conferences.  Once conferences are over then it is like 3 weeks before Thanksgiving week.  After that it is only 3-4 full weeks before Christmas week hits.  It all seems to go very fast, especially when we are working so hard.  I plan to get a lot of things accomplished in these weeks.

COVID-19 Rules - FERPA stands for Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. This is very similar to the hospital's HIPAA laws.  I wanted to make sure you knew that I shared with your students that I am not able to share with them if a student in the room or school test positive for COVID.   It is the job of Public Health to contact trace and make notifications to families who are possibly exposed.  The numbers in Union County are on the rise, there is no doubt about that.  Families in our community are being affected.  We are continuing our mitigation procedures at school. Just know we as teachers can not give out any information.  

Language Arts - This week we are reading a realistic fiction story called Me and Uncle Romie.  It is very good. I really enjoy this story. The story is based on a real character Romare Bearden who was a collage artist.  I am talking about what a collage artist is and what their art looks like.  I hope to have the students do their own collage art at school.  If they are asking for items to bring to school for it, just know it will be glued onto artwork and you won't get it back.  The kids tend to like this story too because it is a "feel good" story. In grammar we have been working on Past, Present, and future Progressive Tenses.  This deals with verbs ending  with -ing and the tense of the verb is based on the helping that is in front of it.  It has been easy stuff for the kids this week.  Our vocabulary strategy was on Idioms.  This is figurative language.  We talked about sayings like "break a leg", "feast or famine", "heart of gold", "good as gold", "head over heals", and "safe and sound".  If we took their literal meanings they would not make sense.  The kids has to rewrite sentences replacing words with these sayings.  Tomorrow is a test day.  Please remind them to study their vocabulary packet (gold) and spelling words.

Math -  We have had some great math lessons this week.  The kids have learned what the Distributive Property is and they have used it to solve problems.  We also finished the week using that same property and expanded form to solve multiplication problems.  They are working problems into the thousands using this strategy.  It is super easy when you are shown what you are doing.  I told the kids their parents would think what they were doing was hard, too long, and makes no sense, but it makes perfect sense them.  This strategy teaches them exactly what multiplication is and what you are doing to find your answer.   Using the standard algorithm is hard for some to learn because they don't understand what exactly they are doing.  They get the process and what to write but they don't know the "why" .  What we are doing now helps them understand the "why" and make them better at math.  They were excited because they all thought it was easy and made sense.  Some people use this strategy as mental math and don't even realize that is what they are doing.  Your kids are dabbling in some Algebra.  They are doing an excellent job too.

Social Studies -  We have been learning this week about Chesapeake Bay in Maryland.  They have learned what the Bay has to offer.  We have talked about Seafood restaurants in Des Moines that may have seafood from this area.  We also talked about fishing being a hobby around here but for the "watermen" in the Chesapeake Bay area it is their job.  If they don't catch anything they don't get paid.  They were amazed by this.  We also talked about how pollution plays a roll in ruining the habitat.  They had great conversations.  We will be gearing up for a test next week.  They will work on a study guide before testing.

Tomorrow is NOT a spirit day!!  

I hope everyone has a great weekend.  I will be cutting back my rose bushes and getting them ready for winter this weekend.  It is not a fun job at all.  I always get compliments on my roses in the summer though.  They are pretty low maintenance.  I water every night and keep the dead buds cut off.  I learned from a neighbor on Montgomery street who always had beautiful roses. He taught me the tricks of the trade.  

God Bless,

Mrs. Sickels

Dear Parents,

     Happy Thursday!!  Well, this is a short week for us.  There will be a few changes in our schedules.  I plan to cover those below.  I am looking forward to conferences next week.  Everyone has signed up for a time. I always like to  visit with parents about their students.  I like to share what I am seeing and hear from you on what you are seeing. I hope the kids enjoy their extra day off.  I sure wish I was getting that extra day off.  Next week will be a crazy week for sure.  Halloween and Conferences in the same week is insane.  I hope to have a fun and successful week.

Halloween- We will be celebrating Halloween on Wednesday, October 28th.  I plan to have a normal morning then spend the afternoon enjoying ourselves.  Our Homeroom Mom, Sam Baird, will be supplying snacks and drinks for the afternoon.  I plan on playing a geography game and then doing some Halloween Art.  There will be a Halloween parade so be sure to send your child's costume to school.  The parade this year will be done virtually. I am not sure on specifics but each class will go to the gym and be filmed parading around the gym in costume and they may even be interviewed about their costume choice. I will get you information about the virtual link next week.

Language Arts - This week we are reading an informational story called Coming Distractions Questioning Movies.  It is interesting the first time you read it, but not the 2nd and 3rd time you read it.  The vocabulary strategy we discussed had to do with Greek and Latin word parts.  Phon, photo, tele, graph, phono are the word parts.  I showed the kids what they mean and how it works in certain words.  I grammar we talked about the 3 verb tenses: past, present, and future, and we learned about helping verbs and past participles.  Fancy words for a helping verb and a past tense main/action verb.  This wee is a short week but I am going to use next Monday as our "Friday".  Since next week is an even shorter week I am extending this week into next.  The spelling Posttest and end of week test will happen on Monday.  Then Tuesday and Wednesday we are going to work on writing Personal Narratives.  This is just a short story or essay about themselves.  I have video clips to watch to help the kids.  A personal Narrative is a Standard that the students must work on in 4th grade.  We will follow the steps on brainstorming, prewriting, editing, revising and publishing to complete the paper.

Math -  This week in math we have focused on multiplication comparisons.  They have done a great job understanding how to write a comparison statement from a multiplication problem.  We then moved onto learning how to use those comparisons to write a word problem with pictures to help us solve.  We finished that lesson today.  If you looked at it you would go, "huh!"  It is not easy stuff.  I am super proud of them for learning it and learning it quickly.  Next week we will begin to move on in the chapter.  Lesson 3 is super easy, I will teach them 2 strategies in one day.  It is multiplying tens and hundreds.  So problems like 100 X 3  or 1,000 X 6.  Then we will learn to estimate products.

Social Studies -  The students have enjoyed putting their first 2 states into their notebooks this last week.  They love to color, cut and paste.  Plus they are learning facts about the state.  We will soon begin learning our States and Capitals song.  I will give them a sheet with the lyrics on it and we will sing along with the song.  It is a great way to memorize all the states and capitals.  The song is found on youtube, it is called States and Capitals Song by Macho Nacho.  You can practice it at home too.  I apologize now because once they learn it, they will sing it all the time.  This class is constantly singing.   The next lesson are over resources in the northeast and harvesting Chesapeake Bay.  

Conferences - Conferences are next week on Thursday.  Everyone has signed up for a time.  Please be sure to read through the rules again.  I will be cleaning thoroughly in between each conference. If you requested a virtual meeting I will just meet you on the classroom link.  It's the same thing your child goes to when getting online for school.

● Conferences will last 12 minutes - this allows for time to clean between each visit. ● 1 Parent/guardian may attend (we recommend the other parents/guardians attend via facetime or speaker phone call) 

● Teachers will take the temperature of the parent/guardian in attendance 

● Masks are required 

● To reduce exposure we ask that parents/guardians use the door nearest your child’s classroom door ● We ask that children to not attend 

● We will have the Book Fair in the gym on Thursday from 1-9:30. We ask parents to social distance and sanitize their hands before shopping.

 I hope everyone has a great weekend.  The student should enjoy their long weekend.  I am preparing for a crazy week next week.  We will survive!  I hope you do as well.  See you next week!

God Bless,

Mrs. Sickels

Dear Parents,

      Happy Thursday!!  I hope everyone is having a great week!  This seems like it has been a crazy week! I have had 2 students online due to not feeling well and one that was gone the end of the week.  Wednesday I only had 2 students in class with me.  That was a weird day.  I hope that next week I have all 5 back with us.  I do understand if your child is really stuffed up and sneezing or blowing their nose a ton and you choose to keep them home.  I am fine with it.  Being online works well! I will have information on Halloween and what we are going to do for it next week in my blog!

Language Arts -This week we are back to reading a story in our textbook and completing spelling.  The story we are reading this week is called Invasion From Mars.  It is a fun "true" story of an event that happened.  On October 30, 1938,  a radio was broadcasting a reading of "The War of the Worlds".  A book written by H.G. Wells.  The section they were reading that day was on an extraterrestrial object landing on earth.  People who did not hear the introduction and turned on the radio in the middle of the broadcast became frantic.  They were thinking the broadcast was really happening.  It caused quite a panic for some.  We have read the story.  Today I plan to have them listen to the live broadcast of this.  They will then see why some Americans thought it was truly happening.  You can search it on Youtube and find it.  My classes really love this story because there is a good story behind it.  In grammar we have started working on verbs.  We talked about action verbs, helping verbs and main verbs, then linking verbs.  The vocabulary strategy was on the suffixes -y, and -ous.  Tomorrow is a normal Friday.  We have a spelling post test and end of the week test.  Be sure they are studying their yellow packets tonight!

Math -  We are beginning our chapter on Multiplication!  This will be a very long chapter.  I will teach the students several different strategies to work multiplication problems.  The exciting part of this is, we know when we grew up we only learned one way to multiply.  Not everyone understood how to do this way.  Kids struggled to learn and be very good at multiplication because they didn't understand.  I understand what I needed to do to manipulate the numbers and get my answers but I never understood exactly how it worked.  I will be teaching your students several strategies to help them understand what they are doing.  I know they are strategies you struggle with and I don't want you to stress over helping them.  I am here before school everyday and usually here after school until at least 4:30 unless Molly has an event.  I will be glad to be the one that helps your student.  I personally like the strategy of "Partial Product" much better than the standard algorithm.  It is so much easier to understand and find mistakes.  This is my favorite chapter to teach in the year.  I will make your children masters of multiplication when we are done.  WOOHOO! 

Social Studies - We are learning about the Northeast this week.  We have learned the location of Niagara Falls.  We talked about it's beauty and its power resource.  They learned that something beautiful can be of great use.  Hydropower plants are generating hydroelectricity to help give energy to the state of New York. We also talked about how glaciers played a huge role in the formation of Niagara Falls.  We also have looked at the different mountain ranges found in the Northeast and how they are important to the skiing industry.  I plan to compare the difference between the Main coastline and the New Jersey coastline.  We will finish up this lesson and then we will put our first state into our interactive notebooks.  They are excited about this!  They think getting to color, cut and paste in Social Studies is super fun!

HELP!!  HELP!!  HELP!!   We are going to run out of wipes next week.  So if anyone could purchase some wipes to send in that would be great.  The students each use 2 wipes a day.  They wipe down at lunch and then at the end of the day.  With only 5 kids 5 bottles didn't go very far.   Thanks for all and any help!

Spirit Day!   Tomorrow is a Spirit Day!   You can wear sweats or a hat for a $1.00.  Perfect day for it   Bring those dollars and be comfy! 

I am headed to Denison today for a Cross Country meet.  It is a long drive to watch someone run 20 minutes.  This could be her last time running though.  She has to run well to get to run in the State Qualifying Meet next Thursday.  If she does not run well, she will be done. Since she is a senior I just can't miss it.  I am listening to a book as I drive.  I am excited because I have not listened since last Thursday.  It is read by a person with a British accent so I am struggling to pick up on everything.  Wish us luck!  Have a great weekend!

God Bless,

Mrs. Sickels

Dear Parents,

    Happy Thursday!  I feel like this week has gone pretty quickly.  The kids think so also.  I am not sure why but it feels like it.  I think the students have finally adjusted to 4th grade.  They understand how important it is to use any time I give them to work on their homework.  I give them things to do every day BUT if they use their time wisely they can get most of it done at school.  There are some days where we have more homework then normal and so some of it may have to come home but it should not take them that long to complete it.  Mainly it would be finishing up some little things.  I try to have them do the things they can complete quickly here, so they are not taking too much home.  When I sign their assignment books, I usually ask them what they have left to take home to complete.  This gives me an idea of what I may need to adjust, or what I can do to help them get more done here at school.  

Language Arts - We have taken the Unit 1 Benchmark test this week.  I break it up into 3 sections. I do not want to overwhelm the students with it all in one day.  We have also done some handwriting during this time and written a Halloween story based off the story  Goldilocks and the Three Bears.  Tomorrow I intend on assigning them their first book report.  This is a cereal box book report.  The students will be asked to read a chapter book that challenges them and then complete the cereal box book report items.  They will need a cereal box and they will need to cover it with paper. You can just wrap it like a package or cut construction paper to cover all sides.  It is up to the student.  I will hand them out pieces of printed papers to help them on the top, and two sides of the box.  These will be filled out, cut out and glued to the proper places.  The front and the back of the box is up to them to create on their own.  It all has to deal with the book.  They need a cereal name that goes along with the book they read.  On the back they will need a game to do.  They also need to include a prize in the box that has to do with their book. Now, they don't really need to have the prize, they just need to talk about it on the box somewhere.  I plan to go over all the directions with the students and give them a print out of directions for them to keep.  I will not give them the items needed until they tell me they are finished reading the book.  This report will not be due until the end of the trimester which is November 13th.  Next week we will go back to a normal language arts week with spelling tests, vocabulary words,and worksheets.

Math - We have finished up chapter 1 in math.  The students have completed a review over the chapter.  They are now working on a "Dress Rehearsal" of the test.  They will do this today and tomorrow.  I will check them over the weekend and on Monday we will go over the test together.  Then on Tuesday they will take the final test.  This one will be online and on paper.  The same test online will be in front of them so they can do all the work on it and then mark their answer on both the paper copy and online.  The online portion helps to sort standards and benchmarks automatically for me.  The paper copy allows me to look at their work and see where they are making mistakes.  It may seem like a lot but it is super easy.  We will begin chapter two at the end of the week.  In this chapter we will begin talking about multiplication.  This is 14 lessons long and really takes us a long time to get through.

Social Studies -  I have introduced the Northeast region to the class.  We have written the 11 states that make up the Northeast in their notebooks along with their capitals.  I am now introducing the interactive notebook to them.  We have put in out front page with all 50 states on it.  Now we are working together through the first set of pages on the United States of America.  They have colored the American Flag, we have created the piece that has the picture of the United States, the abbreviation for it, and the capital.  Today we will work on the fact booklet.  When we have all these things done and cut out, we will glue them in.  They are super excited to get to that part today.  I am always hopeful that this is a book filled with information that the students will want to save for later.  I try to stress for them to so their best handwriting and coloring on these pages.  I will say they don't always listen very well. We will dig into chapter 4 a lot more next week.

CDC Guidelines -  Please refer to Mrs. Simmon's letter she sends out or to our website about the new guidelines about masks from the CDC. It focuses on Gaiters and mask wearing in the classroom, who would quarantine and who would not.  The 4th graders have decided they will wear their mask all the time but will take breaks when needed.  They will take them off for 10 minute periods when they need a break.  I am not mandating this happens, but the kids are making the decision so we can stay in school face-to-face. 

Book It -  We have started keeping track of the minutes we do any free reading in a book of our choice.  We will keep track for the next 6 months.  The kids have an orange calendar where they can keep track.  Please, keep track in minutes only.  So if they read 2 hours please write 120 minutes.  At the end of the month a parent will need to sign the calendar and the students will turn it in.  If they meet the goal at the top of the calendar they will receive a certificate for money off the buffet at Pizza Ranch.  Since we no longer have a Pizza Hut we don't have that as an option.  This month the kids are to read 350 minutes.  This breaks down into 12 minutes a day.  If they do that they will meet the goal easily.  They are also trying to beat Mrs. Sickels.  They are finding that is hard when I have found a good book.  Right now I have found a great book and I am reading most of my evenings.  I have a chart I will keep track of each month for the student.  At the end I total up all their minutes they have read. I give prizes to the top readers.  Happy reading!!

Looks like the weather is going to make for a very nice weekend.  I hope all of you get out and enjoy it.  I keep thinking our nice weekends are going to be few and far between.  I am celebrating a friend's 50th birthday with dinner Saturday night. 

God Bless,

Mrs. Sickels 

Dear Parents,

     Happy Thursday!!!  I hope everyone is having a great week.  For my it is Homecoming week for my Senior.  It is so hard to believe that she is there.  It has been a fun week but busy.  Cross Country in Knoxville on Tuesday and Perry tonight makes for a very busy week for mom!  The weather has been pleasant but sounds like it intends to cool off.  It will be a very chilly football game tomorrow.  We have had a really good week in 4th grade.  I feel they are finally getting the hang of a class routine and also how Mrs. Sickels does things.  We are to the point of really enjoying class and learning.  I love, love, love when we get to this point.  It means I can have some fun with teaching!

Language Arts -  This week we are reading a Tall Tale called "Stormalong".  It is a story about a baby that is giant.  He grows into a very big, strong man.  He is determined to live his life on the sea.  He proved himself a great sailor but it just way too big for a boat.  He travels inland to try his hand at working the land, but he is not happy.  He goes back to the sea.  They build him a giant boat that he can fit on.  He is now happy.  We are paying attention to characters in this story.  Trying to decide what kind of a person Stormalong is by how he interacts with others. We worked on reference materials as our vocabulary strategy.  They focused on dictionary entries and what they tell us.  In grammar we learned or reviewed capitalization.  It focused on historical events and documents, titles of books or stories, and today we are  learning names. languages, and Nationalities.  The spelling list was a bit of a challenge this week.  It was over homophones.  These are words that sound the exact same but the spelling depends upon the meaning of the word.  An example would be wait and weight,  sent, cent, and scent,  and heard and herd.  The students will take their post test tomorrow. They will also do the end of the week test.  Next week we will do our first Unit test.  It will be quite difficult.  They are shocked by what they have to remember from the first 5 stories and lessons. 

Math - We are finishing up chapter one.  We will be completing it next week.  This week we have learned how to rename numbers (hard and some struggled), we have reviewed adding large numbers and now subtracting large numbers.  The subtraction gets hard due to regrouping.  Sometimes there is a lot of zeroes in a problem that have to be regrouped.  We will then move onto problem-solving.  That will be our last lesson before we begin studying for a test.  I will walk them through how math testing works.  We first take what they call a "dress rehearsal".  They will actually be given the test without any practicing(this is the practice).  If anyone gets a perfect paper they are done.   I will then go over the test and every problem with the class to model how the work is done.  They will then take the final test and this test will be scored in the grade book. This gives each student the opportunity to be successful on the test.  Miss Surma does the same thing.  We learned this strategy at a conference we attended last October.  It proved highly successful with our classes last year.  We really collaborated on how to make it work.

Social Studies -  We have taken our first test.  The students all did very well on it.  There were a lot of vocabulary words which some had some trouble matching.  You will see the test today.  Please sign it and have your student return it to me.  They have made corrections and I have based their score off their corrections.  Please look through to see how they did.  They are working on a couple of map skills worksheets before we begin our next chapter.  One of the map skills is focusing on the compass rose.  We will review how to follow one and what the cardinal and intermediate directions are on it.  We will dig into chapter 3 next week.  We are moving along very well in this subject. I hope to keep our pace going.

CDC Guidelines -  Please be sure to read Mrs. Simmons "St. Malachy Minute".  It talks about the new guidelines for quarantine.   Also be sure to fill out the google form on conferences and whether you prefer a face-to-face conference or a video call.

Homecoming!  We dismiss tomorrow 3 hours early.  That means instead of 3:15 you will need to pick up your students at 12:15.  It is a Spirit Day tomorrow!  Bring your dollar to wear your sweats with panther gear!  It will be a good day to do it.  The temperatures are suppose to drop tomorrow.  Remember our dollars go for a great cause.    There will be NO LUNCH served tomorrow due to the very early out.

I hope all of you enjoy your weekend.  The Fall temps are definitely here.  I am going to enjoying my last Homecoming as a parent!  I am really okay with this.  After 3 girls, definitely okay with it.  I will happy to just look at all the pictures next year instead of worrying about taking them!

God Bless,

Mrs. Sickels