Mallen's Monday Memo October 24, 2011

Monday Memo

October 24, 2011

Dear Parents,

I hope everyone had a great weekend. We had a send off party for Mrs. Staley on Thursday. We wish her the best for her future teaching career! This week is Red Ribbon Week. I sent home a note with the students on Friday, which detailed what things they can wear each day this week. We are having an assembly on Thursday at 2:45 about Red Ribbon Week. We are also having our Halloween Party this Friday at 2:00. It begins with our annual costume parade and then continues in our classroom. I wanted to make mention to my room parents that Rachel Boots-Vestweber’s phone number is 641-275-0179. I look forward to the upcoming party and appreciate all the time and effort put into it by our room parents!! The kids always look so forward to it!

This week we are finishing up our MAP testing today!! We are also starting a new story entitled “Boss of the Plains”. It talks a little about how the Stetson hat began. It is part of our new unit “American Stories”. With that, the students have been reading the book Bound for Oregon. This is a great book that talks about a girl’s experience on the Oregon Trail. Each night they are assigned a chapter to read and to write three sentences over. Most of them get the chapter read during the day but wanted to let you know that some of them may be bringing that home as homework. We will be working on the skills of:  comprehension, vocabulary, writing a business letter, using the context, and the grammar skill will be continuing our work on plural common nouns. Our spelling words will have the ir and ar sounds and are attached to this memo. Our guided reading books this week are all American stories and our centers will have us doing Successmaker, a poetry center, our vocabulary center and a spelling center for this week.

For Math, we will be working on a couple of reviews to prepare for our Chapter Two test this week. We should also be getting started on our next chapter over multiplication if all goes well. In Science I will be sending home a study guide tomorrow, to help prepare for their Science test over plants which will be Thursday.  We will continue finishing up on the Northeastern part of the United States this week. I hope to have us testing next week.

I hope everyone has a great week!

As always, feel free to give me a call or email with any questions or concerns!

Sincerely,

Chris Mallen

Phone:  444-4300 ext 336 (School)  444-3093 (Home)

Email:  chris.mallen@belmond-klemme.k12.ia.us

Mallen's Monday Memo October 17, 2011

Monday Memo

October 17, 2011

Dear Parents,

I hope everyone had a great weekend! I am back to teaching again. It was great to have had our student teacher, Mrs. Staley, the last couple of weeks. She will be in our district this week, but will be observing different classrooms.

We enjoyed the firemen and can never hear their message enough! The fire truck rides are always an added bonus to their day! Quite the excitement on Wednesday! I had a meeting in Mason City and the power went out for over an hour. I guess it was pretty dark in the classroom, so it was very interesting continuing with their day. I think our student teacher learned a bit about flexibility that day!

The fourth grade will be starting with our trimester MAP testing. Mrs. Jenison’s class will be doing it from 8:30-10:00 M-W and we will be doing it from 8:30-10:00 Th., Fr., and Mon. That makes our lesson plans a little interesting. We are going to try to complete a new story, Tanya’s Reunion, through the next two weeks. We will be working this week on comprehension and vocabulary, using exact nouns, making inferences, and writing a few character sketches. Our grammar will have us working on singular and plural nouns. Our spelling words have the sounds of u in them this week and the list is attached to this memo. Our centers will have us working on the fusion writers, completing Successmaker, a vocabulary center, poetry center and a language skill review. Our guided reading stories are entitled “A Breath of Fresh Air”, “Gifts of the Dineh” and “Coming Home”.

We will be really working on our multiplication facts as well as working on finishing up our Chapter 2 in Math. With MAP testing this week, it will be a challenge to see if we can get through the chapter. Hopefully within in the next two weeks we will get through it, and tested.

We will be talking about the American Revolution and drawing inferences as our critical skill, during Social Studies. We will be finishing up with Science on the ways that plants reproduce. We hope to get to our vocabulary review this week as well in Science.

On Thursday, we are going to have a little going away party for Mrs. Staley at 2:00. At 2:35 Mr. Johnson is going to talk to the class about study skills. A quick reminder that Math Night is Thursday night from 6:30-7:30. You can stop in a variety of rooms and learn different math games.  I look forward to seeing you there!

Have a great week!!

Chris Mallen

Phone:  444-3093 (Home)  444-4300 (School)

Email:  chris.mallen@belmond-klemme.k12.ia.us