Mallen's Monday Memo February 13, 2012

Monday Memo

February 13, 2012

Dear Parents,

I hope everyone had a great weekend! We had another busy week last week. Our book Harris and Me was due on Friday. I challenged the students that if they passed 4 RC quizzes during the month of February, I would give them a bag of popcorn. They are required to pass 2 for one of their comprehension grades. I have several who have already read and passed 4 quizzes. I love that motivation. We read a book at school from Andrew Clements entitled No Talking and on Thursday we challenged ourselves to follow the rules of that book. It was quite interesting. You could only say 3 words at a time and use gestures, sign language, nodding and notebook writing, to communicate. I think the kids had a lot of fun with that and realized that sometimes when you take the time to really think about what you want to say, you end up realizing that it really wasn’t that important to say. You actually spend more time listening and I thought that was an interesting lesson.

This week and next, we are at the end of our reading unit and will be working on two stories this week and on poems for next week. Our spelling words are review words this week and our grammar lessons are reviewing over the forms of the verb be and adjectives. We our reading some short stories about real individuals who solved some problems in their life, during our guided reading time. Our centers will also be reviewing previously learned concepts. We have an exciting addition to our classroom. You may remember the old SRA kits that you had as a kid. Well, they are so much better than they use to be! They are filled with rich literature and are so colorful! It is a great skill for the kids to work on their comprehension skills, enrichment skills and most importantly, they are working on their independent working skills. They are thrilled with them! They have a correcting buddy, who corrects theirs and hands it back to them for corrections… I have a folder for each student that I will share with you at conference time. Ms Jenison and I are sharing the kits, so we each have them every other week.  I think it is a great addition to our reading materials, and I hope it is another thing we can do to help the students excel on their basic skills tests.

In Math this week, we are working on our new Chapter 6. It involves multiplying 2D by 2D numbers and problem solving. They learned last week how to make organized lists. That was kind of interesting! We will continue working on our math reviews. This week we will also be multiplying money.

For Social Studies, we will be continuing on our exploration of the Southeastern United States region. We will also continue talking about rocks and minerals during Science. If we had our daily oral science and daily oral social studies, we do keep busy each day!!

We are going to the care center today for a Valentine’s party with our friends. That is something we always look forward to!

I thank the room parents for the party they are putting on for us tomorrow!! Thanks for all your time and effort. The kids appreciate it so much!!

Sincerely,

Chris Mallen

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

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

Mallen's Monday Memo February 6, 2012

Monday Memo

February 6, 2012

Dear Parents,

I hope everyone had a great weekend. It did look a little more like winter this weekend, but what a January we had!  It was nice to have a full week of school last week as we were able to accomplish all of our goals for the week. I want to let you know that your child can make their Valentine box this week and bring it to school Monday for Tuesday’s Valentine’s party. I thank the room parents for the planning they are currently doing for our party next week!! We are not allowed to send home the class lists of names, so I won’t be sending that home with the kids this year. I guess it is a privacy law. I can tell you that we have 22 students, if that would help at all. The students can start bringing their Valentines on Monday.

This week in reading, we are reading a story entitled “Sing to the Stars”. It is another of our problem solver stories and it has a problem and how the character goes about solving the problem. We will be working on the following skills:  Vocabulary, Comprehension, Story Structure, Analogies, and in grammar we will be working on using adjectives and elaborating with them. Our spelling words have the VCCV pattern in them and the list is attached to this memo. I am excited to tell you that our school has purchased SRA kits that we will be starting this week. I will be using them on some students more than others, but find that they are an excellent independent activity for students to work on their comprehension skills. I have also challenged the students to read their usual two books for the month, but for those that read and pass at least 4 RC quizzes, I will be giving them their own bag of popcorn as a prize for doing that!! I have a couple students who passed 0 quizzes in January and that hurts their comprehension score for third quarter, so I am hoping this incentive will help them to bring up their grade!

In Math, we tested over our 4^th chapter on Friday. I sent the tests home with the students. This week we are starting on our 6^th chapter which is on multiplication once again. This week our lessons will be with multiplying multiples of ten, estimating products, using arrays to multiply large numbers, and making an organized list. Continue working with the students on their multiplication facts, and this chapter should be very easy for them. We will continue with our daily reviews and timed multiplication tests as well.

We are working on the Southeastern Region of the United States. If you have any artifacts from this region, please feel free to send them with your child to share during our Monday Share Day time. This week we will be talking about the Mississippi River and the warm weather and the cash crops this region produces. Just to write the words warm weather brings a nice thought to my mind…

For Science, we are starting a unit on Rocks and Minerals. Last week I had written that we are going to start on weather, but we are going to continue with the earth theme and work on rocks and minerals. I told the students that if they had some rocks to share and could identify if they were metamorphic, igneous or sedimentary or if they could tell us what kind of rock they were, they could share them also during our share time. I tend to get a lot of polished rocks, and rocks they pick up on the ground on the way to school, if I don’t put limitations on their sharing… We only have so much time…

I hope everyone has a great week! As always, feel free to call me with any questions or concerns!!

Sincerely,

Chris Mallen

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

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

Mallen's Monday Memo January 30, 2012

Monday Memo

January 30, 2012

Dear Parents,

I am having a hard time believing it is the end of January already!! What a fast month that was!! It also seems like a fast winter, with no snow for such a long time. I am not complaining, that is for sure!! Thanks to everyone for remembering to send the boots and snow pants with your child to school. We got through our story last week, even with the late starts. The kids worked really hard and they got through everything I had planned.

This week we are starting on a new story about a boy in China. We will be learning some things about China as well as designing a dragon. The story is called The Last Dragon. We will be working on the following skills:  Comprehension, Vocabulary, Questioning Techniques, Note Taking and Adjectives in Grammar. Our Spelling this week will be words with j and s  and the list is attached to this memo.

In Math, we are finishing up on our 4^th chapter, with the test on Friday. We will be working on misleading graphs, problem solving, and reviewing the chapter, this week. Please continue having your child work on their multiplication facts. We will be taking daily timed tests over them. Our daily reviews (buckets) are such a great opportunity for the kids to review previously learned concepts and they are a great preparation for the basic skills tests that are coming up!

We are starting new units in both Science and Social Studies this week. We are moving to the SE region of the United States for our new unit. This week we are going to talk about the Mississippi River  and doing a skills over maps at different scales. We are starting to talk about weather this week in Science and we will be discussing the layers of the atmosphere this week. We will talk about the layer that most of our weather occurs and a little about the effects of acid rain on the environment.

Thank-you for encouraging your children to perform random acts of kindness. Today is the last day that we will be sharing what we did to be kind to one another. I hope they continue doing these random acts but we won’t be sharing every Monday over them after today.

As always, if you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to call or email me!

Have a great week!

Chris Mallen

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

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

Mallen's Monday Memo January 15, 2012

Monday Memo

January 16, 2012

Dear Parents,

I hope everyone enjoyed their weekend! Just a few quick reminders:  Friday is the Coaches for Cancer during the basketball games. Each classroom is challenged to raise money for cancer. The winning class will get a pizza party with the wrestling cheerleaders. What a marvelous thing to contribute to! The contributions are due this week. Thanks to all who have contributed to this very worthy fight!!

We are starting a new reading unit. It is entitled “Problem Solvers”. The stories are of how different characters have handled tough situations! This week we are starting on a story entitled “My Name is Maria Isabel”. We will be working on a variety of skills including comprehension and vocabulary, symbolism, sequencing, and predicting outcomes. For grammar this week, we will be working on the forms of the very be. Our spelling words this week are attached to this memo. With our centers and our guided reading groups, we are pretty busy during this time.

For Math, we are enjoying our Chapter 4. We are working on bar graphs, graphing ordered pairs, line graphs and problem solving strategies. We do daily reviews as well as working on our multiplication facts, each day. Keep working on those facts. Most of the kids have committed them to memory, just a few still need to get them there. They will with practice!

For Social Studies this week, we will be talking about what the Mountain States are like today and then we will be comparing those states to the Swiss Alps. For Science, I am hoping to get our review in and send the study guide home with the students on Thursday, with the test on Friday. I am planning that as of today!

The students no longer have Spanish class. Mrs. Kelley was needed at the high school, so I wanted you to be aware of that. Just a reminder of the early out on Wednesday.

Thank-you for your help with the random acts of kindness!! I enjoy the sharing the students do over what they have done!!

Have a great week!

Chris Mallen

Phone:  444-3093 (home) 444-4300 ext. 336 (School)

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

Mallen's Monday Memo January 9, 2012

Monday Memo

January 12, 2012

Dear Parents,

I hope everyone enjoyed their weekend. I think everyone is getting back into the routine of school again.

I thank-you for occasionally asking the kids about any random acts of kindness they may be doing. We are going to start sharing these on Monday.

For reading this week, we are finishing up on our “That’s Amazing” unit. This week we will be reading two stories, an excerpt from The Borrowers and an article from Boy’s Life Magazine entitled Lord of the Fleas. This week will be about reviewing our grammar and reading skills from the unit. Those include wrapping up the theme, reading for details, vocabulary over the new stories, comparing/contrasting the flea performers in the story, and a total review of action verbs, main and helping verbs, identifying tense, singular and plural nouns, and possessives, in grammar. Our spelling words are a review over some tricky words from the unit and are attached to this memo.

For Math, we are starting our fourth chapter. We tested over our Chapter 5 on Thursday, and I sent home the results to you. We are still doing period multiplication timed tests and for the most part they are doing really well, but a few still need to keep practicing them. We will talk about units of time and elapsed time, problem solving with time, calendars and pictographs this week, along with our daily reviews.

We are continuing to finish up on our mountain region of the United States. We will be talking about the women’s right to vote, and working on some social studies skills including drawing conclusions, and reference sources.

For Science, we are working on earthquakes and volcanoes this week. We will be doing some promethon board activities over these concepts as well as reading some books over these natural disasters.

I sent home book orders last Wednesday. They are due on January 16^th.

As always, with any questions or concerns, please give me a call or an email!!

Have a great week!

Chris Mallen

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

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

Monday Memo January 3, 2012

Monday Memo

(Tuesday) January 3, 2012

Dear Parents,

I hope everyone enjoyed their enormous holiday break!! Without snow, it was easier to go places, but really didn’t seem quite so festive. Just a reminder that when (or if) it snows, the students need to wear their snow pants and boots. I want to thank our room parents for the wonderful winter party they planned for us, before Christmas break. Thanks to Mrs. Noah, Mrs. Boots, Mrs. Smith, and Mr. Gansen!

The kids had a great time and we truly appreciate their time and effort in planning the party!! We were also treated to our student teacher, returning for the party!

We enjoyed going to the care center and playing Bingo with our friends there! The students are absolutely wonderful over there and  all of them have made someone smile while visiting. I am continually proud of how they act while they are there! The staff is so generous with the students, with their prizes and treats for us!

Getting back to the reality of school, we will be reading a story that we didn’t get to that last week of school entitled “Heat Wave”. We will be working on comprehension and vocabulary as well as fantasy/realism, reading a diagram and comparing and contrasting it. We will be working on the tenses of verbs during our grammar time and we will be working on words with ed and ing on them for our spelling words, which are attached to this memo.

We will be finishing our 5^th chapter in math, with our test on Friday. Knowing their multiplication facts, made this one of our easier chapters this year! For Science, we will be starting on earth science. We will begin with the layers of the earth, this week. For Social Studies we are going to be talking about the Shoshone Indian tribe and talking about ghost towns, in the mountain west region of the United States.

For the month of January, I am going to see how this goes. I am going to talk to the kids about doing Random Acts of Kindness and together we will brainstorm a variety of possibilities. Each Monday during Share Day, I am going to ask the students to name at least one Random Act of Kindness that they did that week for someone. It will be fun to see the variety of ways the students have affected another person in a positive way.

As always, feel free to call/email with any questions or concerns!!

Have a great week!

Sincerely,

Chris Mallen

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

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

Mallen's Monday Memo December 5, 2011

Monday Memo

December 5, 2011

Dear Parents,

I hope everyone had a great weekend! This will be an interesting week, getting ready for Friday’s Christmas program! The kids enjoyed singing Christmas songs at the bank on Friday. Thank-you for your generous donations to our food pantry box.  The Cheer Fund money is also very welcomed and we will be using it to purchase an item off the giving tree. One more thing that our school is going to do is to replenish our hats and mittens supply through allowing the kids to bring some money for “Kaps for Kids”. On Dec. 7, and Dec. 14, the students can wear their hats that day for a donation. These things are just a few examples of how we are a giving and caring community at Jacobson Elementary!!

For reading this week, we are reading a story entitled Cendrillion. It is another version of Cinderella. We will be reading a variety of versions of Cinderella this week. We will also be working on vocabulary, comprehension, fantasy/realism, venn diagram over two characters in the story, main and helping verbs in grammar, and our spelling list is words with the schwa sound in them. The list is attached to this memo. Our small group stories are also all take-offs of Cinderella.

We will be continuing in our new Chapter 5 unit. It is also on multiplication/division. We skipped chapter 4 but will go back to it after we finish this unit. We wanted to stay on this topic to continue getting those multiplication facts learned. This week we will be multiplying 2DX1D and 3DX1D. We will also be doing some multiplication with arrays. Keep working on those facts at home!!

I sent home a social studies study guide with your child today. The test over Chapter 9 will be tomorrow. We will be finishing up on the body systems unit in Science, hopefully this week. Stay tuned to the Monday Memo…

I look forward to the students being all dressed up on Friday. It is always so fun to see them in their “Sunday Best”!!

As always, with any questions/ concerns don’t hesitate to give me a call or email!!

Have a great week!

Chris Mallen

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

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