Mallen's Monday Memo March 4, 2013

Monday Memo

March 4, 2013

 

Dear Parents,

 

I hope everyone had a great weekend! Last weekend was a busy one for us! We enjoyed pairing up with a first grade class (Mrs. Wagner’s class) and listening to an elephant story while making elephants! It was fun to be role models for the first graders! We are really enjoying our month long Read a Million Minutes theme of “Reading to Change the World”. We appreciate your help with having the kids continue their reading of at least 15 minutes a night (Which they already do) and just placing any kind of coin on the coin sheets we sent home. The coins can be as you wish, or simply just put an X on each slot to verify they read for 15 minutes that night. The money will be used to buy books for an orphanage in Africa. The students have each chosen a country in Africa and are bringing information/facts/pictures… about their country to share with each other. Africa is a very interesting continent and filled with countries that range from extremely poor and malnourished to wealthy. Thank-you for helping your child find some facts and to continue to build our Africa center with information! If you would like to donate any used books, that would be great as well. We are sending slightly used books as well as any new books you may wish to donate to them. We will be having a book fair during conference week. This week the first graders are going to come to our classroom and share an African game with us. Next week, we will be going to their classroom and sharing an African food. I may need some help in buying  the ingredients… so please stay tuned to the Monday Memo, where I will share any requests I may have. This has been a lot of fun for us!! It also helps us get through the long winter time. Speaking of, my class has really been great with this, but just a reminder that the kids need snow pants and boots to play at recess. Thanks for your help with that!

 

This week in Reading, we are starting a new unit entitled “Heroes”. This goes perfectly with our discussions on famous African Americans and their contributions to our country. Our first story is about Dr. Martin Luther King and how his influence helped a troubled little boy. We will be working on subjects and pronouns, cause and effect, comprehension, vocabulary and sequencing, this week. Our spelling words for the week are attached to this memo.

 

We tested last week on our rocks and minerals unit for Science. We will be working on social studies this week and we will be talking about the seaways and cities in the Northeast Region of the United States. We will also be working on the corresponding vocabulary words we learned in our reading of this region. The students also have a Northeast Region of the United States booklet that they are working on in their spare time.

 

In Math, we are working on multiplying 2DX2D numbers, and multiplying those with money. We will also be working on writing our explanation of how we multiply, in words. That is tough for them to do. They can do it, but to actually take the time to write down the steps of how they did is, requires a lot of brain work!

 

Just a reminder that we have our field trip on Friday. We will be leaving at 8:30 and should be returning by 1:15. We will be eating our lunch in Fort Dodge before we return. This should be a fun and informative field trip for the students. Again we appreciate the donations given to this program from local area donors!

 

As always, please call with any questions/concerns!

 

Sincerely,

Chris Mallen

 

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

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

 

Mallen's Monday Memo February 11, 2013

Monday Memo

February 11, 2013

 

Dear Parents,

 

I hope everyone had a nice weekend! Last week we finished our social studies study over the Southeastern Region. I sent the test scores home with the students on Friday. We were also treated to  a jazz band performance on Friday morning. It gave the students a nice taste of what being in band can offer you. I think they really enjoyed the music! This week we are filled with a lot of activities. We will be MAP testing on Tues., Wed., and Thurs. of this week and we will be finishing on the 20^th. We will be testing for an hour a day in the subject areas of Language arts, Math, and Reading. We will also be going to the Belmond Rehabilitation Center on Wednesday afternoon. We will be playing Spring Jingo. We always look forward to our trip over there!! On Thursday we will be having our Valentine’s party. It begins at 2:15. I would like to thank Marco’s mother and Abbie’s mother in advance for their time and effort in putting our parties together. We are so fortunate to have had such wonderful parties put on by our room mothers this year!! Thanks to you all!! I have attached a class list of the students for their Valentines if you wish for your children to bring them. I am asking the students to bring their Valentine box, sack… from home any day this week. Unfortunately we just don’t have time in class to make them so I thank-you for helping them bring some kind of Valentine container to school!!

 

In Reading this week, we will be reading a selection entitled “Sing to the Stars”. This story is a fun story about a child who is trying to find a place to play music and not bother other people. It is a part of our problem solver unit. We have enjoyed listening to a variety of stories about people who have made a difference in other’s lives and who have been problem solvers in their own life. This week we will be working on the skills:  Vocabulary, Comprehension, story structure, and analogies.  Our grammar this week is over making and comparing adjectives. We will also be talking about the proper use of the words good, better, and best. In Spelling, our words follow the VCCV pattern and the word list is attached to this memo.

 

We will be starting a Rocks and Minerals unit in Science this week. This is always one of the student’s favorites as they get the chance to touch and feel different kinds of rocks… We will be focusing on minerals, types of rocks, and the rock cycle, this week.

 

The students have a new book entitled The Secret School which needs to be test over by February 19^th. They will be reading a poem book by Sharon Creech to end their February books. By reading and passing the quiz over the two books I have required of them, that will give them a 3 in their comprehension grade. If they pass more than 3 quizzes from independently read books, they will receive a 4 in their comprehension grade.

 

Just a reminder that the students don’t have school on Friday and Monday. I hope everyone enjoys that long holiday!! I will have another Monday Memo the 18^th of February. As always, if you have any questions or concerns please feel free to contact me!!

 

Sincerely,

Chris Mallen

 

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

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

Class List:

 

Deserae

Keagan

Alexis

Madison

Abigail

Alex

Jaden

Maddison

Kenedie

Marcos

Remington

Malachi

Hannah

Kannon

Carson

Jordan

September

Emily

Maria

Jason

Mallen's Monday Memo January 28, 2013

Monday Memo

January 27, 2013

 

 

Dear Parents,

 

I hope everyone had a great weekend!! I think the kids really enjoyed going bowling last week! I also think they got really tired of indoor recessJ Hopefully it will warm up a bit soon and they can go back outside. Map testing begins this week and I don’t think we will be starting until next week. I will put more about that in my next memo.

 

This week in our “Problem Solvers” unit, we are reading a story entitled The Last Dragon. It is the story of a little boy who sees a puppet dragon in the window and the lengths he goes through to restore it back to its former condition. The students will be working on a variety of skills throughout this story including:  Comprehension, Vocabulary, the prefixes pre, con, com, drawing conclusions, following directions, and the suffixes ful, less, and ly.  Grammar this week has us working on adjectives. We have covered a few parts of speech so far this year:  Nouns (and the different kinds of nouns), Verbs (and the different kinds of verbs) and now we will start learning about adjectives and how they can improve our writing… Our spelling words this week have the final /j/ and /s/ sounds and the list is attached to this memo.

 

We are going to be working on multiplying 3D x 1D numbers this week, choosing a computation method, and multiplying money. Now I think the students are understanding why it was so important to learn their multiplication facts! It sure makes their life easier in math, to have those memorized. Again, thank-you for helping them with those!

 

We didn’t get as far with social studies as I had planned last week, so this week on Thursday, they will be taking home their study guides for a test on Friday. Next week, we will see how Map Testing goes. Our next region is the Northeast Region and we will be talking about rocks and minerals in Science.

 

Upcoming Event:  KC Spelling Bee:  February 8 at 4:00 in my classroom. The spelling lists and entry forms are in my classroom.

 

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

Sincerely,

Chris Mallen

Phone:  444-3093 (Home)  444-3500 Ext. 336 (School)

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

Mallen's Monday Memo January 21, 2013

Monday Memo

January 21, 2013

 

Dear Parents,

 

I hope everyone had a great weekend and Happy Martin Luther King Jr. Birthday!

Speaking of him, we are going to be doing a little of activities involving this great hero of ours. 

 

This week in reading, we are in our unit on problem solvers. We will be reading a story about a little boy who has to live away from his family due to health issues. The story takes place in the early 1900’s. He has to work with people who don’t speak his language and are quite a bit older than him. It shows how he was able overcome all of those obstacles and succeed. Talking of Martin Luther King Jr. and many famous African Americans during those times, works quite well into our problem solvers theme. We will also be working on a lot of skills over this story including, comprehension, vocabulary, questioning techniques, note taking and a health link over winter survival.  Our grammar this week is over irregular verbs. Our spelling has us working with words with a final e on them.

 

For Math, we will be starting our new unit on multiplying with 2 and 3 digits. We tested over our chapter 4 on Friday and I sent the results home with the students. If all goes right, we will be finishing our social studies unit this week, with a study guide going home on Thursday night for a test on Friday.

 

I realize this is a rather short Monday Memo, so I will just take this moment to let you know that I am really happy with the way the students are progressing. It is showing in their test scores, SRI scores… Keep having them read 15 minutes a night (or more) as it is the greatest way to see progress on their SRI and it is excellent practice in the area of reading. All of them have tested over The Jacket and are on their second book for the month. Many are on their third or fourth book. Keep that upJ Unfortunately The Diary of a Wimpy Kid book that I gave some for Christmas doesn’t have a quiz yet because it is so new. So, today at library, those students are going to pick out a book (some already have one) to read for their second book. On February 4, I will be giving the students a Sharon Creech poetry book that is really fun to read. That will cover the poetry genre. It is also an RC quiz book.

 

As always, please call with any questions/concerns!!

 

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 14, 2013

Monday Memo

January 14, 2013

Dear Parents,

I hope everyone had a nice weekend! We really worked hard last week and accomplished so much!!  We finished our “Amazing Stories” unit in reading. Our final test for the unit was on Thursday. I sent the results home with your child. Our new unit is entitled “Problem Solvers”. The stories are about people who have overcome difficulties to become very successful in life. Our first story is entitled My Name is Maria Isabel. This story is about a girl who has a difficult problem to solve.  We will be working on the following skills this week:  Vocabulary, Comprehension, prediction, discussing the genre of realistic fiction, words with the suffix –ible, using commas correctly, and writing an opinion. Our grammar lessons this week are about the forms of the verb “be”. Our spelling words are words with the /k/ sound spelled ck, k, or c and words with the /kw/ sound spelled qu and words with the /ng/ sounds. The list is attached to this memo.

We are finishing our 4^th chapter in math this week, with our test on Friday. This week we will be looking at misleading graphs and problem solving. We will be doing a lot of review this week to prepare for Friday’s test. We will start our 5^th Chapter on Monday.

In Science, we will be finishing up on our Earthquakes and Volcanoes unit. A study guide will go home with the students on Wednesday, with the test on Thursday. I will also be sharing some of the books I have about Earthquakes and Volcanoes. For Social Studies we will be continuing to learn about the Southeastern Region of the United States. This week we will talk about Colonial Williamsburg and then discuss how a new government was built.

The end of our second quarter is today. So hard to believe we are at the second semester point already!! Time surely flies!!

I hope you have a great week!

Sincerely,

Chris Mallen

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

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

Mallen's Monday Memo January 7, 2013

Monday Memo

January 7, 2013

Dear Parents,

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday! I would like to thank-you so very much for thinking of me this holiday season. I truly appreciate the extremely generous gifts I received from you. I also want to thank-you for having your child work on the “Pay it Forward” concept. It was awesome hearing the stories of how they helped others… We placed 4^th in the food pantry “contest” with 72 items of food brought. That is fantastic and such a help to the food pantry!! We also were able to give money to the cheer fund which resulted in a very kind thank-you from them that was shared with the students. Hopefully they all felt the joy of giving at some point during their Christmas holiday! We also enjoyed our time at the care center. We played Christmas Jingo with them and I think the kids and the residents all enjoyed their time together. We will be going back around Valentine’s Day. I want to thank Maria Vara’s mother and Deserea Abele’s mother for the wonderful Christmas party they threw for our class! The students had a great time and I appreciate the time and effort put into planning and putting on the party!!

This week we will be working on a variation of the Cinderella folk tale. The title is Cendrillion. We will be working on the following skills for this story:  Comprehension, Vocabulary, Suffixes, and using the pronunciation key. We will also be listening to a variety of other countries’ versions of Cinderella and making some sequence posters over those stories. I sent the spelling list home with the students last week. Our test over those words will be on Thursday. Our grammar this week is over helping verbs and their role with action verbs.

In Math this week the students will be making graphs, working on median, mode and range, using the data from surveys, and how to read misleading graphs. For Science this week we are working on Earth Science. We will be discussing earthquakes and volcanoes. We are also working on the next chapter of the Southeastern Region of the United States.

Just a reminder that we have a teacher inservice on Friday. I sent book orders out on Wednesday. They are due on January 15^th. I also gave each an Andrew Clements book entitled The Jacket. It needs to be tested on by January 15^th. I gave them a reading counts book for Christmas that they can read when they finish The Jacket and they can add that to the two books read for the month!

Have a great week!

Sincerely,

Chris Mallen

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

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

Mallen's Monday Memo December 10, 2012

Monday Memo

December 12, 2011

Dear Parents,

I hope everyone had a great weekend! Just a reminder that with snow comes the need for snowpants and boots… It really helps them not have wet clothes all day and it helps keep our carpet from getting so wet. I have just a few reminders for this week. The Christmas program is on Thursday at 4:00. I will be with the kids in the vocal music room after the program. I will have a check out sheet that I am required to have you sign to take your children home. Thanks for doing that for us. The dress rehearsal is at the high school on Wednesday at 1:00. We have been doing a great job with food for the food pantry. Please keep sending it as it is a wonderful way for the kids to feel the giving in Christmas. Thank-you for helping them to “Pay it Forward”. Today is our first day of talking about what they did to help others. It really is fun to hear all they are doing. If you care to send $2.00 for the cheer fund, that would be great, and I need to get the money to them by December 18^th. Thanks for all you are doing to help our class continue to understand the power of giving. We will be going to the care center on Friday to play Christmas Jingo with our friends. It is such a joy to go there. This will also be my last Monday Memo until 2013. Thank-you for all you do in helping me help your children to be the best students they can be!

We are continuing our “Amazing Stories” theme. This week we will be reading a story entitled “Heat Wave”. It is an interesting story of weather gone wild. We will be working on comprehension and vocabulary, fantasy/realism, and comparing and contrasting the stories in this theme. Our grammar lessons are on the past, present and future tenses. Our spelling words all end in ed or ing. We will be working on our centers and small group this week as well.

In Math, we have started on Chapter 4. The students did a fantastic job with their Chapter 3 tests! I sent those home last Wednesday. Our Chapter 4 is about time, charts and graphs. I think they will do very well. We will continue having periodic timed multiplication tests, so keep working on those facts at home. Most are doing very well!! Our daily “buckets” are also one of my favorite things they do each day as it really reinforces everything we have been learning!

I am planning to give the Science test over the systems of the body, on Friday. If they just study their study guides, they should do very well. We are also finishing our first chapter over the Southeastern Region of the United States. Next week I am hoping for us to test over that before we leave.

Thank-you ahead of time to our room mothers for putting a Christmas party together with our kids. The party is planned for Wednesday, December 19^th at 12:45. Our room mothers for this party are Deserae’s mother and Maria’s mother. Thanks so much for your time and talent! The kids really appreciate it and have so much fun!! Just a reminder that it is an early dismissal day for our teacher inservice.

I wish everyone a wonderful Christmas and I hope everyone has a relaxing break!!

Sincerely,

Chris Mallen

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

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