Week 6

Happy Friday!

We had a very busy day today, with our assembly and a birthday to celebrate! A few quick things for next week: Please try not to miss school Wednesday or Thursday morning. On Wednesday we will have our vision and hearing screenings in the nurse's office. Thursday is school picture day! A form went home yesterday to pre-order pictures. Our time is at 8:15, so please come to school with shirts tucked in and hair nicely combed! We also have Math/Phonics Night from 6-7:30 pm on Wednesday. This will be a great opportunity to see the curriculum in action, as you take on the role of student. :)

Our first assembly - Grandparent's Day

Responsibility Virtue Award Winners: Way to go, Lily!

Here's what we have coming up!

Literature: We are continuing Cinderella stories from around the world! This week we will read about Pear Blossom and Yeh-Shen (the Korean and Chinese versions of our classic tale). On Friday we will reflect on our favorite version of the story and decorate a shoe for Cinderella.
Homework: Please bring in Owl at Home this week if you have not done so yet. We will begin reading it next week!

Spalding: We have 30 words as normal this week and will test on Friday! Homework will be the same formatting as last week since it worked well; however, we will make the word break down a little clearer on the master page for which words need to be practiced each night.

Monday: live, live, hill, late, big, bag, beg, bog, bug (10 words)
Tuesday: mother, three, land, cold, hot, hat, child, ice, play, sea, see (11 words)
Wednesday: bird, cool, earth, feed, fur, green, oil, paint, pool (9 words)

Phonograms to practice: h, m, n, o, u, ai, ea, ee, oi, ur

Writing: In writing, we have copy work and narration exercises from Mary Poppins!

Grammar: In grammar, we will begin our Question and Answer flow. Students will learn how to use this flow to name the parts of a sentence, with an emphasis on nouns and verbs this week. For example, “Dogs played.” Who played? The dogs (dogs = subject noun) What did the dogs do? They played (played = verb)

Poem: “The Pasture” by Robert Frost – Please practice stanza 2. We will recite next week!

Idiom/Proverb: If at first you don’t succeed, then try, try again. (This ties in nicely with our virtue of perseverance!)

Math: We will start off our math week by reviewing everything we have learned about addition so far with some interactive games and new activities. I'm looking forward to seeing how much everyone has learned about addition facts within 10, number bonds, counting, and all other important addition skills. On Wednesday, we will take a cumulative addition test which will allow us to demonstrate what we know and also move on to a very new and exciting unit - subtraction! Many of us have already been so excited about subtraction and have demonstrated our "take away" knowledge, so I can't wait to keep learning together.

History: This week in History we will be learning about ancient history and civilizations from long ago. Students will become aware of where they fit on the historical time line and learn about how people from the past learned to exist with things that surrounded them. They will learn about the basic needs of food, clothing, and shelter, and also realize how we still have those basic needs today.

Science: This week we will continue to learn about habitats and the plants and animals that live in them. The class will learn about two different water habitats: ponds and oceans. The students will study the different ocean zones and learn about how the environment changes in deep water. We will wrap up our habitat unit by completing the world habitat mobile and discussing similarities and differences between all habitats covered.

Have a FANTASTIC weekend!

Week 5!

Good morning! I hope everyone enjoyed their long weekend of rest and relaxation. Can you believe we are already a month into school? Time really does fly when you are having fun and learning lots of new things, of course :)! We are diving right into this second month of school, here's what's coming up: 

Literature: We are continuing to study stories from around the world, but this time we are comparing Cinderella stories! We will be reading the Western version that is very familiar and comparing it to the Egyptian version (Rhodopis). We will also read a story called “Billy Beg,” a Cinderella story with an interesting twist – a male main character! J

Spalding: Due to the holiday on Monday, we will only have 19 words this week! There will be two old words “have” and “are”. These will help us to review jobs of silent final e and apply job 5 to a new word. Our Spelling Test will be on Friday as normal! Please note that the phonograms on the sheet going home every Monday are the phonograms we are testing on Fridays (on the back of the Spelling Test). Please have your child practice the sounds of these two phonograms each night! We will also move to writing our words 3 times, instead of 2. For the third time, your child may copy the words without markings. Please dictate the words as though it were a spelling test so that the words are practiced and memorized for the first two columns. (This means it should not be completed during study hall after school; math and reading can be done during this time instead!)

Tuesday: today, look, did, like, six, boy, book, by, have, are

Wednesday: had, over, must, make, street, say, come, hand, ring

Writing: In Writing with Ease, our stories this week come from the Grimm Brothers: “The Frog Prince”.

Grammar: We are very excited to learn a new jingle this week, as we begin our study of verbs! We will be learning about action and linking verbs, with more of an emphasis on action verbs this week. Students will identify verbs in sentences and create phrases with subject noun and verb pairs. We will play some sorting games with nouns and verbs to get students up and moving as well!

Poem: We are beginning a new poem this week called “The Pasture” by Robert Frost. We will study stanza 1 this week, stanza 2 the following week, and practice the poem in its entirety and recite at the end of the 3^rd week. (Recitations on September 22 and 23)

Idiom: Review of our first three idioms: Sour Grapes, Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing, and Golden Rule

Math: This week we will practice writing addition sentences and stories and students will work together to create their own numbers stories. We will also be moving towards even better mastery of addition as we practice our addition facts and begin to commit number combinations for numbers 1-10 to memory. I'm looking forward to using many different visuals and hands on activities this week to help everyone stay engaged and enthused. 

History: This week we will finish learning about the landforms of the earth.  We will discuss and recognize the equator, northern and southern hemisphere, and the prime meridian.  We will read a book about our individual location on the globe, and then do an activity in relation to the information.

Science: This week we will study habitats and the plants and animals that live in them. We will be focusing on polar regions and rainforests. We will review some of the habitats that we have learned about so far, and we will find similarities and differences between them. We will also continue to add on to our world habitats mobiles!

 Here's to another wonderful week!

Happy Friday!

Happy Friday!

We gained our last letter in "Responsibility" (our August virtue of the month), so we got a special treat at the end of the day! Since we have been studying habitats in science and learned about the underground habitat and earth worms this week, we ate dirt cups!

Here is a video we watched about earth worms!

Have a fabulous 3-day weekend! :)

Grandparent's Day

Grandparent's Day ~ RSVP here!

As a grandparent of an Archway Arete student, we hope you can join us for our first annual Grandparents Day Event! Coffee and refreshments will be served in our new library with the headmaster at 8am. An assembly begins at 8:30am where you can enjoy a song and poem recitation by our students. Virtue awards will also be presented. After the assembly you will have the chance to sign up for our special "Heritage Society" and have a tour of our campus. We hope you can join us for this special event!

Reserved parking in the front of the building will begin at 8am and please sign in at the front office desk before proceeding to the library or assembly. Overflow parking will be available at "The Falls" event center just East of our campus on Baseline Road.

Week 4

Good afternoon!

I hope everyone has a had a restful weekend! We have a big week ahead with DIBELS testing and our poetry recitations! The upcoming 3-day weekend will be well deserved! :) Here's what's on the agenda:

Literature:
This week we are continuing our Tom Thumb stories from around the world! We will read “Little Finger of the Watermelon Patch,” a story from Vietnam. Then we will compare and contrast the characters of Tom Thumb, Issun Boshi, Thumbelina, and Little Finger. There will be a small assessment on Thursday.

Spalding: There are 29 spelling words this week! Some of these words have silent e’s! Here’s how we remember them:

Job 1 – “vowel, consonant, e” (ex: time – e helps the i say i)
Job 2 – “v, u – job 2!” (ex: have, blue)
Job 3 – “c, g – job 3!” (ex: chance, charge – notice how the e helps the c/g say its second sound)
Job 4 – Every syllable must have a vowel. (ex: little)
Job 5 – no job e! (ex: are)

Please practice the following phonograms at home: b, d, g, r, t, ar, ay, ch, oo, ou. Spelling Test and McCall-Harby Reading Comprehension Test on Friday!

Words this week:
Monday: my, up, last, not, us, am, good, time, have, blue
Tuesday: chance, charge, little, are, ago, old, bad, red, of, be
Wednesday: but, this, all, your, you, out, may, into, him (Note: 9 words today!)

Grammar: We are learning about pronouns in grammar this week! We have a fun, interactive PowerPoint that will help us identify and come up with pronouns to make our sentences a little more interesting!

Writing: copy work and narration exercises from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

Poem: “Caterpillar” by Christina Rossetti – We will recite in partners on Friday!

Idiom: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. (Golden Rule)

Math: This week we will have our second math test - on Tuesday! We were blown away by our first math test scores and are excited to see how we do on Tuesday after our unit 2 review on Monday. The rest of the week will be very fun as we work together to dig deeper into what it means to "add". This will include writing number sentences, making our own unique number stories, and learning about the addition and equals signs.

Homework will be as follows: Monday- review test B, Tuesday- addition worksheet, Wednesday- WB 25-26, Thursday- WB 27-28, and Friday- WB 29-30

Geography:
This week in Geography we will be learning about the continents and oceans of the world.  Students will be able to locate the 7 continents (Europe, Africa, Asia, North and South America, Australia and Antarctica), and the 4 oceans (Pacific, Atlantic, Indian and Arctic) on a map,  and will be creating a booklet with facts about each continent.

Science:
This week in Science we are continuing to study habitats, this time focusing on the forest and prairie. We will also take a look at animals and plants that live underground. We will discuss adaptations and interactions within each of these habitats and work on a world habitats mobile!

Have a wonderful week! :)

Spalding Rules

Spalding Rules

(Note: This is a shortened list that includes the most common rules and rules that we will encounter in the first section (A-G) of spelling words. We will send home more rules as we encounter them!)

1 - The letter q is always followed by u, and together they say “kw”
2 - The letter c before e, i, or y says “s”
3 - The letter g before e, i, or y says “j”
4 - The vowels a, e, o, and u usually say their name at the end of a syllable:
“A may say “a” at the end of a syllable.”
“E may say “e” at the end of a syllable.”
“O may say “o” at the end of a syllable.”
“U may say “u” at the end of a syllable.”
5 - The letters i and y may say “i” at the end of a syllable:
“I may say “i” at the end of a syllable.”
“Y may say “i” at the end of a syllable.”
6 - “English words don’t end in i.”
8 - There are five spellings for the sound “er”. The phonogram /or/ may say “er” when it follows w. (Ex: works)
17 - We often double l, f, and s following a single vowel at the end of a one-syllable word.
18 - We often use /ay/ to say “a” at the end of a base word.
19 - Vowels i and o may say their name (“i” and “o”) when followed by two consonants. (Ex: find, old)

Week 3!

It's already time for another wonderful week of school! Last week we really got to know each other well as we worked together to master our Spalding phonograms, learn about different landforms and geography in History, and display our impressive singing skills with Ms. Weddle. Here is a video of the students singing during music class:

We can't wait to see what this third week of school brings as we venture forward and keep learning and working together: Here's what to expect for week 3:

Literature:

In Literature this week, we will be starting Tom Thumb stories from around the world! We will read and compare these similar stories from England, Japan, and Denmark. We will also start sending home leveled readers this week! Please have your child read through the stories one time each night to increase fluency. We will check fluency on Friday, and new books will go home every Monday. Homework is to read for 15 minutes every night; the readers probably will not take this entire time, so please have your child complete their reading with a fun book of their choice!

Spalding:

We are excited to begin spelling words this week! Please listen to your child sound out the words and check to make sure markings are correct. Our first spelling test will be on Friday. It will contain all 30 words, as well as the ten phonograms of the week. We will also take the McCall-Harby reading comprehension test every week after the spelling test. This consists of a short reading passage that we will read to the class. There are ten “yes”/“no” questions that the students will answer following the listening of the story. (Please note that this reading test is not weighted as heavily as the spelling tests!)

Writing:

In Writing, we are doing copy work and narration exercises from Rumpelstiltzkin.

Grammar:

We are continuing to study nouns and discussing the differences between common and proper nouns. There will be a small noun quiz on Friday!

Idiom:

“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” (the Golden Rule)

Poem:

“The Caterpillar” continued! Work on stanza 2 – we will be reciting soon! J

Math:

This week we will continue to strengthen our addition skills as we take on some interactive activities with number bonds, number stories, and matching number pairs. We will have a chance to practice combining parts to make a whole number and decipher how we can break down different whole numbers within 10 into two parts. Last, your super scholars will also be taking their 1st grade beginning of the year addition and subtraction Singapore assessment tests. We will make sure to allow a lot of room to breathe and re-assess as they navigate through these assessments.

History:

This week in Geography we will be studying bodies of water, such as oceans, lakes and rivers.  We will discover the major rivers of our own country and discuss why they are so valuable to the communities around them.  We will review landforms and bodies of water in preparation for a simple quiz on Monday using a variety of interactive mediums. The students should have a delightful time of discovery learning new vocabulary for this unit.

Science:

This week we will be begin a unit about habitats. During this unit, we will explore plants, animals, and environments around the world. The students will describe, compare, and contrast habitats. The first habitat that students will study is a familiar one: the desert. We will learn about how desert animals and plants are able to survive in that environment. We will also begin to explore forest habitats and learn about plants and animals that live in them.