Marvelous Monday

This morning we read the story Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, by Judith Viorst and practiced retelling different events in the story from the point of view of other characters in the book. We also identified the mood and used aspects of the story to support our choice.

After that we defined fact and opinion. Then we identified statements as either fact or opinion.

Finally, we practiced making strong opinion statements about oil spills. Additionally, we used facts we learned from reading about the Exxon Valdez to support our statements.

This afternoon while I meet with reading groups the students will work on a worksheet focusing on point of view and mood in Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. They will also complete a fact/opinion worksheet. Finally, they will write an opinion statement about oil spills and use facts to defend their opinion. This planning sheet will eventually be used to write a persuasive letter to Congress.

In math we completed the unit 3 assessment. We will begin unit 4 tomorrow. This unit is geometry. We will begin by identifying different types of lines and angles.

Following music, lunch and outdoor recess the students worked independently while I met with reading groups.

Bears: We began reading and discussing chapter 6. For homework the children need to read all of chapter 6 and answer the question, on a sticky note, "Why do you think Sarah asks about winter?".

Lions: We discussed parts of chapter 5 including the rumor about Simon that caused children to be sacred of him. For homework the students need to reread chapter 5 and answer the question--What did father mean when he says, "seem she went to a lot of trouble for you." on page 55.

Crabs: We discussed what caused Grandpa to change. Tonight the students need to read chapter 6 and list unknown word on a sticky note.

We ended the day with a student reading a book, that he had brought from home, to the class. Then we tried, for the second time, to watch one of our students do a Mexican dance on video. Unfortunately, it failed to work, again! :-(