Sunday, April 13, 2014
Poetry
April is National Poetry Month. Love that! We have several poetry activities we are working on in class. Students are writing poetry.
Students are creating poetry notebooks. Using the mod-podge technique, students are creating a collage of pictures, images, phrasing, and more.
Working together, students are able to explore different types of poems.
Students are reading poems. It was fun to hear one student exclaim, "I am reading Shakespeare!"
Students are also selecting a poem to memorize. Next week, students will be practicing their poems in class. Students should also practice their poems at home.
Wednesday, April 9, 2014
Mid-Week Email
Students have received daily printouts of missing work all week, and on Tuesday, Ms. Leom attached copies of every page each student needed to be successful. Please ask your fourth grader and check out School-View for more details. The permission slip is attached. Blue permission slips are being sent home with every fourth grader tonight. We WANT students to go!
Third Quarter Report Cards will be sent home Friday. Look for it please. Contact Mr. Greninger and Ms. Leom with any questions.
Information and Permission slips for our Friday May 16th trip will be sent home on Friday. Information about cost ($15) and chaperones are included. Please use the permission slip to indicate chaperone availability. Parents need a up-to-date background check filed in the District Office to be a chaperone.
Summer School Invitations will be sent home on Friday. If your child receives this two page information, please seriously consider their attendance. We know summer schedules are busy and transportation can be challenge. We want our students to be successful and gave careful consideration for each of our students. If you have questions after the invitations are sent home, please contact your fourth grader's homeroom teacher by email or phone.
We started practice tests this week in Communications. The tests begin in two weeks. We want students feeling confident. We want their goal to be improving from last year. We talked about a good night's sleep, eating a healthy breakfast, and NOT to be feeling nervous. These tests won't cause them to "fail" fourth grade. The tests will communicate to parents their progress. They will communicate to teachers and staff what we can do to better plan and support success. The tests need to be taken seriously. This is student's opportunity to "shine" and "show off" their hard work and learning during the school year. We also stressed taking your time.
It is a busy time of year!! Thank you for being involved!
Sincerly,
Corey Greninger
corey.greninger@milaca.k12.mn.us
982-7116
Michele Leom
michele.leom@milaca.k12.mn.us
982-7113
Tuesday, April 1, 2014
Out of My Mind
In March, Ms. Leom started reading the novel, Out of My Mind by Sharon Draper to her homeroom.
The book is told in the first person (from the perspective of the main character), Melody. She was born with cerebral palsy. As a result, she is a quadriplegic without the ability to speak. When she is a fifth grader, she experiences two significant first experiences: inclusion (attending regular education classes) and finding her voice using technology. Melody is an intelligent girl, who describes her experiences, frustrations, and dreams as she is trapped within her body.
As our Milaca Elementary school actively strives to be a safe places for all students, with our Olweus curriculum, this perspective of a population that may not be able to speak for itself opens a discussion for us.
Ms. Leom read this book over Winter Break (Winter Break and summer are some of her best opportunities to catch up on newer literature!). She couldn't put it down, and she couldn't wait to share this book with her students!! You know it is well-written book when students beg to hear it, and the whole room quiets so you could hear a pin drop with anticipation when the reading begins.
Ask your fourth grader to share with you their thoughts about this book.
As our Milaca Elementary school actively strives to be a safe places for all students, with our Olweus curriculum, this perspective of a population that may not be able to speak for itself opens a discussion for us.
Ms. Leom read this book over Winter Break (Winter Break and summer are some of her best opportunities to catch up on newer literature!). She couldn't put it down, and she couldn't wait to share this book with her students!! You know it is well-written book when students beg to hear it, and the whole room quiets so you could hear a pin drop with anticipation when the reading begins.
Ask your fourth grader to share with you their thoughts about this book.
Main Idea / Theme
Mr. Greninger and Ms. Leom are both looking at making EVERY MINUTE of the day effective and preparing students for our MCAs (state tests in Reading in Math). Starting next week, Mr. Greninger will be pulling fifteen extra minutes from Science for extra Math teaching and practice. Ms. Leom already teaches and has students practice reading and comprehension skills in Social Studies. Both teachers have been using morning work time to focus on specific skills.
For the Reading test, a big portion of the test is for students to successfully determine the main idea or theme of their writing in addition to comprehension skills. We use main idea for nonfiction texts and theme for fiction texts. The change to Common Core has a stronger focus on nonfiction texts, so we have invested more time in nonfiction. For the past few weeks, students have read an article every morning for morning work and answered questions. Many times the questions reflect other testing skills; such as, fact and opinion, compare and contrast, cause and effect, setting, and more. When class starts, we reread the article together, discuss the questions, eliminating the obvious choices and discuss the answers we select. Then, we've been working on the main idea and the theme.
Ms. Leom does "think alouds" to model our steps ... "I am thinking about ..."
We start by looking at the title.
We look at key words and phrases that are repeated throughout.
We read the first and last lines of the article.
We find the introductory paragraph (tells us what the article is about) and closure paragraph (ties up and rewords the article). The middle paragraphs are the detail paragraphs. For the details (in figuring out the main idea), you try to reword the detail paragraph in one sentence.
Then we look at our three (or more) detail sentences to determine our conclusion.
We spent over two weeks working on main idea together on the board. Ms. Leom has given a few opportunities to practice independently. It gives her feedback about ways we can improve and what she needs to reteach and model. For example, for the main idea, "it is about (insert topic here)" isn't specific enough or "facts about (insert topic here)" needs more specific terms and words from the article. This week, students started thinking aloud and completing the main idea on the board. We will continue to practice in the coming weeks.
Here is an example of today's practice with one of the classes.
It is exciting to listen and watch our progress. More and more students are successfully and confidently participating in our daily practice.
For the Reading test, a big portion of the test is for students to successfully determine the main idea or theme of their writing in addition to comprehension skills. We use main idea for nonfiction texts and theme for fiction texts. The change to Common Core has a stronger focus on nonfiction texts, so we have invested more time in nonfiction. For the past few weeks, students have read an article every morning for morning work and answered questions. Many times the questions reflect other testing skills; such as, fact and opinion, compare and contrast, cause and effect, setting, and more. When class starts, we reread the article together, discuss the questions, eliminating the obvious choices and discuss the answers we select. Then, we've been working on the main idea and the theme.
Ms. Leom does "think alouds" to model our steps ... "I am thinking about ..."
We start by looking at the title.
We look at key words and phrases that are repeated throughout.
We read the first and last lines of the article.
We find the introductory paragraph (tells us what the article is about) and closure paragraph (ties up and rewords the article). The middle paragraphs are the detail paragraphs. For the details (in figuring out the main idea), you try to reword the detail paragraph in one sentence.
Then we look at our three (or more) detail sentences to determine our conclusion.
We spent over two weeks working on main idea together on the board. Ms. Leom has given a few opportunities to practice independently. It gives her feedback about ways we can improve and what she needs to reteach and model. For example, for the main idea, "it is about (insert topic here)" isn't specific enough or "facts about (insert topic here)" needs more specific terms and words from the article. This week, students started thinking aloud and completing the main idea on the board. We will continue to practice in the coming weeks.
Here is an example of today's practice with one of the classes.
Blue Shirts
April is Child Abuse Prevention Month at Milaca. Mrs. Stupar has several activities planned to bring awareness to this issue.
First, Milaca Elementary students are invited to go on a quest to find ten blue ribbons displayed on Milaca businesses. Students record the participating business and the ribbon's message. When the journey is complete, students turn in their blue paper. They are invited to the Ice Cream Social on Friday May 9th.
Students in fourth and fifth grade will be drawing posters about preventing abuse in Art. These posters will be voted on (no names available) and prizes will be given.
Today, to kick off this event, students and staff are invited to wear blue shirts to bring awareness.
Today a reporter from the Mille Lacs County Times came into our school to gather information for an article he is writing about Milaca Elementary's effort to bring awareness to Child Abuse Prevention Month. He took pictures of students in Mr. Greninger and Ms. Leom's classes. (Sometimes it helps when staff know you are "open" to having your picture taken ...).
The class with the highest percentage of blue shirts was awarded an ice cream party! (It wasn't us! We were at 83%.)
First, Milaca Elementary students are invited to go on a quest to find ten blue ribbons displayed on Milaca businesses. Students record the participating business and the ribbon's message. When the journey is complete, students turn in their blue paper. They are invited to the Ice Cream Social on Friday May 9th.
Students in fourth and fifth grade will be drawing posters about preventing abuse in Art. These posters will be voted on (no names available) and prizes will be given.
Today, to kick off this event, students and staff are invited to wear blue shirts to bring awareness.
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| Our social worker, Mrs. Stupar and Mille Lacs County Time reporter, Mr. Joel Stottrup |
Food Pantry
In March, the Milaca Elementary collects food for the Milaca Food Pantry. Many of our families directly benefit from this community program.
On Monday March 31, Ms. Anderson's Reading Flex students walked to the Milaca Pantry to help organized the elementary donation. In one hour of work, they were not able to sort through all of the food donated!
Thank you to all the families who were able to participate! Your donation matters!!
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| Food gathered from Ms. Leom's students |
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| Food gather from Mr. Greninger's students |
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| Ms. Anderson's Fourth Grade Flex Group arriving at the Pantry |
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| working in the pantry |
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| fourth graders in the pantry entrance |
Electronics Reward
On Friday March 28th, we had an Electronics Reward! It was the last day of the THIRD Quarter, and we wanted all students to be successful and their success to be reflected on their report card.
Here are images from one of the three reward rooms.
Congratulations to ALL of our responsible students!!
Here are images from one of the three reward rooms.
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