Comparing communities

November 6, 2007

Dear parents,
I hope you had a safe holiday and extra family time this past long weekend!

DANIEL had confidence that God would hear and answer his prayers, especially about interpreting the king’s dream in chapter 2. Our verse is our confident statement: Hebrews 13:6 I say with confidence,
“The Lord is my helper;
I will not be afraid. What can people do to me?”

MISSION SPOT on Fridays is led by Mr. and Mrs. Green, for an intense 15 minutes. We have learned about sacrifices and struggles of Wm. Carey and his family as missionaries to India. I have been delighted to see the keen interest of 2nd graders. Ask your child what he or she remembers about the Carey family.

READING Squanto gives us practice in phonics, vocabulary, and writing summaries of each chapter. Your children are reading with me, and then reading cooperatively with partners. It's an exciting way to learn on USA history.Someone even noted what happened to Squanto as a reminder of what happened to Joseph in the Bible.

ICE CREAM CELEBRATION Last Friday we celebrated all the reading your children have done outside class, since August, with ice cream and lots of sweet toppings! Now we begin going around the room again, with recorded titles of books. Thanks for encouraging your child to remember to read 20 minutes each evening.

BOOK BUDDIES Fifth graders read the library books your child has chosen after library time every other week. They are encouraging examples of better readers. Ms. D. and I are pleased with positive attitudes in all students.

COMMUNITY is a group of people living near each other.. Thanks to Sam Lara’s mom, we have “ECA Community” letters labeling our map of our observations on our field trip walk, on the wall. On Wednesday, your child’s map of his or her home community is due to come to school, and we will compare. We will also inspect a native American community, like Squanto’s, to see how they lived and found food. Soon we’ll compare with the early Pilgrims’ community, too.

MATH: Using green units and cubes we’ll practice changing and exchanging ones and tens so we can add and subtract larger numbers.

SPELLING list F contains 20 words that will be on Tuesday’s homework. Test is on Friday.

COMPUTER lessons are now taught by Mr. Hicks, who is more knowledgable in correct terminology that I am! I am thankful for his help in challenging my students to practice typing and learning new procedures.

MRS. MOLINA continues to rest and recover. We pray for her often, and miss her. Thank you to Katia’s mom, Sam’s mom, Esteban’s mom for helping us in class!

For the sake of the children,
Mrs. Glenda Moyer