Manoa Mountains News for February 7, 2008

The Manoa Mountains have been very busy with their regular classwork every day. Their Literature Circle work has included some legends about Kauai, and their vocabulary work has enabled them to learn the meanings of twenty new words this week. Their Writer's Workshop pieces are being edited by their peers. Six at a time are being published on the computers. There has been lots of activity during writing time!

Our math lessons have been challenging and fun. The third graders are working with perimeters, angles, and areas. Their polygon-building kits, made of different lengths of straws which the children will cut up, will enable them to create various sizes and types of polygons. We will also compare different types of triangles and quadrilaterals.

Test-taking preparations have involved the use of workbooks to familiarize the students with test-taking questions and a multiple choice format. They are doing a good job on their work. The third graders are also working on their D'Nealian Handwriting books to practice cursive writing.

Reading Log entries are getting better and better with more details and information about the characters. The clarity of the writing has improved, as everyone has taken the time to do a thorough job on the summaries and responses.  Drawings are becoming more detailed, too.

Now that everyone has brought their earphones to school, their Garageband compositions for music class are really taking off. They are learning to do some complex music composition.

Today we had the pleasure of celebrating the Chinese New Year of the Rat with a Chinese lion dance. The students all gave the lion a red envelope filled with four quarters as an offering so that they would receive good luck for the coming year.

The next project which is due for presentation is the book report, which everyone should be working on. The presentations will be on Monday, February 25, in our classroom beginning at 10:00 AM. We are hoping that many parents and grandparents will be able to join us for this sharing of projects.

Please turn in the "Jump Rope for Heart" permission forms and donation envelopes as soon as possible. The event will be held next Friday in the gym and should be lots of fun for everyone! We still need volunteers to help out at the event. We will be at the gym from 12:30 - 2:00 PM.

Posted on February 7, 2008 6:11 AM | Permalink