A Brief look at our first week:

Dear Parents,

It was wonderful meeting you all on Thursday.  Thank you for making the time to come to Archway Arete so we could introduce ourselves to both you and your child.  There is always a bit of nervous, yet excited energy that comes with changing schools and teachers.  Now your child has knowledge of his/her teachers and knows where to go, tomorrow.    We look forward to a wonderful year teaching and getting to know your child.

Please have your child bring a clean sock to be used as a dry erase marker holder and an eraser for a white board.  Darker colors work well, because they don’t show the dirt!  I’m confident that you have a sock that has lost its mate somewhere around.  Please send this in, tomorrow.

LANGUAGE ARTS 

                SPALDING:  We will begin Spalding, our Phonics and Spelling program on Monday. We will begin with basic features like sitting position, pencil grip, and making strokes. We will start learning phonograms as early as Tuesday. Children will not have Spalding homework now, but they will begin to have Spalding homework after our “Curriculum night”. I encourage you all to join us so that you know how to support your child while they are doing homework.

                

  We are also beginning Charlotte’s Web and plan to get through the first four chapters this week. Please have your child bring their book to school.

          

We will also begin our Writing With Ease  curriculum. Children will begin to copy model sentences and listen to dictation as sentences are read out loud to them. In subsequent emals I will go in-depth to describe each of these curriculum pieces at length. 

MATH

 We are focusing on scholar’s depth of knowledge, not just whether or not they can perform an algorithm.  We stress the “why before the how,” so to speak and encourage students to prove what they are doing so we can verify understanding.  Because of this, we are asking that students NOT go ahead in the Singapore Workbook, even if they “know how to do it.”  We would appreciate your reinforcing this message at home.

We will be reviewing concepts from last year, this first week to see where the scholars’ understanding lies.  We will begin with a pre-test on Tuesday, August 12. We would like all students to solidly know their addition facts to 10.  A good website with activities is ,GregTangMath.com.  Automaticity of arithmetic facts is a crucial foundation for all we do in math.  Does your child know his/her math facts or do they have to stop and count fingers, a number line, or count in his/her head?  If so, your child is still counting to find the answer, they have not yet internalized the addition of the numbers.  We are going to work on that fluency this week, but we need your help to commit to working on math facts at home, as well.  Fact fluency is similar to reading fluency.  If a child needs to slow down to figure out the addition or subtraction, his/her comprehension of the problem is compromised. 

SCIENCE

We will begin our study in Science with the study of the Water Cycle. In the course of learning this unit , we will be performing some water experiment. 

HISTORY

Our geography will begin with the study of continents, oceans and maps (compass rose, legend, cardinal directions, etc.) . We will complete this unit by focusing on the Geography of North, South and Central America. 

Homework Folders and Agendas - The Homework Folders will be red.  Please check inside to see what is to be done and returned the following day.  We would appreciate your help in establishing good work habits at home.  Homework is expected back the next day, unless otherwise stated.  Please check the agendas for information.