January Curriculum Update

Happy New Year!

Please read below to see how Class 4-312 is hitting the ground and running in 2019.

Math
We kicked off the New Year by beginning Topic 11 of our math program. During this unit, students will learn about factors, prime and composite numbers, multiples, equivalent fractions, and ordering and comparing fractions. We are using our knowledge of multiplication and division to build on these more complex concepts. After our introduction to fractions in Topic 11, we will continue to develop our understanding of fractions in Topic 12 when we learn how to add and subtract fractions and work with mixed numbers and improper fractions.

Writing and Social Studies
We are continuing to learn about the theme and essential question of what it means to be free by studying the European migration to the New York area. In this interdisciplinary unit that blends social studies and writing, students are learning about the development of the 13 Colonies and what life was like during this time for Native Americans, colonists, and slaves. Students are strengthening their non-fiction reading skills by determining the main idea and supporting details and understanding how non-fiction text features support comprehension. Additionally, students have been learning note-taking strategies and how to pull out the most important information and respond to it with deeper inferences and wonderings. Over the next few days, students will choose a sub-topic they are interested in learning more about, and then they will begin a research report.

Reading
This week, we launched our realistic fiction book clubs. Students have been divided into small-group literature circles to allow for greater discussion, engagement, and individualized support. Each group meets twice a week to discuss the assigned reading while a teacher acts as a facilitator. The objective of each meeting is to practice reading strategies, which include monitoring literal comprehension, making inferences, tracking character change, determining character motivation, identifying theme and important life lessons, and considering author’s purpose. A dual objective of book clubs is for students to improve their listening and speaking skills by engaging in rich discussion with their peers. We encourage you to have conversations with your child about his/her book club text and any assignments that go along with it.

Last week, we started our read-aloud book, Out of My Mind by Sharon Draper. Please find the synopsis of this wonderful book below:

Eleven-year-old Melody has a photographic memory. Her head is like a video camera that is always recording. Always. And there's no delete button. She's the smartest kid in her whole school—but no one knows it. Most people--her teachers and doctors included--don't think she's capable of learning, and up until recently her school days consisted of listening to the same preschool-level alphabet lessons again and again and again. If only she could speak up, if only she could tell people what she thinks and knows . . . but she can't, because Melody can't talk. She can't walk. She can't write.

Being stuck inside her head is making Melody go out of her mind--that is, until she discovers something that will allow her to speak for the first time ever. At last Melody has a voice . . . but not everyone around her is ready to hear it.

Best,

R & L