APRIL+6

=__**APRIL 6**__= ==** What a fun afternoon we had on Friday! We'd like to send a HUGE thank-you to Jill McCoy, Connor's mom, who is a pharmacist at Target. She gave a great presentation about her job, and then the kids moved from station to station and became pharmacists themselves! They donned lab coats, used a mortar and pestle to grind "medicine", practiced measuring out correct dosages of liquid "medicine", and got to count "pills" into their own prescription bottles! Thank you, Mrs. McCoy, for a wonderfully fun and educational presentation! **==


 * We are scheduled with another guest next Friday, but the rest of our Fridays are open! We'd love to entertain more guest speakers during these last weeks of school, so please consider making a visit to our rooms! **

__** ANNOUNCEMENTS AND UPCOMING DATES :**__ **Week of Apr. 9**...Iowa Assessments (formerly known as Iowa Tests of Basic Skills) //Please make sure your child is present and well-rested each morning, and has eaten a healthy breakfast! Number 2 pencils are required.// **Mon., Apr. 23**...NO SCHOOL. Professional Development for teachers.

//**For this final quarter, all of us in Gr. K-5 are adding a 1, 2, or 3 to the Success Charts if a student loses a stamp. We will still write what happened, but the addition of the number(s) will help with our data collection, and will also better inform you of which Bulldog Belief was being misused. 1 means there was a lack of respect, 2 a lack of responsibility, and 3 a lack of safety. **//

**If your child is going to be absent for a few days due to a family trip, please let us know with a note in advance so we may gather homework to send with you. We can't always have //everything// ready to go, but it's very helpful to the teachers and the office to be aware of extended absences ahead of time. Thank you!**

=== Both homerooms will have a "Homework Club" each quarter. We will keep a chart in our rooms, tracking which students return their homework packets on time each week. Students who consistently return their packets each week will be rewarded at the end of each quarter! ===

=== //We have been informed that the kitchen can no longer store items that need to be frozen or refrigerated. You will need to provide a cooler if your child is bringing treats that require refrigeration. Thank you for your cooperation.// ===

Our field trip to Neal Smith Wildlife Refuge is scheduled for Friday, May 4th. Permission slips have been sent home. Please be sure to sign and return the form. If you are interested in chaperoning, please let your child's teacher know by April 13th so that arrangements can be made and finalized.

__**LITERACY:**__
We are continuing to introduce the 6-Traits of Writing. We have focused on the traits of Ideas, Organization, and most recently, Word Choice. In reading, we are making predictions and connections. We are using context clues, identifying main events, questioning, inferring and summarizing. Please encourage your child to read at home.

__SCIENCE:__
We took a break from science this week to become "TEST BUSTERS"! This is a unit to prepare the 3rd graders for their first year of Iowa Assessments. The kids learned about the value of a good night's rest and a healthy breakfast. They learned relaxation techniques for chasing away the "Stress Monster". They learned how to be prepared for the test, how to work at a "middle speed" (ask them what a Turbit is!!), and how to work back and forth between the test booklet and the "bubble" answer sheet. They also learned the value of Iowa Assessments as a chance to show off their 'brain power"! Hopefully this week of Test Buster training will make for smooth and successful testing days next week!

__**SOCIAL STUDIES:**__
==== The objectives this chapter are to analyze the role of natural resources in creating new communities and to describe some ways that communities change as they grow. They will be discussing why natural resources are important to industry, and they will give examples of the ways factories changed communities. The students will be responsible for listing some of the reasons immigrants came to the U.S., and they will be describing how communities changed when large numbers of immigrants came to the U.S. Finally, the students will explain how the automobile changed how and where people lived and worked, and students will identify changes made during the last century to provide people with better transportation. ==== We read, investigated, and compared Alice Ramsey and Amelia Earhart. Ask your child for more information about these two amazing women.

The Country Project has started! Each student has chosen a country that they will research. Some students chose to work with a partner and some preferred to work independently. Please check with your child about their country choice and then visit the following link to find out more! Mrs. Volk's Google Site

The Country Potluck is scheduled for Tuesday, May 15th from 5:30-6:30 p.m. in the school cafeteria. Please visit the above google site for more information. ==== Check with your child about Daily Detective. The purpose of this project is to not only help the students learn about the countries of the world, but also to help them research. Each day a new clue will go up on our 'detective board'. The students will be able to write the clue down and bring it home so that you can, if needed, help your child to identify the country. The clues start out very broad and as the week goes on, get more specific. Please ask your child about Daily Detective and each daily clue. ==== Last week's successful detectives were: Lucy, Jonathan, Isaac, Jonah, Jaden, Tico, and Sean.

__**MRS. VOLK:**__
IOWA ASSESSMENT NOTE: I sent home information regarding the Iowa Assessments yesterday. In the note it says that we will be testing Monday-Thursday mornings. I will not be in school on Thursday so I will not be testing that day, but will finish the tests on Friday. Again, we will test Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings. Thank you.

I sent home the final book order of the year. Please consider ordering books for summer reading. If you would like to order on-line, please access scholastic.com/bookclubs and enter the class activation code of GXPY2. Orders are due on April 13th. Thanks

Your child has been registered for Sumdog.com. This is a site that will help your child practice their math facts. Each student was given a username and password. They are encouraged to use this site at home.

Please continue to encourage your child to complete and return their weekly homework packet. Some students are not returning their packets in a timely fashion, if at all. Please be looking for those each Monday and they are to be returned on Thursday. Thank you to those students who are completing and returning their packets each week. You are showing responsibility when you do so!

I sent home a reading calendar for April but did not specify a reading goal. I want the students to set their own reading goal...not too little, give a bit of a challenge, but not over the top either. :) Your child may opt to talk to you for a little guidance on setting an appropriate reading goal. Thanks for your reading support at home.

Congratulations to Tico, Kylie, Josie, Lucy, Max, Ethan, Anthony, Isaac, Sophia, Allen, London, and Kaia for meeting the March Book-It reading goal.

A separate CONGRATULATIONS goes to Tico, Kylie, Josie, Lucy, Max, Ethan, Anthony, Allen, and London for meeting the reading goal all 6 months. A special 'something' is coming your way!

**__MRS. SKAHILL/MISS STEPHENS__** **__Scholastic book orders are due FRIDAY, APRIL 13!!__**

** LILY, KENNEDY, EMMA, CONNOR, and SYDNEY **
Just a reminder: Spelling word lists are handed out at the //beginning// of each unit so they can be studied in preparation for the cloze test. Watch for the word lists glued into the planner. As mentioned previously, we won't be taking a cloze test every week...we work up to tests as we go through the word/phonics lessons in each unit.