We're making progress!!

Dear families,
Where did the January go? Your children are working hard and I'm seeing progress across all subject areas, but especially in writing. One of the strategies we use in class in order to find and correct errors is reading a finished piece of writing to a friend. It's amazing how this simple exercise helps students improve their work.
As I mentioned in my last Blog, report cards are coming. Teachers are turning in their evaluations on Monday, February 2nd, so you will be receiving them shortly after that. In some cases, I will be having your child assessed to move into a different level. The decision to move a child to a different level is based on test scores and classwork. If this occurs, I will send home notification with the weekly paperwork you receive.
In my Language Arts class, I am going to start your children reading from a Literature Anthology. The vocabulary is more advanced and I believe the students will enjoy the variety of activities offered. I had some students read a selection today, and they were very interested.
Projects are going well! On Monday, your children should have come home with labels marked, "Spend", "Share", and "Save". They were asked to label three containers and decide how they wanted to use their allowance (if they get an allowance). The idea is for them to understand the ways people use money. We discussed short and long term saving goals and giving to charities. They also learned about bartering and why money evolved. Since the end product of this project will be to open a school store, they also spent time learning how to make change. We will also be looking at costs and profits. On February 9th, a speaker (Stephen Pullom's) dad will be explaining the history of money. Stephen's dad is working on his Ph.D in History!
For our Solar System project, students have had the opportunity to create a scale model and convert distances from kilometers to centimeters. They learned an easy way to divide by 10,000,000! Our scale model went on paper first and next week will be created with the edibles I mentioned in my last Blog.
That's it for now! As always, if you have any questions or concers, please email me.
Kim