Angry Verbs!

**For the new school year, 2012-2013, students in Room 121 created an updated version of Angry Verbs. CLICK HERE to check out the newest post--featuring tons of pictures and writing!

After being inspired by this Angry Verb bulletin board using the Angry Birds, I had my students review verbs as well by writing a sentence on an angry bird and underlining the verb/verbs.

During class project time on Monday (when some students were in Orchestra), a few students covered the door with butcher paper while several others began working on coloring the birds. Later on during Daily 5, students who were doing Word Work practiced finding verbs by creating their own Angry Verbs.

"Santa" Independent Clauses and Verb Tree

To learn about independent clauses, which are complete sentences that include both a subject and predicate, each of us created a "Santa" independent clause. First we wrote simple sentences on the hat; then we underlined the simple predicate (the verb), and we circled the simple subject (the noun). Later, we used our "Santa" independent clauses to decorate both sides of the door around our verb trees we made earlier in December. 

Weak Verbs vs Strong Verbs

Verb Snowmen

Last week we learned about the different types of verbs--action, linking, and helping--, and then we made verb snowmen using Tagxedo for the bodies, and our own creativity for the rest. It was a fun, festive way to review verbs as we are launching into our study of independent clauses this week!

Learning Highlights 10/10-10/21

Math
While we will be reviewing many, many prior concepts, these are the main concepts we are focusing on:

• more practice with adding & subtracting decimals
• multiplying decimals
• data & landmarks
• probability 
• rounding & estimating

To watch an interactive video on any of the above math concepts, go here and type in the concept in the search box in the upper right hand corner. 

Communication Arts

• making connections during Read-to-Self 
• text-to-self
• text-to-text
• text-to-world
• CLICK HERE to learn more about these connections!
• previewing novels for Book Clubs beginning the week of 10/17-10/21
• letter writing
• We will be writing letters to our pen pals in Mr.Malany's class in Kenton, Ohio, this week!
• spelling 
• We will spend time practicing our spelling words on Spelling City.
• Oreo sculpture "how-to" second drafts
• verbs 
• action verbs
• linking verbs
• helping verbs 
• Here's a verb video we'll be watching to learn more about verbs:

Science 

• cooking in the kitchen with Chef Rob on Thursday, 10/13
• working in the greenhouse with Farmer Curtis on Thursday, 10/20
• measuring the mass of Oreos as an extension of our O.R.E.O. project
• separating the hydrogen and oxygen atoms from water in a lab
• reviewing what we've learned so far about matter in a "Find Someone Who" activity; quiz will occur two days after review (specific date TBA)
• mobile science van special activity on Thursday, 10/13

Health

• "Don't Meth with Me" presentation on Wednesday, 10/12 to learn the harmful effects of meth and its shocking prevalence in Missouri and immediate surrounding areas
• counselor visit on Friday, 10/14
• Sometime during the week of 10/17-10/21, we will be watching the Family Life and Safety videos.

Other 

• On Tuesday, October 11, we learned what we had in common with the fellow classmates in our team; we will be using these commonalities to generate a team name to help us improve team spirit and cooperation for cooperative learning activities to come! 
• On Friday, October 14, we worked in our teams to develop our team names. All but a couple teams finished finalizing their team name.
• On Wednesday, October 19, we will be going on our field trip to the art museum!
• On Thursday morning, October 20, we will be going to the Health Fair.