Elementary

4th/5th: Week of 9/30

ELA Update This was finally the week where we finished our novel! On Monday we had a discussion about the very exciting culmination of events in chapters 16 – 18. We also took some time to do in-class reading of the book together this week for the first time. Chapters 19 – 21 are so important for character development and we needed to know how things ended up for our characters to thoroughly and accurately analyze them. Reading these chapters aloud together in a voluntary popcorn reading was a blast because we got to feed off of each other’s reactions […]

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Fifth grade student points at tv screen at STEM school.

4th/5th: Week of 9/23

ELA Update On Monday we went over our P&P and discussed the novel, as per usual. There are lots of predictions flying around about how things will end up for our characters! Even reluctant readers early on in the book are finding it irresistible to weigh in on the fate of our characters by this point in the story! On Tuesday and Wednesday we used a webquest document to learn about the Salem Witch trials and the history of the idiom “a witch hunt” as it applies to the book and what happens to Kit when she is accused of

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Two fifth grade students work on math at table at micro school in Austin.

K/1st: Week of 9/23

This week in Our Big Backyard… So, Alphas knew that our Earth has layers and that they get hotter and hotter the closer you get to its center. So we acted out what it might be like to be some gooey magma deep inside our planet… Here we are…all comfy and flowing down towards the center…but wait – it’s getting kind of hot… Yeow! Get me off this hot thing! Magma gets excited and flows away from the hottest spot – but them what happens? We learned that it bumped into the solid crust layer. If the crust was too

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2nd/3rd: Week of 9/23

Math – Ms. Andrea’s math group became number comparison experts this week! We sorted numbers from least to greatest, greatest to least, and learned a game called Dare To Compare in which the players compare their numbers and sometimes the bigger number wins, but sometimes the smaller number wins. We practiced finding differences in number sequences, determining patterns and continuing them. This multistep process can be tricky, particularly when dealing with numbers in the thousands or when progressing the pattern necessitates a crossover in place value. These Beta 1s showed tenacity and rocked it. We also sorted, ordered, and compared

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Student works on STEM project at private elementary school.

K/1st: Week of 9/16

This week in Our Big Backyard… The questions we had this week were…What’s under the soil? What’s down deep? We went way back in time when our sun was newly formed and space dust and debris swirled around it which slowly gathered to make planets and our earth. We learned how all of those minerals and materials can still be traced to everything around us. A peach looks a bit like inner earth! We talked about how, although we don’t have the tools to travel down too deep (and it’s too hot!), scientists have created other ways to “see” what’s

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Two kindergarten students learn about symmetry at STEM school.