Congratulations to Room 15 kids Maddie, Melissa, Rachel, and Luke for taking 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place in the “Life in the Rogue Valley” art show at the Mall. Their work, along with 13 others from our class, shared space in the Mall with student art work from all the Central Point schools.
Congratulations also to Luke (photo right), Melissa, and Falon for winning the classroom bookmark contest. The contest was an element of our first “Book Club” of the year. Students started their second Book Club last week, reading from either Island of the Blue Dolphins, Where the Red Fern Grows, The BFG, or James and the Giant Peach. Students record specific reading tasks in their Vocabulary Journal each night, and they’re required to have a parent signature to get credit, so be sure to be checking those Journals. This week, students have a vocabulary exam on words from their first Book Club. These words are also listed in their Vocab Journals.
Parents, wondering how your child is doing in class? Ask him how much money he has in his classroom checkbook. Because the project rewards quality work and penalizes poor behavior, each student’s bottom line says a lot about his or her work ethic, behavior, and classroom performance. Any student with consistently less than $100 in the checkbook is struggling with attendance, behavior, and/or completing work. Any student who is “flat broke” is likely struggling with all three and is in need of some intervention, both at home and school. The project does a good job of foretelling a child’s future, but fifth grade presents an opportunity to make changes before a high school diploma or a roof over one’s head is at stake.
Another way to evaluate your child’’s classroom performance is on the student web pages. Students post many of their most significant projects, so a student with minimal material is clearly not keeping up. How’s your child doing? Click on numerous pages to get an idea of the expectations, then click on your own child’s page. Students recently posted their “In My Shoes” essay. This multi-paragraph writing task prompted kids to say how their shoes represent who they are. Walk a mile in a child’s shoes by clicking on the Student Web pages tab, above right.