Student Government

Mrs. Mundigler will be in our room this week to talk to the class about participating in student government.

What is Student Government?

• Involves students in sharing ideas
• Enhances good citizenship
• Promotes service learning (doing good things for our community)
• Develops leadership and planning skills
• Gives students a voice in solving problems and making decisions

Student Government will consist of 8 people

• Two 5th Grade Co-Presidents
• One 5th Grade Representative
• One 4th Grade Representative
• One 3rd Grade Representative
• Three more reps from any grade level

How do I get on Student Government?

• Type or hand write an essay that contains the following:
• Your name and some facts about yourself
• The qualities you have that make you a good candidate for student government
• An idea you would like to see led by student government (example - Adopt a Family at Christmas time)
• A parent AND teacher signature

Deadlines for becoming a representative or Co-President:

• October 30 - Assembly - What is Student Government?
• November 4 - 5th Grade Co-President Speeches - election immediately after
• November 6 - Representative Speeches (grades 3, 4, and 5) - election immediately after.

Halloween Bash

Thank you WES PTO for a great night!

October 20-23 Update

No School on Friday, October 24th!  The KSD staff is traveling to local businesses on Friday to learn more about and discuss job opportunities our students may have after graduating from the KSD. 

Math
This week in math, the 5th graders reviewed what they had learned about adding and subtracting decimals and solving story problems.  All fifth grade students completed the Unit 2 assessment on Thursday.  Fourth graders continued to work on multiplying single digit by two digit numbers and two digit by two digit numbers.  Students were exposed to many different methods of multiplication, most recently to the "short-cut" method which is the more traditional method.  Third grade focused on continuing to learn and practice multiplication facts including the 7's, 8's and 9's. 

Reading
This week's theme was theme!  Together, we created an anchor chart listing the most important points of theme: it's the lesson of the story, it's what you learn from the whole story, it can be seen or applied to other books.  We worked with theme as a whole group, in book clubs and in small groups.  All students that participated in book clubs finished their books by Thursday, the 23rd.  New books will be selected next week!

Writing:
We continued to practice personal narrative writing.  Many students are taking advantage of the current season and writing stories about things that are spooky or haunted! 

Social Studies:
The fall of the Aztecs and Incas was the focus of social studies this week.  We discussed how it would feel if a stranger showed up on our doorstep and asked us to change our religious beliefs, our language, the way we grow and eat our food and the way we raise our children.  Most students were very vocal in their opinions-no way would they be ok with that!  Next week we will continue to talk about other conquistadors and explorers as they move towards America.

October 13-17 Update

Thank you for taking the time to visit our blog!  Here is the information from the week:

Math:
During this week in math, students in third grade focused on growing their multiplication and division facts.  Fourth grade students continued to work with multiplication models to multiply two digit by one digit numbers.  Fifth graders had some fun with decimals, making sure to line up the decimal before adding or subtracting. Next week we are going to change our independent stations a bit. When students are finished working independently on their workbook pages or activities, they will have online games to play that correlate with the lesson of that day.  Thank you to Mrs. Maas, Mrs. Oelhafen, Mrs. Kreuser for volunteering their time in our room!

Guided Reading:
Summarizing continued to be our focus during our mini lessons and small groups this week.  Some students continued to work with a graphic organizers while others moved onto writing paragraphs using the information they would typically include in the graphic organizer.  Next week we will begin talking about finding the theme in literature.

A book club group discussing their book, before writing about it!

Writing:
We continued to work on personal narratives during our writing sessions.  Something new that we began this week is starting our writing period off with a brainstorm session!  If a student is stuck on how to resolve their conflict or what characters to add or how they might begin their piece, their peers give suggestions.  It is so neat to hear all of the unique ideas that they share together.

Our anchor chart for personal narratives continues to grow!  Every mini-lesson we have is added to our list of must-haves.

Social Studies:
Exploration was the name of the game this week in social studies.  Columbus, Magellan, Cabot, Balboa and Vespucci were the topics of lessons this week.  On Thursday and Friday, students took time to create an artifact having to do with exploration.  Some students selected decorating a trunk for travel and creating a list of 25 items they would take with them on a voyage, other students selected reading a choose-your-own-adventure book and writing a short summary of their experience and others decided to create a picture of a shoal complete with a ship, animals and underwater plants.

Students in the 3-5 Cohort working on their social study activities!

Reminders:

• Don't forget to RSVP for the PTO's Halloween Bash that will be held next Thursday, the 23rd from 6:00-7:30.
• No school for kids on Friday, the 24th.  KSD Staff has an inservice day.
• We will be holding a cake walk at the Halloween Bash-5th grade students took home more information on Friday.
• Red Ribbon Week begins next week. 
• Monday is Wear Red Day! You will be given a pencil and bookmark purchased by our PTO
• Tuesday is Hats Off To Being Drug Free-wear a hat (the crazier, the better)
• Wednesday is I "Mustache" You Not To Do Drugs-wear a mustache or disguise
• Thursday is-Being Drug Free is Healthy For Me-wear clothes for exercising and bring a healthy snack

October 6-10 Update

The temperature may be dropping, but the sun is still shining!

This week during reading, we spent our mini-lessons discussing the skill of summarizing.  This skill was then carried over into small groups.  The format we like to use most is: Somebody, Wanted, But, So, Then. One of the books we used in our lessons was titled "The Widow's Broom".  The perfect story to match our changing weather!


Our Summary: Minna Shaw wanted to keep her magical broom but, her neighbor didn't like it because it was magic.  So, when the neighborhood men came to take the broom she gave them her old broom in the closet and painted the magic broom white!  The old broom pretended to be a ghost and scared the neighbors away.  Then, the neighbors moved away and Minna Shaw, the widow, kept her wonderful magic broom.

Our writing lessons revolved around the personal narratives that we have been working on for the past week.  This week, we talked a lot about adding dialogue to our text and using correct capitalization.  Many students are beginning to wrap their pieces up so next week, our mini lessons will focus on how to make our pieces stand out while publishing!  In our newer writing workshop format, when teachers meet to confer with students, they will point out one or two areas the student should work on in their piece.  The piece is not edited by a teacher, but instead students are encouraged to strengthen their writing skills throughout the year.  This encourages student ownership over their piece and helps them grow in their individual skills under the guidance and instruction of the teachers. 

During our social studies time we have began exploring the facts and stories about explorers! We began the week learning and revisiting mapping skills that include: reading a map, finding the map legend and using a compass rose.  We continued the week learning about the Vikings, Marco Polo and the reasons for exploration paths to Asia.  Many students found this Viking website fun and full of information!

Math is continuing to go well.  The third grade finished their first math post-assessment on Friday, and will take their pre-assessment on Monday.  We use the pre-assessments to determine the placement of the students in groups. Fourth grade groups are working on multiplying one digit by two, and fifth grade groups ended the week adding decimal numbers.

If you haven't already, please take a few moments to complete the parent survey put together by the WES staff.  Results are anonymous and very important to us.  We are so excited to examine the results to make our school the best school we can! 

That's the news of the week!  



Parent Survey

If you haven't yet, please take a moment to complete our survey (Click Here).
We are excited to discover the opinions, thoughts and questions of parents regarding our current classroom design and our future classroom design. 
Thank you!

September 29 - October 3 Weekly Update

The highlight of our week was going to FES to participate in the mini-KEYS event.  The music was pumping while the students ran laps.  When they were done, they were each given a snack.  Mr. Thull put a lot of work into making this event fun for the WES and FES students.

Our students reached our class goal of 100 bee points.  On Monday, we will vote on our reward!

Math

Our fourth and fifth grade students had their first assessment and will begin unit two next week.  We had all students take a pretest to determine new groups.  

The third grade students will continue to work on multiplication facts.  We have learned how to multiply and divide by 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 9, and 10.  Next week, we will work on 6, 7, 8.  Please continue to review facts at home.  There are many great apps and online programs you can use.  In class, we use aaamath.com.  You can search for many different math skills to work on at this site.

Fourth grade will begin a unit on multiplication.  They will learn to multiply one digit numbers by up to four digit numbers.  Eventually, we will get into two digit by two digit multiplication.  If students aren't secure in their basic facts, they need to be reviewing them at home.  All facts are expected to be secure by the end of third grade. 

Fifth grade will begin a unit on decimals.  They will be expected to read, write, and compare decimals to the thousandths place. In addition to this, they will round, add and subtract decimal numbers.

Reading

We are full swing in our workshop model.  Students are divided up into eight different groups based on their Fountas and Pinnell reading test.  During our small group reading time, students are reading a short book at their level.  As we read, we are focusing on story elements and character traits.  Next week, we will move on to summarizing.

When students aren't reading with a teacher, they are either in a book club or independent reading. They are assigned a book club at their reading level and continue to work on the same skills they are learning in the teacher group.  The students are loving the workshop model!

Writing

Last week, we introduced personal narratives to the students.  We have gone through pre-writing and drafting.  This week we started revising and editing.  Students are meeting individually with a teacher for assistance on this.  We have enjoyed reading their stories.  It helps us to get to know each of them a little better.  We will continue to work on this next week.  Students will have an opportunity to share their writing with their peers as well.

Science

We wrapped up our plant unit this week and had our first assessment.  Students will receive their test back on Monday.  We will move to social studies next week.

West Bend Daily News

The West Bend Daily News visited our school on Tuesday, September 30. Click HERE to read the article.