Spring Has Sprung!

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We are fully immersed in our nonfiction unit of study in both Readers and Writers Workshop this month. The students have learned that when writers are composing a How To piece it helps to plan orally with a partner to make sure that they understand all of the steps that are involved. The students got to try out this strategy in partners and while they read their writing piece their partner pretended to walk through the steps. I think that you can see from some of the photos that there was a lot of active engagement with this exercise! The writers then gave each other feedback about what was clear and suggestions on what they could add to make their writing piece even more easy to understand. Then they students learned about features that all How To pieces had and assessed each other's writing using a checklist to see if the piece contained a title that told what it was teaching, a list of materials that is needed, clear steps in order, and pictures that describe the steps.

On Thursday we embraced the unseasonable weather with a Hawaiian Spirit Day. The students went all out with their costumes and it felt like a sunny summer day in Synergy House. I have enclosed some photos in the slide show. I love the one of the girl's rendition of the "hula hula."

Don't forget to sign up for a conference if you haven't already. Reports will be coming home on Friday.