Mazama Lodge Trip, December 5-7

The teachers and OES chaperones met with staff from Mazama Lodge on Thursday evening to prepare for our visit next week. They have a rich and exciting curriculum planned! The conditions look ideal for our trip with a little snowfall over the weekend, and then great conditions all through next week.

The children met with the teachers today to discuss final details before our departure on Tuesday morning. These are some highlights from our discussion:

• Label everything!
• Consider bringing a bag with straps for carrying, not a suitcase on wheels.
• Leave the bath towel at home but consider bringing a small hand towel.
• Extra socks and gloves are always a good idea.
• Warm slippers are nice for the lodge if you have them (packing these at the top makes sense as we’ll put them on when we arrive inside the lodge).
• They have extra boots and rain pants for us to use, just in case ours get wet.
• Bring warm clothes or pajamas for sleeping.
• Backpacks for water bottles, etc. are optional.

On Tuesday morning:

• Children should wear their jeans, or comfortable pants, along with a couple of layered tops, their waterproof jacket, and shoes/boots.

• Please arrive at school on time, or even a little early.
• The children will need to drop off their bags by the old covered walkway area next to Farriss Hall.  
• We plan to organize the bags into a pile for boys, and a pile for girls.
• Once the children drop off their luggage they need to head to classrooms for attendance.

On Thursday, December 7, pick-up will be behind gym at 2:30 PM. Lyn will provide arrival updates as needed.

Please find all forms, including the packing list here.

Gift Exchange

Please support your child in packing a “little something” for gift exchange partner (see the sheet in your child’s homework folder).  Bringing it on Monday is okay if your child does not want to pack it in his or her bag.

Giving Chapel

Please note that on the morning of Friday, December 8, it is Giving Chapel. Please consider organizing the Giving Chapel bags with your child over the weekend, ready to be brought into school before our trip on Monday, December 4, or after we return on Friday, December 8.

Coming Up:

Nov. 21	-  Grandparents Day
Nov. 22-26	- Thanksgiving Break
Nov. 28-1 Dec.	-  ERB Testing
Dec. 5-7	-  Fourth Grade Overnight

ERBs:

On Monday after Thanksgiving break, fourth graders will do a short ERB practice test to help them get familiar with the ERB format. Each day during testing week, we will review guidelines and provide reminders about good test taking strategies.

Here is our ERB schedule:

Tuesday 11/28	Wednesday 11/29	Thursday 11/30	Friday 12/1
Chapel 9:00-9:20 Logistics and material prep 9:20-10:00 Reading Comprehension (40 min)	8:15-9:00 Quantitative Reasoning (45 min) 9:00-9:20 Break-- snack, bathroom run 9:20-10:00 Math 1 (40 min)	Late Start 9:00-9:40 Math 2 (40 min) 9:40-10:00 Break-- snack, bathroom run 10:00-10:30 Writing Mechanics (30 min)	8:20-9:20 Auditory Comprehension   (Times will be estimated) 9:20-9:40 Break-- snack, bathroom run 9:40-10:15 Verbal Reasoning (35 min)

Mazama Lodge:

For homework last week, students were asked to do an inventory of the packing list to see what they have ready and what they still need to source. Please review the list  with them.

Permission forms for the trip are due by November 28th. If you are sending medication to camp with your child, please give it to the office in a ziplock bag, along with the OES medication form. Please let me know if you have questions.

A Note From Service Learning Coordinator, Kristen Haferbecker:

Consider giving the gift of time to honor our Giving Chapel season!

Volunteer to restore area wetlands with Clean Water Services, December 2, 8:45- 1:00, 16500 SW Oystercatcher Ln, Beaverton, OR 97007

Inspired by the 4th grade’s year-long study of water advocacy, we have reserved several volunteer spots for OES families to give the gift of time alongside Clean Water Services and Friends of Trees at Churchill Forest on Saturday, December 2. The Friends of Trees website notes: “This planting project is situated in the headwaters of Summer Creek and will help to protect the uppermost section of the watershed by planting a wide variety of native trees and shrubs.” Family members will serve together. To reserve your spots, please contact Kristen Haferbecker at haferbeckerk@oes.edu.

DEAR with our Kindergarten Buddies on Friday

   

Coming Up:

Nov. 21	-  Grandparents Day
Nov. 22-26	-  Thanksgiving Break
Nov. 28-1 Dec	-  ERB Testing
Dec. 5-7	-  Fourth Grade Overnight

We have had a busy week, and one of the highlights was getting together with our Kindergarten buddies to follow up on the storyboards created during our last visit; the children were very excited to use ideas from the storyboard to help their buddies write their stories. We had been trying get together with our buddies for a while, but unable to do so because of schedule conflicts. Then on Monday, we finally did; the excitement, smiles and gentle interactions with the younger children made for a lovely time together and a great start to our week.

Writing:

Students have been gathering ideas for their fiction narratives. In addition to small moment/seed ideas, students have been thinking about stories they wished existed, such as books they would like to read, for example, books about kids like themselves. They wrote down the ideas floating in their imaginations but realized that to make their wish into a story idea, they needed to invent details. So they began by asking questions and doing the exciting work of looking through their writer’s notebooks at all the ideas they collected to decide on the one idea to develop into a fictional narrative.  

Reading:

We finished our shared reading of Tiger Rising by Kate DiCamillo. This story embraces ideas that fourth graders can readily identify with around the themes of friendship and relationships. One of the main characters, Sistine Bailey, is a girl who shows her feelings and emotions as readily as Rob, the other main character, hides his. Even though Rob does not like Sistine at first, they begin to share their life stories, learn to trust each other, and become friends. After Rob loses his mother he puts all his sorrow and emotions in a “suitcase,” keeping this imaginary suitcase closed tight because he does not like to show his emotions, but Sistine helps him open this suitcase of emotions. To bring closure to our reading we shared personal reflections. Students found it easy to relate to the characters dealing with their emotions, and understood well that some emotions are easy to share and others cannot be shared as readily. We are following up our discussions with students writing about ways in which they deal with their emotions.  

Math:

This week in math students have been thinking about how their ongoing work with base ten pieces (math manipulatives) to build arrays could support them in moving to a more efficient method for multiplying multi-digit numbers. They considered what happens when multiplying or dividing numbers by 10,100, and 1000.

Challenge Homework:

The new challenge homework was sent home last week. The children have a lot of exciting opportunities for individual learning and expression this month.

Reminder:

Wet and cold weather has arrived; please remember to send a rainproof layer to school each day. Students are expected to be outside multiple times during the day, rain or shine. With limited covered area at recess and none for 3rd-5th dismissal, they need to bring proper outerwear to school.

Coming Up:

Oct. 31	-   Overnight Informational Meeting
Nov. 2 & 3	-   LS Conferences
Nov. 21	-  Grandparents Day
Nov. 22-26	-  Thanksgiving Break
Nov. 28-1 Dec.	-  ERB Testing
Dec. 5-7	-  Fourth Grade Overnight

Reminder: Tuesday, October 31 from 7:40 a.m - 8:20 a.m

The 4th Grade overnight parent information meeting is in the Lower School Library. We hope many of you can make it; if not, forms will be available during conferences.

Social Studies:
The big news last week was the arrival of the salmon eggs in the fourth grade affinity commons! These eggs came from fish recently returning to the Clackamas River, and about 500 Chinook salmon eggs were lowered into their new home. The children will track their progress in the weeks to come. Stay tuned to hear about the release of the fish into the Willamette River close to Winter Break.
Students are finishing their concept maps on self-selected topics covered over the last two months to share their learning.

Reading:

We continue to read Tiger Rising; the text is rich with literary devices such as figures of speech. We are exploring these as well as symbolism, metaphors, and personification.

Students worked with their partners to

• share their ideas about characters and episodes from the text and support their ideas with evidence
• talk about characters by outlining examples from the text... My character often... for example... this makes me think…
• review their conclusions on characters by providing supporting evidence for the change in their thinking using examples from the text... I used to think my character was... because...but now I ... because I realize... about my character.
• to note patterns in characters’ actions and form ideas about them by asking... How do new actions fit with/change those ideas? What might be motivating the character to act in this way?

Writing:

We are wrapping up our writing about a small moment.

Students are at the gathering stage to begin a persuasive piece of writing.  We talked about all the experiences we have had in our salmon study thus far and identified some of the stakeholders in considering different  perspectives. Students will consider biases and different points of view to develop their own points of view in getting ready to write their persuasive pieces.

Math:

In math we've started our work in Unit 2 by exploring larger arrays and double digit multiplication. We've also been challenging ourselves to work systematically to solve some complex problems.

Challenge Homework:

Challenge homework is due next week; please let me know if your child needs an extension. A few of the children have already shared their projects.

P.E: Unicycling

Please remind your child to bring his/her helmet to school on the following dates:  

November 1 and 10

Jacob, Hayden, Evie, Lucas, Maija and Lucy.

November 17 and 20

Jot, Kamran, Katie, Abi, Dianna and Annie.

Parent Conference Schedule:

	Thursday, November 2	Friday, November 3
7:30-8:00 AM	Jonah	Evie
8:00-8:30 AM	Lucy	Jot
8:30-9:00 AM	Griffin	Stu
9:30-10:00 AM	Maija	Kamran
10:00-10:30 AM	Selin	Hayden
10:30-11:00 AM		Jake
12:00-12:30 PM	Katie
12:30-1:00 PM	Jacob
1:30-2:00 PM	Annie	Shay
4:30-5:00 PM	Abigail