This week our small-group book clubs are officially in full swing. Our class set of Rules is in and students are spending a few days per week popcorn reading with their groups (reading aloud, with each person taking a turn to read a page) and then using the other few days to discuss group member responses to their “Author and Me” or “On My Own” questions with their fellow group members. This will be the first time that they have been asked to invent questions that they believe will best promote discussion, rather than resort to short answer questions or questions with yes/no answers. As such, based upon the responses of their group members as well as some guidance from me, they will begin to recognize the level of conversation that a well thought out, higher level thinking question can create.
In our Portland social studies unit, we are moving into our study of the Stumptown era of Portland’s history. We begin the week sketching out our imagined interpretation of what this area looked like during this time period, followed by a small group study of the pioneer’s forms of transportation, schooling, buildings, way of dress, and food choices. We will then end the week with a time travel exercise in which students will write a journal entry from the perspective of a Stumptown pioneer and then collaboratively create a mural of the Stumptown settlement.
In math we continue our work in multiplication. This week we will be working on multiplication arrays in which students will use various combinations of numbers (or dimensions) to create shapes with the same array area (i.e. a shape with an area of 16 can have the dimensions of 4×4, 8×2, 16×1, etc.). We will also take a timed multiplication facts quiz on multiples of three.

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