March Journeys Test Dates & Descriptions At A Glance: MONDAY 2
TUESDAY 3
WEDNESDAY 4
THURSDAY 5
6
Judy Moody Saves the World – Comp. and Vocab Test 9
10 PARCC TEST NO READING, GRAMMAR. SPELLING.
16 Start “8 day cycle” of The Albertosauarus Mystery (Unit 4, Lesson 17)
17
23
24
30 NO SPELLING, GRAMMAR, OR PHONICS THIS WEEK
11 PARCC TEST
Grammar, spelling, & phonics tests (Unit 4, Lesson 17) 12
PARCC TEST
18
FRIDAY
13 PARCC TEST
19
PARCC TEST
20 Grammar, spelling, & phonics tests (Unit 4, Lesson 18)
31
25
27
Test on The Albertosauarus Mystery
26 Start a shortened “6 day cycle” of Dog of the Sea Waves (Unit 5, Lesson 24)
1
2
3
Test on Dog of the Sea Waves
Grammar, spelling, & phonics tests (Unit 4, Lesson 19)
OFF – Start of Spring Break
WEEK OF MARCH 2nd – 6th •
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 4th: Comp. and Vocab Test – Judy Moody Saves the World o The Journeys text that the reading test will focus on is Judy Moody Saves the
World. Unfortunately, this text cannot be accessed online through the student portal because it is from the updated version of the Journeys Program. However, it has been shared with the students via Google Drive, so you can access it there from home. o The skills that will be tested, story structure (how chapters build on one another) and theme, were worked on in both whole group reading AND small group reading over the course of several class periods. o The vocabulary test will focus on 5 of the 10 target vocabulary words (listed below) as well as the vocabulary strategy – multiple meaning words. The target vocabulary words were discussed at length during class and the students spent a good deal of time defining the words using context clues and verifying their definitions with an online thesaurus. Additionally, the strategy of multiple meaning words has been worked on weekly since the beginning of the year. On this test, the students will be given a sentence with an underlined word. They must choose which word (from 4) helped them best understand the meaning of the underlined word. The students practiced this particular skill in class. TARGET VOCABULARY WORDS: rubbish, carton, hardly, global, shade, complicated, recycle, pollution, dripping, project
(week of March 2nd – 6th continued on next page)
WEEK OF MARCH 2nd – 6th…continued •
FRIDAY, MARCH 6th: Grammar Test o This test will focus on the grammar skill that we have been working on over the course of the week – adjectives and articles (the use of a vs. an) o A practice sheet will come home on the evening of Thursday, March 5th. This is OPTIONAL for students to complete, but it will help them prepare for the test. The practice sheet will reflect what we worked on regarding this grammar skill over the course of the week in class.
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FRIDAY, MARCH 6th: Spelling Test & Phonics Test o Spelling Word List sent home Monday (3/2) o Students will be completing Tic-Tac-Toe activities with these words on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday night (March 3rd, 4th, 5th) for homework o The spelling and phonics tests will focus on words with /j/ and /s/. The students learned the difference between the hard g (making the “guh” sound) and the soft g (making the “juh” sound). The students also learned the difference between the hard c (making the “kuh” sound) and the soft c (making the “sss” sound)
the vowels e, i, and y make c and g sound soft •
EX: cent, cinnamon, cyclone, gem, gill, gym
the vowels a, o, and u make the c and g hard •
EX: cat, cop, cup, game, gone, gum
o Another phonics skill we discussed this week is the VCCCV pattern and how to split words with this pattern into syllables.
Look for the consonants that create a blend. Split before or after the blend (use the chin trick for this part) •
EX: C O M P L E T E
EX: K I T C H E N
V C C C V
V C C C V
*divide BEFORE the blend
•
*divide AFTER the blend
EX: H U N D R E D V C C C V *divide BEFORE the b lend
EX: S A N D W I C H
V C C C V *divide AFTER the blend
WEEK OF MARCH 9th – 13th NO TESTS – STUDENTS WILL BE TAKING THE PARCC
WEEK OF MARCH 16th – 20th •
FRIDAY, MARCH 20th: Grammar Test o This test will focus on the grammar skill that we have been working on over the course of the week – using the verb “be” and helping verbs (am, is, was, were, are, have, had, has). In class, we discussed that adjectives tell what kind and how many. On the test, the students will be given a sentence and will need to choose what change, if any, needs to be made to a given sentence. o A practice sheet will come home on the evening of Thursday, February 19th. This is OPTIONAL for students to complete, but it will help them prepare for the test. The practice sheet will reflect what we worked on regarding this grammar skill over the course of the week in class.
•
FRIDAY, MARCH 20th: Spelling Test & Phonics Test o Spelling Word List will be sent home Monday (3/16) o Students will be completing Tic-Tac-Toe activities with these words on Tues, Wed, and Thurs nights (March 17th, 18th, 19th) for homework o The spelling and phonics tests will focus on: words with /k/ and /kw/ o On the phonics test, the students will be given a word, such as park and need to choose a word that has the same sound for k. Students will be provided with 4 choices (for the word park, the choices might be kind, know, knife, knight…the answer is kind).
WEEK OF MARCH 23rd – 27th •
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 25th: Comp. & Vocab Test – The Albertosauarus Mystery o
The Journeys text that the reading test will focus on is The Albertosauarus Mystery, which is in Unit 4 of the Journeys Program (to access this text at home, go to Think Central online, choose student book 2, pages 42 – 58)
o
The skill that will be tested, drawing conclusions, was worked on in both whole group reading AND small group reading over the course of several class periods.
o
The vocabulary test will focus on 5 of the 10 target vocabulary words (listed below) as well as the vocabulary strategy, the suffix -ly. The target vocabulary words were discussed at length during class and the students spent a good deal of time defining the words using context clues and verifying their definitions with an online thesaurus. TARGET VOCABULARY WORDS:
fossils, clues, remains, prove, evidence, skeletons, uncovering, buried, fierce, location •
FRIDAY, MARCH 27th: Grammar Test o
This test will focus on the grammar skill that we have been working on over the course of the week – irregular verbs in the past tense (such as come/came; go/went, do/does, give/gave, take/took, see/saw, grow/grew, eat/ate, write/wrote, run/ran). On the test, the students will be given a sentence and will need to determine what change, if any, needs to be made to a given sentence.
o
A practice sheet will come home on the evening of Thursday, March 26th. This is OPTIONAL for students to complete, but it will help them prepare for the test. The practice sheet will reflect what we worked on regarding this grammar skill over the course of the week in class.
•
FRIDAY, MARCH 27th: Spelling Test & Phonics Test o
Spelling Word List will be sent home Monday (3/23)
o
Students will be completing Tic-Tac-Toe activities with these words on Tues, Wed, and Thurs nights (March 24th, 25th, 26th) for homework
o
The spelling and phonics tests will focus on: words with the vowel sounds in spoon and
wood.
o On the test, students will be given a word, such as suit and need to choose a word that has the same sound as the underlined part of the given word. Students will be provided with 4 choices (for the word suit, the choices might be rot, roots, brook, wooded…the answer is roots).
WEEK OF MARCH 30th – APRIL 3rd •
THURSDAY, APRIL 2nd: Comp. & Vocab Test – Dog of the Sea Waves o The Journeys text that the reading test will focus on is Dog of the Sea Waves, which is in Unit 5 of the Journeys Program (to access this text at home, go to Think Central online, choose student book 2, pages 270 – 286) o The skill that will be tested, author’s purpose, was worked on in both whole group reading AND small group reading over the course of several class periods. o The vocabulary test will focus on 5 of the 10 target vocabulary words (listed below) as well as the vocabulary strategy, words from other languages (such as hammock, tambourine, canoe, wok, lagoon, maize, volcano, polka, barbeque). The target vocabulary words were discussed at length during class and the students spent a good deal of time defining the words using context clues and verifying their definitions with an online thesaurus.
TARGET VOCABULARY WORDS: voyage, lava, rippled, arrival, guided, twisted, aboard, anchor, spotted, bay
