Hello 5-2 Parents ~
It was SO great to be able to return to the classroom this week - your children have been absolutely delightful!! I didn't realize how much I missed their smiling faces or warm hugs until I saw them on Tuesday :) Thank you so much for all your well wishes and kind words as I've returned - I'm so blessed to be able to work with such a wonderful group of students and parents.
I'm looking forward to seeing all of you next week at conferences and sharing your child's progress thus far in the trimester. We will discuss beginning of the year benchmark scores and I will have their midterm standards based grading report for you, as well as their goals for the remainder of the trimester.
Important Dates
Team Building with the Principals ~ Tuesday, 10/22 from 2:15-3:15pm ~ Ms. Davis and Mrs. Pemberton will be taking the 5th graders for an hour on Tuesday afternoon for a team building activity. This has become a treasured tradition for both our principals and the 5th graders as they always have such a great time getting to know each other a little better while building community.
Parent-Teacher Conferences ~ Thursday, 10/24 & Friday, 10/25 - No School
Halloween Party and Parade ~ A great big THANK YOU to the room moms (Mrs. Shah, Mrs. Koroulis, and Mrs. Klinkenborg) for all their hard work planning the Halloween party! If you have not yet given your child permission to participate, please click on the Google form here. All students need permission to participate in the parade and party, and we need to know their lunch plans for the day. Thank you!
Math
We spent the majority of the last two weeks practicing word problems. Your children are developing their ability to read and break down a real-world problem, and then apply their computation skills to solve the problem. Some parents have reached out to me to ask if there is a specific way we ask the students to solve the problems. We do teach Bar Modeling as a strategy, but your child can use any strategy to solve the problem. So long as they arrive at the correct answer, I am not particular about the method. If you would like to review Bar Modeling, just look back into the chapter. You'll find several examples at the end of each chapter with the word problems.
They took their Chapter 2 Assessment today, so look for these to come home on Monday as a sign and return. This was a challenging test, but they really worked hard to master skills in this unit! If your child did not master the concepts in Chapter 2, they will also bring home an additional practice packet to continue to work on skills. We will continue to work on skills during Target Time, and they will be given another opportunity to demonstrate mastery on an assessment before progress reports are issued.
With the end of chapter 2, we are moving on to adding and subtracting fractions in chapter 3, which means we will finally be working on a different standard! We will actually be covering two standards in chapter 3 - adding and subtracting fractions, and performing operations on decimals as we will convert fractions to decimals. This unit isn't quite as long as the previous unit, but we will work in it for the next 2-3 weeks. As we get closer to the end of the unit, I will post our assessment date. As in previous units, I will post assignments on Khan to give your children extra practice with the skills.
Science
Your children were very excited to begin the Earth and Space science unit last week with Mrs. Raffone! They had a great time creating models of the earth and gravity. This week, we made observations about the earth's rotation by collecting data about the movement of the sun and shadows. They have a packet to finish up this weekend analyzing that data and drawing some conclusions. They were challenged today to create a model that describes what causes daytime and nighttime and explains why the sun seems to move across the sky during the daytime. Ask them how their model effectively demonstrated this phenomenon, and the challenges they endured while creating the model.
They will be completing a few performance assessments and quizzes next week to demonstrate a mastery of the content learned over these past two weeks - look for Owl Scorecards to come home next week with their assessment grades.
Your children were very excited to begin the Earth and Space science unit last week with Mrs. Raffone! They had a great time creating models of the earth and gravity. This week, we made observations about the earth's rotation by collecting data about the movement of the sun and shadows. They have a packet to finish up this weekend analyzing that data and drawing some conclusions. They were challenged today to create a model that describes what causes daytime and nighttime and explains why the sun seems to move across the sky during the daytime. Ask them how their model effectively demonstrated this phenomenon, and the challenges they endured while creating the model.
They will be completing a few performance assessments and quizzes next week to demonstrate a mastery of the content learned over these past two weeks - look for Owl Scorecards to come home next week with their assessment grades.
Reading
Your children wore their Book Review t-shirts with pride on Tuesday, and they did an excellent job presenting their Book Review Talk! I was SO impressed with the quality of the t-shirts and the effort so many of them put into preparing their presentations! On Tuesday afternoon, the entire 5th grade class had an opportunity to share their t-shirts and book talks as an entire group. They were engaged in conversation with each other, and so many were recording book titles they were interested in reading. I loved the enthusiasm for their book and the encouragement of each other's creative work! The shirts are hanging in the classroom so you can check them out when you come in for conferences. I'll send them home in a couple of weeks. The Owl Scorecards for these Book Review Talks came home earlier this week.
We finished up our Launch Unit, so your children took some time to reflect on their participation in reading conversations, as well as the quality of their work and organization in their Reading Notebook. Their notebooks and rubrics came home today in a red folder. These rubrics provided an opportunity for excellent conversation, and they allowed us to set some goals for the next reading unit. Ask your child to share their reflections and goals with you. Take the time to flip through your child's notebook and the rubrics, then please sign and return them to school on Monday. These rubrics inform their Student Skills scores on the progress report.
We finished up our Launch Unit, so your children took some time to reflect on their participation in reading conversations, as well as the quality of their work and organization in their Reading Notebook. Their notebooks and rubrics came home today in a red folder. These rubrics provided an opportunity for excellent conversation, and they allowed us to set some goals for the next reading unit. Ask your child to share their reflections and goals with you. Take the time to flip through your child's notebook and the rubrics, then please sign and return them to school on Monday. These rubrics inform their Student Skills scores on the progress report.
Writing
We also wrapped up our Writing Process unit with a final published piece this week. Your children took a self-selected piece of writing through the writing process to publication over the past several weeks. They are so proud of the books they've created!! We met with Mrs. Klimas' class today to share our stories and give feedback. This time was so valuable - your children came back to the room elated over the feedback they received and excited to write more stories to share! I loved their enthusiasm! Ask your child what feedback they received on their story :)
The Owl Scorecards for this published piece also came home today, along with their own reflections and the rough draft. If you would like to read their final piece, ask them to share their document with you on Google Drive.
LMCStudents have been working on research in their weekly LMC lessons to prepare for a debate related to space exploration. Your children are engaged in researching either the pros or cons of one of these questions:
Should we spend money on space exploration?
Would it be safe to live somewhere other than earth?
Ask your child which debate they are focused on, and which side they are on. They will be working to gather research to support their debate over the next couple of weeks. The debate will be on Thursday, 11/7 during their LMC time. Students will be assessed on their ability to gather information from multiple sources for research (writing standard), as well as their ability to support their claims with evidence (science standard) with this research. They will also be assessed on their ability to present information (speaking standard) during the debate.
The Owl Scorecards for this published piece also came home today, along with their own reflections and the rough draft. If you would like to read their final piece, ask them to share their document with you on Google Drive.
LMCStudents have been working on research in their weekly LMC lessons to prepare for a debate related to space exploration. Your children are engaged in researching either the pros or cons of one of these questions:
Should we spend money on space exploration?
Would it be safe to live somewhere other than earth?
Ask your child which debate they are focused on, and which side they are on. They will be working to gather research to support their debate over the next couple of weeks. The debate will be on Thursday, 11/7 during their LMC time. Students will be assessed on their ability to gather information from multiple sources for research (writing standard), as well as their ability to support their claims with evidence (science standard) with this research. They will also be assessed on their ability to present information (speaking standard) during the debate.
As always, please feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns.
You can teach a student a lesson for a day;
but if you can teach him to learn by creating curiosity,
he will continue the learning process as long as he lives.
~ Clay P. Bedford
but if you can teach him to learn by creating curiosity,
he will continue the learning process as long as he lives.
~ Clay P. Bedford
Cheers ~
Theresa Fowler
