WEEK OF JAN 21- JAN 24

DATES:
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 8.....Release Time
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 22...Popcorn Day
FRIDAY, MARCH 1............No School- Records Day
FRIDAY, MARCH 8............Half day of school- Dismissal is at 11:40-no lunch
 
This was a really short week! Great days for the kids to enjoy time with friends and family! We are behind a little, but we will work through it in a relaxed manner!


Math: We have 2 more lessons in our first fractions unit. We have been reviewing along the way. 5th grade teachers do not give the test for this unit until after we are involved a bit in the next one as the concepts are used over and over again and allows for more practice.
 I have placed a folder for fractions on my fusion page. It has very good tutorials for review and activities attached.  I will continue to add to this. Click on "Fractions" and choose your topic. We have covered comparing fractions, simplifying fractions, converting mixed numbers to improper fractions, greatest common factors, and equivalent fractions. We will continue to review these and will move into converting decimals to fractions next week.



FRACTIONS TEST 1: We don't give the test for this unit until we are already into the next unit -fraction operations. The concepts from our current unit are used repeatedly in the next, so kids get more practice.

READING: We got a whole one day into our Book Clubs this week! I am trying something new this time. Each of the 4 groups is set up in Edmodo as a group. I post guiding questions on Edmodo for each group. As they read and discuss their book, they will type responses, questions, their thoughts, etc. onto the post. I will usually have some individual questions for each student that is a google form for them to respond to individually. Using Edmodo, even when I am not meeting with a group, I will be able to monitor students' thinking and respond to them before we meet if necessary. There will be some paper/pencil work as well.We are discussing what goes well and what doesn't in order to make this a smooth process.



WRITING:   Students are finishing up their pieces focusing on onomatopeoia (sound words such as bang, crash, etc) and using various sentence structures. Instead of using so many subject/predicate sentences, they have a graphic organizer that has a variety of sentence structures with examples. Using a variety of structures allows writing to flow, seem less choppy, and shows a progression in their writing abilities. We will make this a focus from now on.

SCIENCE:  We are involved in our Forces and Motion unit which allows for a lot of hands on activities and movement. We are connecting lessons to how they affect our real lives every day since physics is part of our everyday lives and we don't even realize it! 
We just finished some activities that involve calculating speed.


Spelling: No spelling this last week.  List 16 was sent home last week. The skill is blends such as str, bl, thr, etc. The test will be this coming Friday.

Have a great weekend!
Laura Blowers 
 
 

WEEK OF JANUARY 14-18

First of all, I am sorry I didn't post anything last week- I really don't have a good reason, except that time got away from me which isn't a reason at all! 


Spelling Bee:  Rayah Blood won and Evan Eding was runner up. Congratulations to them! Kyle Heyerman, Brendan Nyboer, and Seth Hartz also participated from our class and did well! I am very proud of them!

Assembly: You may have seen information about our writing assembly in the paper or on the news. "Think it Up and Write it Down!" was the theme. All students will have the opportunity to write a story and submit it to teachers. 10 stories will be chosen from 3rd-5th and sent in to the group from Detroit. They will choose some stories and perform these when they come back in March while students whose stories were chosen sit in the author's chair.

 

Spelling: The skill this week was diagraphs- ch, wh, ph, th, sh. We took lesson 15 test on Friday. Tests will be sent home on Monday. List 16 was sent home earlier this week.


Math: Fractions, fractions, fractions! We are involved in the first of 2 fraction units right now. We are also working during RTI with fractions. I have placed a folder for fractions on my fusion page. It has very good tutorials for review and activities attached.  I will continue to add to this. Click on "Fractions" and choose your topic. We have covered comparing fractions, simplifying fractions, converting mixed numbers to improper fractions, greatest common factors, and equivalent fractions. We will continue to review these and will move into converting decimals to fractions next week.

TEST: We don't give the test for this unit until we are already into the next unit -fraction operations. The concepts from this unit are used repeatedly in the next, so kids get more practice.

READING: We have been reading various nonfiction texts the past 2 weeks. Learning the text structures of these texts is an important skill. We have worked on problem solution, cause and effect, vocabulary, how to read for information and connect what we read in a "deep" way where we gain more insight into the text, not a "flat" way.   We will begin reading realistic fiction and work in Book Club groups. 

WRITING:   We have been discussing various sentence structures and had some fun practicing those orally. We reviewed onomatopeoia -sound words. Students are have a couple of options for writing a short story that includes these skills. 

SCIENCE:  We are involved in our Forces and Motion unit which allows for a lot of hands on activities and movement. We are connecting lessons to how they affect our real lives every day since physics is part of our everyday lives and we don't even realize it! 
We just finished some activities that involve calculating speed. Before Christmas we also worked on a lesson about simple machines which we will revisit later.

Have a great weekend!