A Week in Review

September 29 - October 5

 

 

Another busy week has zoomed by! We were focused, hardworking, and full of enthusiasm for learning! The Leadership Field Trip to Camp Terry was a PERFECT way to end the week! This is an amazing group of 5th graders and they showed RESPECT, RESPONSIBILITY, HONESTY, and COURAGE on our outing. I was extremely PROUD watching these students represent our school and community.

 

 

Virtues Awards:

Rose H. for showing the virtues of JOYFULNESS and RESPONSIBILITY! Rose is always working to keep our classroom organized and running smoothly and she does all with a smile and a positive attitude.

Gabi W. for showing the virtues of DILIGENCE and RESPONSIBILITY! Gabi consistently challenges herself to go above and beyond the expectations on all of her assignments, she is a wonderful example of what it means to be a 5^th grade leader.

 

Reading:

We started work in our Journeys literacy curriculum. We focused on the target vocabulary, worked in groups to make predictions of the meaning of these words and then talk about their actual meanings. We used context clues to guide our thinking. We also read the main selection, A Package for Mrs. Jewels by Louis Sachar. We used a new strategy called "Team Talk" to answer higher level thinking questions and really dig deep into analyzing the text and the author's craft. We discussed foreshadowing and the elements that made this book fall in the category of humorous fiction.

 

Writing:

Using our timeline of important events in our lives, we began writing our memoirs. Students listened to my memoir, the last summer I spent with my grandpa, and then worked diligently to begin their own writing. We discussed voice and the techniques I attempted to use in my writing to add voice. I look forward to reading each student's memoir!

 

Math:

Our brains were challenged this week as we looked at converting measurements within the Metric system, calculated perimeter and area of triangles and parallelograms. The important learning was not just the formulas that help us solve these perimeter and area problems, but WHY the formulas work. Ask your student, "Why do you find the area of a triangle with (l x w)÷2?"

 

Social Studies:

Mrs. Brown, our ITCL (Instructional Technology Curriculum Leader) borrowed our class to try out a new teaching technique she had learned. Students were given a statement, "Archaeologist Investigate Sunken Ships" and challenged with the task of coming up with questions that this statement sparked. They worked in teams to categorize their questions into "closed and open-ended questions". Then they chose the questions from their groups brainstorm that they felt were the most important. We will use these questions in our Chapter 4 lesson, "Why Europeans Left for the New World" as we begin to study European exploration of the Americas and artifacts that the explorers encountered and used.

 

Science:

Students used their playground models to create maps of the playground. They took a transparency with a grid and 'traced' over the model from a birds-eye-view. Then they used the transparency to create a map (on paper) with a key. The maps are not quite complete, but we're almost done!

 

Field Trip:

Camp Terry was a HUGE success! A special THANK YOU to Ms. Andrea Keenan for being the coordinator for this field trip and to the Curriculum Enhancement Committee for picking up the tab. The field trip focus was on leadership and what it means to be a leader. Ask your student about their favorite part, but also ask them what leadership means to them. Challenge them to think about how they will use what they learned about leadership here at school.

 

Have a wonderful weekend!

 

~Mrs. Hatlestad

 

Important Dates:

9-Oct - third money/pledge collection for the Walkathon

10-Oct - Walkathon/Spirit Day + Crazy Hair Day - 12:00-3:00 PM

11-Oct - All-School Pajama Day