We passed out the science study guide yesterday afternoon. Students are welcome to use their textbook, science notebook or the internet to fill it out. We will go over it tomorrow before the quiz on Friday. Here is a copy of the study guide:
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We passed out the science study guide yesterday afternoon. Students are welcome to use their textbook, science notebook or the internet to fill it out. We will go over it tomorrow before the quiz on Friday. Here is a copy of the study guide:
We are already a month into the school year and it's flying by! The students have routines and procedures down and we are really diving into the curriculum and standards.
Here is what we will be studying next week:
Writing- We will focus on revising and editing our narratives. This week we showed the students the county expectations for a fifth grade narrative and I think some of them were a little surprised! We are going to use the rubric next week to edit. Specifically we will focus on dialogue and transitional phrases. Students will be publishing their pieces by the end of the week and turning them in on Friday.
Reading- Next week is all about making inferences. We are going to use "clues" from our reading to infer what the author is saying. We will practice this in both fiction and nonfiction texts. We will really focus on using text evidence (words and phrases from the book) to support our inferences.
Math- We are continuing to work on writing expressions and building confidence with place value. We will focus on the idea of powers of 10.
Science- We will be wrapping up our unit on Genetics. We discussed learned behaviors this week and will be diving into inherited traits next week. We will look at some examples of dominant and recessive traits and see which ones show up in our classroom! Our assessment on genetics will be Friday, September 2nd. We will send home a study guide and I will post it to the blog next week!
In the Thursday folder you should have seen a Fifth Grade T-shirt order form. Please return those by September 9th.
Thanks for all of your support and please let us know if you have any questions.
I have two updates for you all:
Box #4 on the Math homework should say: Where would you put the parenthesis in the expression to get an answer of 220? 8 + 5 x 20 – 40 (Previously it said to get an answer of 240 which was a typo!). Sorry for any confusion or homework frustration!
Happy Picture Day!
Your student received a study guide for the quiz tomorrow that had the following key points to look over:
-Rights vs Responsibilities
Students should be able to explain the difference and give an example of each as a U.S. Citizen.
-Due Process
Students should be familiar with this concept and that it guarantees rights to citizens such as the right to a speedy trial.
-Bill of Rights
Students should know that this refers to the first 10 Amendments and should be able to explain what they mean. Students are not expected to memorize all 10 Amendments verbatim, but should be able to explain the phrase "freedom of speech" or "quartering of soldiers".
-Amendment Process
Students should know the two steps that must be completed to add an amendment (Proposal and Ratification) and should be able to explain why we have this amendment process.
-Amendments: 13, 14, 15, 19. 24. 26
Students should be familiar with the result of each of these amendments and how they relate to voting rights.
Today students wrote opinions on which amendment they thought was the most important. It led to some really great conversations!
Another great week is coming to an end! Tomorrow we will be taking our Vocabulary Quiz and Citizenship Quiz. In your student's Thursday Folder you should see their Vocabulary Quiz from last week and the first reading passage we did as a class. We take these weekly to show areas of improvement and practice test tasking strategies such as underlining the answers in the passage or eliminating wrong answer choices.
Picture Day is August 24th (the September dates on the picture form are incorrect).
Coming Up Next Week:
Writing- We are going to continue our Narrative writing. This week we really focused on adding detail and description so next week is all about wrapping up and writing satisfying endings! Your child will study 4 techniques for ending a story by looking at some Mentor Texts and then will practice each technique. In Grammar we are going to focus on past tense verbs.
Reading- We have started a class study of The Wizard of Oz. While we read chapters next week we will be practicing asking and answering questions before, during and after reading. Your student will then practice this skill during their own independent reading. We are going to write and answer 3 types of questions: Right There, Search and Think, and On My Own.
Math- Everyone has been doing well with the order of operations. Next week we will be practicing writing expressions and powers of 10. We have been practicing model drawing where students use unit bars to set up their problem and solve.
Science- We are starting our first science unit next week! We are kicking it off with an M&M's experiment to practice the Scientific Method. Then we will move into Genetics and focus on inherited traits and learned behaviors. Genetics is a fairly quick unit so we will have our assessment September 2nd.
Also, Mr. Buscher and I would love to attend your child's after school activities (games, recitals, performances, etc.)! So let us know if anything is coming up and we will try to attend. Feel free to email us or send in a copy of a game schedule or any big events! We like to see our students succeed in and out of school.
We are continuing to settle into our routines and procedures! We have started homework and journals and are on a roll. Open House is tonight and we will be giving out some math and reading information and going over any questions you may have!
Tomorrow we visit the media center for the first time and students will be able to check out books. Make sure these books go back in your child's backpack every night so they do not get misplaced at home.
Coming up next week:
Writing- Begin personal narratives! We will be focusing on adding details and descriptions to create mental images with our writing. We also will be studying a "mentor sentence" to review nouns and verbs. A mentor sentence is just a sentence that an author wrote in a book. We believe it is more meaningful for students to learn from a sentence in an authentic book and see how authors use the grammar and language skills we talk about in class!
Reading- We will be focusing on comparing and contrasting characters, setting and events in books. We will also begin to quote pieces of literature to support our comparisons and contrasts.
Math- We are continuing to work on the order of operations. This year we are using Front Row Math. Students can log on at home with their first and last name and our class code (buschk) for extra practice!
Social Studies- This week we introduced citizenship and studied the Bill of Rights. We will continue looking at more amendments next week. We are also going to look at some of our economic standards!
Hope to see you tonight!
We have had a great first week! Thank you for signing forms and sending them back to school. You should have also received an email with an invitation to join our ClassDojo. If you have not seen this e-mail please let us know and we will send you a code to get connected! Also, thank you for sending in family photos! We are using these pictures to help decorate our classroom and give students a piece of home at school.
Next week we will start sending home homework. Students will get all of their homework on Monday and it will be due on Friday. Students can prioritize how they will complete each assignment, but they should also be reading 20-30 minutes each night. This helps them build up stamina and practice reading strategies we use at school. Ask your student about reading stamina. We have been practicing all this week! The class is already up to 31 minutes of silent, independent reading!
Next week is our open house. Parents are invited to join us August 11 to learn all about curriculum and expectations for fifth grade! The schedule is:
6:00 - 6:15 PTSA meeting
6:25 – 6:50 Session 1 Open House
7:00 – 7:25 Session 2 Open House (repeat session)
We hope to see you all there!