Monthly Archives: September 2019

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What’s Coming Up – Week of September 30-October 4, 2019

Hey parents! Check out what’s happening in our classroom!

Math:

  • We are wrapping up our first unit involving addition and subtraction of fractions with a test next week. 
  • As this unit unfolds, a focus will be to master our multiplication and division math facts. Please practice these at home daily!
  • Check out the Subject Areas: Math page on the blog! It helpful videos and practice links for unit 1! MobyMax is also a great option for extra practice!

ELA:

  • We’re working on strategies that help us bring our stories to life and continuing to write our narrative pieces.
  • Students should be reading for 20 minutes each night and filling out the reading log.

Science: 

  • We’ll begin discussing collaborative work practices and scientific understanding prior to our first unit.

Social Studies:

  • We’ll be moving on to our second unit, Three Worlds Meet. 

Important Reminders:

  • Walk-a-thon on September 27th!
    • Fifth grade will walk from 10:45-11:30
  • Culver’s Night Fundraiser..Monday, October 7
  • Halloween Party-More info to come next week!

Turkey Trot–See message below from Mrs. VanKoevering

Hello everyone,

I am hoping you can add this to your blogs this week.  We are trying to get Georgetown kiddos to sign up online for turkey trot and promote this through blogs and emails (so no paper copies going home).   So if you could copy and paste this into your blog that would be super helpful.  

Turkey Trot 2019 Registration is now open!   Deadline to Register is October 9, 2019.

Use THIS LINK TO REGISTER  and click on the PE BLOG LINK to learn more about the Turkey Trot Race.

Picture This…Our Class at Work!

We worked with partners to practice Adding & Subtracting Mixed Numbers with unlike denominators!

We rolled dice to make it a bit more fun, and even incorporated rock, paper, scissors into our practice!

For helpful links to help study at home before our test, check out the Subject Areas: Math page on the blog! It helpful videos and practice links! MobyMax is also a great option for extra practice also!

In Reader’s Workshop, we took stock of the work we had been doing as readers and celebrated how far we’ve come!

In Social Studies, we reinforced our learning about Federalism with a “Power Sort” game where students needed to work together to sort powers and actions into the different levels of government!

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What’s Coming Up – Week of September 23-27, 2019

Hey Parents! Check out some important things coming up in the next week!

Important Reminders:

  • Early Release day Friday, September 20th!
  • Popcorn Friday on Sept 20th.
  • School Safeties start on Monday, September 23rd!
  • Walk-a-thon on September 27th!
  • Picture Day Thursday, September 26
    • Envelopes went home on Wednesday, September 18
  • Spirit Week Schedule
    • Monday 9/23- PJ Day
    • Tuesday 9/24- Crazy/Mismatched Socks
    • Wednesday 9/25- Crazy Hair 
    • Thursday 9/26- Dress Your Best (Picture Day)
    • Friday 9/27- Eagle Spirit (Blue and Gold)

Picture this…Our Class at Work!

We’ve spent some time this week working with our reading partners.

We practiced summarizing our texts and capturing highlights from our reading.

In writing, we worked with others to whittle down ideas that we can write about for our Memoir writing unit.

It helped to talk through ideas to identify which ones are meaningful for us, which ones will give us a lot to write about, and make for an interesting story for our audience to read.

We’ve also been focusing on 6 different “signposts” that readers can encounter.

    The signposts that readers come across are: 1) Contrasts and Contradictions 2) Tough Questions 3) Aha Moments 4) Again & Again 5) Words of the Wiser 6) Memory Moments Ask your child to tell you more about each one of these!

 

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What’s Coming Up – Week of September 16-20, 2019

Hello, parents!

Research shows that daily homework has little to no effect on elementary-age students. For the most part, the only daily work your child will have at home is reading. Because students have choice in what they read, they should be more than willing to complete this daily assignment. Here is what is expected of students each day for their reading homework:

  • Bring independent reading book to and from school and home each day.
  • Read for at least 20 minutes outside of school.
  • Record reading on the reading log calendar, which students keep in their take home folders.

I encourage you to talk with your child about what he or she is reading.  Visit this page for some ideas about talking to kids about books, or start with one or more of these questions:

  • What “signposts” are you seeing as you read your book? (Have them explain the 6 different types of signposts readers may encounter!)
  • Who are the characters in your book? What problem are they facing?
  • When and where does the story take place?
  • Is there a character in the story to whom you can relate? Why?
  • Who is your least favorite character in the story? Why?

Although reading will be the main homework, there will be times when students need to study, finish projects, or practice skills for mastery. You can keep up with what we’re working on in class as well as with any work that may be assigned by checking your child’s weekly planner sheet. We fill this out together daily, and you can also find a copy that is updated daily on the “Agenda” tab of the blog.

Math:

  • We are working our first math unit, Addition & Subtraction with Fractions! 
  • As this unit unfolds, a focus will be to master our multiplication and division math facts. Please practice these at home and look for MobyMax homework to come soon!

ELA:

  • We’re working on establishing strong independent reading lives and writing narrative pieces.
  • Students should be reading for 20 minutes each night and filling out the reading log.

Science: 

  • We’ll begin discussing collaborative work practices and scientific understanding prior to our first unit.

Social Studies:

  • We are reviewing the structure of our government. 

Important Reminders:

  • Early Release day next Friday, September 20th!
  • Popcorn Friday on Sept 20th.
  • Walk-a-thon on September 27th!

Picture This…Our Class at Work!

We collaborated as we reviewed the 3 branches of our government.

We split the class into 3 groups and each focused on one branch to become experts! It was a great first attempt at larger group work! 😉

In math we practiced converting mixed numbers into improper fractions and back again. We did this “Oprah style” with different examples under our chairs. I think I was more excited than students were when I could say, “You get a mixed number! And you get an improper fraction!”

Students practicing converting mixed numbers and fractions!

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What’s Coming Up – Week of September 9-13, 2019

Miscellaneous: 

  • Next week we will begin our first set of practice safety drills for the year. 
  • The district has adopted a K-12 behavior matrix that is familiar to Georgetown.  The district model, SOAR, blends beautifully with our school mission of BE NICE, WORK HARD, LEARN WELL.  We want our kids to SOAR wherever they are at Georgetown — and many of our existing expectations have meshed well with BE SAFE, OWN IT, ACT RESPONSIBLY and BE RESPECTFUL.  This week our SOAR focus was the BUS. In coming weeks we’ll focus on the playground, lunchroom, and hallway behaviors.  

Important Reminders:

Birthdays are wonderful opportunities to celebrate each child in our classroom. I will provide a treat for each student on his or her birthday or on the closest school day. If a child has a summer birthday, we’ll celebrate on his or her half birthday. Some families also like to celebrate birthdays by sending in a treat for the class, while others opt not to send anything. In the interest of health and safety of all students, fifth grade teachers are asking that families do not send in food or toys as birthday treats.

Instead, please consider sending something for the class to enjoy such as:

  • A game for the classroom
  • A classroom book (A nice touch would be to your child pick it out, sign it, and date it.)
  • A classroom set of items for each child to keep such as pencils, pens, erasers, markers, etc.

The items listed above will still make your child feel special and they will last a lot longer than a food item.

Picture This…Our Class at Work!

We interviewed each other to find out things that we’re good at!

We discussed how we’ve been able to train our brains to become good at those things.

We helped each other see how much we’ve grown in our abilities over the years. Having a growth mindset takes work, but is helpful to learn new things!

We’ve been discussing what it means to develop our reading lives and have been deciding together how we want our class to track our reading, organize our books, and share about what we’re reading. Today, we tackled the organizational side of things!

We cleared the shelves and sorted into piles by author!

Each person owned an area of the alphabet and sorted through books!

It was a BIG mess before it got better…

With all hands on deck, we were able to get the job done!

Students sorting baskets for better ways to help each other find good books!