Happy Friday!
It’s hard to believe that February will be arriving next week! January just has flown by!
Here’s a glimpse into what we’ve been working on, and a peek at what’s ahead for next week!
Literacy This week we wrapped up the first half of our science fiction unit. Next week, we will start to read a science fiction story called Jess and Layla’s Astronomical Adventure. The two main characters of the story travel back in time and meet many of history’s famous philosophers and scientists! Throughout the reading we will work on skills such as understanding text structure, using context clues to understand word meaning, compare and contrast characters—-just to name a few.
We have also been concentrating on learning a few new greek and latin roots each week. I am trying to show the students that if they know the meaning of basic greek and latin roots, they can often discern the meaning of unknown words.
Writing* This week our students completed a writing assessment which required students to plan and compose a science fiction story in one session. It was especially good practice for the PARCC assessments in the Spring! Next week, we will start to conduct research for a new informative essay. Students will be asked to select a historical discovery in the area of space and write a their version of a science journal entry. The essay will include facts presented in an organized format, as well as visuals to support their topic. Students will also be asked to evaluate and cite their sources.
Spelling* We are continuing our work with the Words Their Way program. Just a friendly reminder that each boggle choice sheet is due on Friday with three completed activities. Please encourage your child to start working on these assignments earlier in the week rather than waiting until the night before they are due.
Math* Last week we finished a short math target that involved interpreting the size of a product of a fractional multiplication problem based on the size of each factor. We are currently working on solving real-world problems involving the multiplication of fractions.
Social Studies* This week we started to discuss and read about the liberties that we are fortunate to have, living in our country. Throughout the unit, we will also contrast our liberties with various countries who may not have some of the same freedoms that we are fortunate to have. We read a very interesting article about North Korea and the lack of liberties experienced by the citizens who live there. We engaged in a discussion board on Schoology where kids posted their reactions and were able to respond to the comments of peers as well. Today, after reading an article about two North Korean teens who fled their country, we did a “talking chips” activity. Here. students could verbally respond to and discuss questions about the article within small groups.
Science* This week we continued to learn about how a star's brightness correlates to a star's distance from the earth. On Monday we did a fun investigation using flashlights and graph paper to measure what happens to the rays of the sun and other stars when distance is increased. We discovered that using the ceiling gave us the best results!
Friendly Reminders and Upcoming Events
**Tuesday, Jan. 31—PTO Special Lunch (Culver’s) Early Release @ 2:00
**Thurs., Feb. 9—PTO Family Bingo Night @ 6:30 @Ivy Hall
**Tuesday, Feb., 14—Valentine’s Day parties @ 2:00
**Thurs., Feb., 16—5th Grade Music Program @ 6:30 pm
**Fri., Feb., 17—3rd-5th Movie Night @ 6:00
**Mon., Feb.20—No School Presidents Day
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