5-2 Updates ~ 10/24

Hello 5-2 Families ~

I hope you have a chance to relax and enjoy some family time weekend.  Thank you to all of you who took the time to come out and visit our classroom on Thursday night for Open House!  It was so nice to see all of you, and the students were SO proud to show you around the classroom!

Important Dates

Team Building with the Principals ~ Wednesday, October 28th - Mrs. Fitzpatrick and Ms. Davis will take the 5th graders on Wednesday morning for a fun team building activity.  Always a favorite with the 5th graders!!

Halloween Party ~ Friday, October 30th at 1:10pm - The kiddos are getting excited for our Halloween celebration on Friday!  Our Annual Halloween Parade begins at 1:30pm, with the party immediately following.  We look forward to seeing you all along the route!  Please refer to the Olive Blog for more information on rain plans, as well as Halloween costume expectations.

Math

My math class began to work on geometric concepts in unit 3 this week.  They were introduced to a new online resource this week - LearnZillion.  They should be working on Classifying and Comparing Quadrangles at home for extra review on polygons.  They will also be working on Khan Academy this unit ~ Properties of Shapes.

Social Studies

After our exciting start to the unit on Wednesday, we didn't get to return to our social studies unit until Friday.  But we were interrupted with some great activities!  On Wednesday, our Genius Hour fell during the social studies, so the students were engaged in personalized learning.  On Thursday, Mrs. Watanuki visited our room with the Maker Cart and introduced your children to dozens of engaging STEM activities.  They had a blast!  Ask them what they chose to explore for the hour.  I'll include some pictures of the activities below.  We did return to the rising tensions in the American colonies on Friday, and we will continue our discussion next week.  Students will create posters on one of the 6 events leading up to the Revolutionary War next week as well!

Reading

We wrapped up our Launching Unit in Reading this week with students doing reflections on themselves as readers.  I continue to meet with the students individually to discuss their reading goals and to have them evaluate their reading notebook using a rubric.  This will be the assessment grade for our Launching Unit since the objective of this unit was to establish routines and procedures.

We also began rotating for Target Time this week.  Target Time is a 30 minute block in our afternoon where we have the opportunity to focus on each student's greatest need, and provide additional instruction.  It may be re-teaching or enrichment depending on their needs, but all students will enjoy rich instruction, as well as have the opportunity to experience different classrooms and instructors.

Writing

We began the process of writing our final Personal Narratives this week.  We will work slowly through the process for about 2 weeks, focusing on how to pull a Personal Narrative together into a polished piece with an engaging introduction and reflective conclusion, then they will be expected to write a Personal Narrative independently while being timed.

As always, please feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns.  Have a fantastic week ~

Live so that when your children think of fairness, caring, and integrity, they think of you.

H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

Cheers ~

Theresa Fowler