September Flew By!

Hi Everyone,

I cannot believe the first month of school has already flew by! It feels like yesterday the kiddos were walking in the door on the first day.

We had a great trip to Nature's Classroom last week.  I will be posting pictures soon from the trip.  The students had a blast learning about a wide variety of topics including dissections, astronomy, night vision, argument protocol, and many more.

In math,we have been studying algebraic expressions.  The students have learned  how to use the order of operations to solve and write numerical expressions.  We have also been practicing our multiplication facts!  By 5th grade, it is imperative that students know their multiplications facts well in order to work with fractions, which is a large part of our curriculum. To practice, we have been doing multiplication ladders with a buddy in class.  Ask your child about multiplication ladders!  It is important that students practice their facts at home as well as school.   This week, we will begin a short unit on patterns and graphing data on coordinate planes.

In reading, we have been working on routines and procedures for Reader's Workshop.  In Reader's Workshop, students are expected to read independently in a just right book and write a reader's response once a week. Students have been practicing how to write a reading response that includes the Title, Author, Genre and Summary. This week, we have also begun guided reading groups.  Students will be reading realistic fiction books and studying characters.  Some of the books students are reading are: Flying Solo, Extra Credit and Return to Sender.  

In writer's workshop, we just finished up a mini unit on the Writing Process.  Students learned the steps in the writing process, with a major focus on revision.  We even got to see the first 5 drafts of the book Because of Winn Dixie! The kids thought seeing an authors revision work was really interesting!  This week, we will begin our first narrative unit.  Students will be writing either a personal or realistic fiction narrative story.

In social studies, we just began our unit on the government.  Students will learn about the 3 branches of government and their roles in creating laws.  We will also study the Bill of Rights and learn about our rights as citizens of the United States.

I hope to see you all at Open House on October 4th!

Ms. Phillips