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Sunday, September 29, 2013

September 30th ~ October 4th

We will have a busy week with NWEA testing, a field trip to the Alberta Bair Theater, and watching Bridge to Terabithia in preparation for a compare/contrast persuasive essay.

We are testing on Monday from 9:30-11:30 (Math), Wednesday from 8:30-10:30 (Language), and Friday from 8:30-10:30 (Reading). The kids may bring chewing gum to enjoy during our testing times.

We will head downtown to the Alberta Bair on Tuesday from 8:45 to about 10:45. The presentation of Doktor Kaboom should be a fun science-themed show.

Our counselor, Mrs. Tatum will visit our class again on Wednesday. Her lessons will focus on feelings, friendship, bullying, etc.

We will not work with a spelling unit this week due to our testing schedule. We will practice our keyboarding skills on Friday afternoon. The kids do not love this activity, but our testing environments are online and will require some typing skill. These practice sessions will serve the kids well in the future . . . I just have to keep reminding them about all the positives.  :)

Language ~ We will work with the Latin/Greek root words -celer- and -gress-.
Reading ~ The kids will create a project to summarize Bridge to Terabithia. We will watch the Disney movie version and the students will begin writing persuasive essay comparing/contrasting the book with the movie.
Math ~
5th: We will continue working with the order of operations, expressions, and equations.
6th: The kids will work with Greatest Common Factors and Least Common Multiples this week.
Social Studies ~
6th will continue learning about the Neolithic Age. The kids will create a comic strip on Thursday.
Science ~
We are working with the various states of matter - solid, liquid, gas. We will work with an online activity on Tuesday and then get a bit messy on Friday as we experiment with liquids and solids.

I was at Saturday Live fairly early, but it looked like a great turnout was in store. I am very thankful that the weather held out for us!! Thanks to everyone who donated, volunteered, or supported the event by attending.

Don't forget about the book order. I would love to have the forms back Monday, but will not place the order until Wednesday if you are still browsing.

Have a fantastic week!!

Sunday, September 22, 2013

September 23rd ~ 27th

Thursday is an early-out day to allow for instruction-related training for teachers. Lunch is not served on early-out days and the kids will be dismissed at 12:00 noon.

Mark your Calendars ~ October 1st Field Trip to the Alberta Bair Theater. This is usually just a 6th grade treat, but I asked Mr. Croff and he was able to have our entire class included. You will find a permission slip in the Wednesday Watch this week and I would like to have it returned no later than next Monday, the 30th. The show this year is Doktor Kaboom, which focuses on the fun and intrigue that science and math can generate.

NWEA Dates ~ I have changed one of our NWEA dates because it conflicted with the Alberta Bair show. We will now test as follows:
Monday September 30th ~ Math
Wednesday October 2nd ~ Language
Friday October 4th ~ Reading

Spelling ~ 
5th: Unit 3 - long i and long e
6th: Unit 3 - vowel sounds
We will take a pretest on Monday, work with our words and selected vocabulary throughout the week, and take a final test on Friday.
Language ~ Both grades will work with the Latin word roots ~brev, ~cede, ~ceed, & ~cess. Each week, the kids learn the meanings of these word roots and then use their expertise to "create" a new word using at least one prefix, one suffix, and one word root.
5th: Action Verbs and Past Tense Verbs
6th: Reflexive Pronouns and Demonstrative Pronouns
Reading ~ Both grades will finish reading Bridge to Terabithia this week. They will work on a final project for the book next week. For each reading selection, the students must make predictions, look for connections to self, text, or world as they read, maintain an awareness of unknown words or concepts as they read, and then write a short summary of each chapter.
Writing ~ The kids will begin doing a 15-20 minute rotation each day dedicated to using writing prompts for short pieces - or self-selected topics they choose to take to publication after revising and editing.
Math ~ 
5th: We will be working with the Order of Operations this week. This concept is pivotal for later concepts and we will complete several real-world activities to reinforce this concept.
6th: Our focus will be rules of divisibility, prime & composite numbers, factors & prime factorization, and greatest common factors.
6th Social Studies ~ We are continuing our study of Hominids.
6th Science ~ We are continuing our work with density and will create a layered density tower on Tuesday. It is messy, but fun! We will learn about the various states of matter.

Have a fantastic week - and thank you again for sharing your child with me!