9/30/22

We wrapped up the week and the month of September by taking our second math assessment of the school year. This 5 questions quiz will be used to gauge the kid's progress with multiplication work. Over the next two weeks, we are going to be spending some time working with division problems.

Please return any safety patrol permission slips by early next week.

I hope everyone has a nice weekend.

9/29/22

Fifth graders continued their work with another short story as part of our literary writing unit. Today, the kids read Spaghetti by Cynthia Rylant. The last two days have been top shelf writing lessons. I was impressed with the responses that the kids were giving to some inference questions.

As a reminder, please return safety patrol permission slips as soon as possible.

9/28/22

The fifth graders finished their exploration of the short story Eleven during our ELA time. Each of the kids annotated and marked up their story and then pulled out some possible writing ideas that we will explore further over the next two weeks. Later this week, the fifth graders will look at a few more short stories and then look to make connections between them.

All of the kids are taking home a permission slip for Fifth Grade Safety Patrols. This is optional. Students are welcome to have this signed and returned as soon as possible. 

9/27/22

The fifth graders are going to continue their work with literary essay writing this week. We completed annotating out first short story together this morning. Over the next few days, the fifth graders are going to be responsible for working in pairs to explore three other stories. 

Our work with various multiplication strategies will also continue throughout the course of this week. We had an excellent lesson today that built on some of the work we were doing last week.

9/23/22

We concluded a productive week by exploring a short story during our literary essay writing lesson. The fifth graders practiced using their annotation skills and answered some focus questions about this piece of writing. Next week the fifth graders will be exposed to a variety of short stories and will ultimately choose one to begin crafting a literary essay about.

Science time saw the kids putting the finishing touches on a model of the solar system. They were also able to share some of the interesting details that they have learned about the planets with each other.

I hope everyone has a nice long weekend. 

9/22/22

This Thursday saw the fifth graders continuing to work on their models of the solar system. The kids have also been using their Chromebooks to gather interesting details about each of the planets. They are going to add this to their finished models. We will look to have all of the students done with this tomorrow afternoon.

It was nice to meet with so many of you last night. Thank you for taking the time to attend the curriculum night.

9/21/22

We transitioned to the second section of unit one during math class today. This portion will see the kids working to master various multiplication strategies. Today was a quality first lesson and the kids continue to impress with their ability to explain their logic. 

I look forward to meeting with parents and families during Back to School night, which is tonight. Parents whose last name begin with letters A through L are invited into my classroom from 6 to 640. While those whose last name falls within M through Z are welcome to come in from 720 to 8. In between, there will be a presentation in the gym be the specialist teachers.

9/20/22

The fifth graders took their first assessment during our math time this morning. This assessment, which presented the kids with questions about multiplication and order of operation problems, will serve as a quality gauge as to where they currently stand. I look forward to going over the results.

As a reminder, this Wednesday the 21 is Back to School night. Parents whose last name begin with letters A through L are invited into my classroom from 6 to 640. While those whose last name falls within M through Z are welcome to come in from 720 to 8. In between, there will be a presentation in the gym be the specialist teachers. I look forward to meeting with families this week.

9/19/22

This week will see the kids launch our first science unit. We will explore the solar system, with special points of emphasis on the sun and planets. There will be an experiment conducted involving tracking the progress of the sun over the course of a school day later this week. The kids seem excited to start this work.

We also had another productive lesson centered around order of operations during our math time. Impressive partner work was in evidence throughout the room.

As a reminder, this Wednesday the 21 is Back to School night. Parents whose last name begin with letters A through L are invited into my classroom from 6 to 640. While those whose last name falls within M through Z are welcome to come in from 720 to 8. In between, there will be a presentation in the gym be the specialist teachers. I look forward to meeting with families this week.

9/16/22

We wrapped up a busy week by working with order of operation problems during math class. Between this work and the group work that was done on our number puzzles, it was an impressive and productive week in math class.

All of the fifth graders also finished their "Important Me" poems. These will be hung up and parents can read these during Back to School Night next week.

I hope everyone has a nice weekend.

9/15/22

During math class, the groups continued to work on their number puzzles activity. Once again, we had excellent teamwork throughout the classroom. A few groups were able to complete the final two puzzles this morning. We will have one final day of work on this activity tomorrow.

Tomorrow, we are going to have our first social studies lesson of the year. We are going to begin our work by learning about compass directions and longitude and latitude. 

9/14/22

We began a two day math project this morning. Over the next two sessions, the kids will be working in groups of four to solve number puzzles. Using some of the math terminology we have built recently as well as their recall of multiplication facts, the fifth graders were able to get off to a quality start with this today. 

Members of A303 also concluded their pre-assessment for our first reading unit. I compliment the kids getting this piece of work done.

9/13/22

We began our pre-assessment for our first reading unit this morning. This assessment will ask the students to respond to four prompts concerning a short video and a short story by Cynthia Rylant. The fifth graders completed the first two questions today and will look to finish this tomorrow. The valuable data from these questions will serve me well as I establish reading groups. 

The members of A303 also had another productive math class. We continued our work with arrays. I have been impressed with the work the kids have been doing in the early stages of the school year.

9/12/22

This is going to be a jam packed week for the fifth graders in room A303. Our first full week together will see the kids continue to work with arrays during math class. Today, many of the students were able to use math tiles to create multiplication problems and their solutions. Some nice partner work during this session. 

The students also had their first music class this morning. This year the members of A303 will have the following special schedule:

Monday - Music

Tuesday - Gym

Wednesday - Art

Thursday - Gym

Friday - Library

I would also continue to encourage all of the kids to have an independent reading book with them in the classroom. Three days during the week, the students have silent, independent reading time after lunch. To best utilize this time, each student should have a chapter book with them. Thanks in advance for your help with this.

9/9/22

We concluded our first week together by continuing our exploration of multiplication in math class. The fifth graders are doing a nice job of explaining their reasoning and working through these early lessons. I look forward to continuing this work next week.

During the second half of the school day, we also read the second chapter of Wonder by RJ Palacio. Next week, the students will look to respond to some focus questions about the novel.

I hope everyone has a nice weekend.

9/8/22

Our first Thursday together saw the members of A303 undertake their first math lesson as a class. The fifth graders looked to fill out a multiplication chart. Any unfinished sections were then completed together as a class. This segued into the second part of our lesson where the kids created images after answering some multiplication problems using their charts. A productive first session.

Later in the school day, the kids worked on a reading lesson that utilized a picture book that touched upon some of our important guiding principles, such as theme, character motivation and setting. 

Homework

Writing - fifth graders should decorate their writing notebooks with images and drawings that are significant to them. As an example, here is a picture of my writing notebook:

9/7/22

The fifth graders in room A303 were able to use their school Chromebooks for the first time today. Using the devices, the kids were able to set up their Spy Ponders accounts as well as sign in to the class website. I greatly appreciated the patience of everyone as we got this complete together. 

We also were able to take part in another introductory batch of activities that allowed the kids to learn more about each other and some of the things we will be learning about this school year.

Homework

Writing - fifth graders should decorate their writing notebooks with images and drawings that are significant to them. Ideally, everyone will have done this by Friday.

As an example, here is a picture of my writing notebook:

9/6/22

We officially began the 2022 - 2023 school year at the Thompson today. Although the weather outside left something to be desired, the students and staff were thrilled to be back together.

The members of A303 spent the early stages of the day taking part in some activities to get to know each other better. We had our first morning meeting and took part in our first energizer together. These routines are going to play a significant role in our classroom this year.

The fifth graders also had gym during their special time today.

As the week progresses, we are going to look to have the fifth graders get set up on various websites that will be important this year. They are also going to have their first official math lesson later this week.

A great first day in the books and I look forward to building upon it tomorrow.

I hope everyone has a nice night.