January 3 - 13 (Week 18 & 19)

Week 18 – 19 (January 3 – 13)

Sharing Writing to Grow (Opinion Pieces)

The kids have been thriving with creating amazing narrative pieces. So we’re attempting to steer our writing in new directions, opinion writing. We began with a few debates. Each kid chose a topic, which they had to argue, was better than fellow peer’s topic. We voted as a class which student won based on the support and voice they gave. We discussed the importance of opinion pieces, how they played a roll in our lives, and what should be included in an opinion piece to best persuade our readers.

Since then, the kids have written many opinion pieces. Such as what they would change about the class and which book they think is better. You can see check out their opinion pieces on which book they think is better (Because of Winn-Dixie or Stella by Starlight) on our bulletin board outside.

Habitats

We recently started our unit on habitat, animal, and energy transfer. We began by looking at the different habitats (biomes) that animals reside in. We’ve now begun looking at how they survive in their habitat. We will dig a bit deeper with this in order to better understand the animal adaptation, food chains, and competition.

Understanding Math

What better way to practice fluency than through exercise? With the weather being so lovely, we have been able to go outside for the very popular (within our classroom) game of Math Race! The kids are split into 2 teams. I can out a problem and the kids race (I decide if they run, hop, skip, jump, or whatever other exercise) to the white boards to write down the answer to the problem. The kids love this game and it really helps with fluency.

Now that our kids have a strong understanding of multiplication, we are moving on to area, which is directly related. We’ve began by creating rectangular shapes we have a known length and width for. For those who are ready, we’ve begun finding the area by counting the squares within the shape, and for those who are even further along we’ve began using the formula for area.

December 5 - 16 (week 16 & 17)

Week 16 & 17 (December 5 - 16)

Group work (what does it look like, feel like, and sound like)

The kids love working in groups and are very effective at it. However, they've really been struggling with working with a single partner. So we chiseled out some time to practice this. We worked with a partner and decided what worked and what didn't work. We also observed two of our classmates work as partners because they experts at it! 

Multiplication

We're still working on our multiplication fluency and the kids are excelling!

NO MORE RECESS!!

Mrs. Elliot informed the students that from now on the 5th graders are allowed to take over our recess time and there was no discussing it. Well the kids thought this was very unfair, they shed tears, and then began to find ways to stop this from happening. They wrote letters to Mrs. Elliot and the 5th graders and even made protest signs in order to protest. About mid day we informed the students that it was a hoax in order to help the empathize with the Native Americans who had also been pushed off of their land. The kids immediately made the connection and gained a better understanding of what the Native American tribes had to face!

 

Because of Winn-Dixie Movie Premiere

After reading the amazing book Because of Winn-Dixie we watched the movie. We compared the movie and the book and noticed some significant differences that we then discussed. 

Writing with Detail

For homework a week ago the kids had to choose a family member and write a disruptive paragraph about them. They really thought carefully about these!

Revolutionary War

We looked into the battles of the Revolutionary War. The kids found some interesting facts to present to the class. 

Celebrating Sofia

Sofia invited me and some of the other students to her party at EdVenture. We all had a blast celebrating with Sofia. 

Winter Holidays

Before leaving for Winter break we looked at the winter holidays: Hanukah  Kwanzaa, and Christmas. We researched and read about the people who celebrate these holidays, the traditions, and what was the meaning of each.

We kicked off our Winter break with a party!