Updates for the Week

I hope everyone had a restful Labor Day weekend. As a note, I have updated the class calendar. You can access the calendar on the right side of the blog. I have added some new dates including dates for our 5th grade trip to Camp Kanuga. I have also added our Twitter feed on the right side of the blog. We use Twitter to keep in contact with the citizen science community, the maker community, and we post things we make during explorations. There is also a link to follow us on Twitter if you are interested.

Each week we slowly get back into the thick of things. We have begun our latest DBQ on the Reconstruction Period. You will be seeing these DBQs at home since I will be asking students to work on some of it at home for homework. At the same time, in social studies, we finished collecting information on the Reconstruction Period and are focusing on synthesizing this information.

In math, we are taking a slower, yet more direct view of problem solving and this seems to be working. Students seem a little less anxious and more focused. We have been working on number puzzles in which students have to find a specific number based on clues. These clues involve students having to understand terms such as multiples and factors, prime numbers, square numbers, and composite numbers.

I do want to take the time to emphasize the importance of making sure everyone has their multiplication tables memorized and recall them automatically. Those that seem to be less confident in math at this point are struggling with automaticity of their multiplication tables. As I have emphasized with students, 18 out of 25, 5th grade math standards involve multiplication. I will be sporadically testing kids on their multiplication tables. If they are unable to pass these tests they will be using their explorations time to memorize. You can help by working with your child on their multiplication tables or allowing them to use Multiplication.com, or another website. Any extra help is appreciated.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

More "Balanced / Unbalanced" Activities

Image
Today we continued playing around with balanced and unbalanced forces. So today we an activity in which students sat laid down on chairs with their heads on another person's lap. The chairs were pulled out. If forces were balanced, students should be able to stay up (not for long).  Here are some pictures of students laying down in chairs then having the chairs pulled out while balancing.
Read more

A Couple of Things for this Short Week

I hope that everyone is having a restful Labor Day weekend. 1) Remember that T hursday, September 6 (6:30-8:00 ) is Opening Picnic . We purposely hold Opening Picnic after Labor Day so that students become acclimated to school and feel comfortable showing you around the classroom and school. After we all gather for the picnic, students and parents will head into the classroom. I'll give students the chance to show you around before I spend a few minutes talking about a few items you as parents will want to know such as homework and discipline policies. Other than that, I'm more hoping to get to know all of you so we can quickly start relationships that will benefit the academic success of your child. 2) On Friday, September 21 at 2:20 will be our first 4th grade gathering. We will most likely be sharing about current studies such as student poetry, our study of Native Americans, and weather. 3) MAP testing in math will be this Wednesday, September 5th . 4) Have student
Read more

First Week of School

We made it and everyone is in one piece! We got our first week of school and our first week of the new loop is out of the way. During this time we accomplished quite a bit: We started discussing our expectations for the new loop, We immediately began moving into new routines and schedules, As issues came up in class students began the task of taking on classroom jobs, We are reviewing math while I'm getting to know your child as a mathematician, Students are creating a presentation of things they  think I should know about them, Students got to meet our new MAT Mrs. Meredith, We are getting back into the flow of reading and writing by doing  real reading and writing. This helps me get to know them as readers and writers, Our Chromebooks are all set up and accounts have been created. Really, this list is simply about getting procedures down and setting up expectations for the next two year. This is a critical part of the class because it's these expectations that
Read more