What's the News in Room 19?: January 2015

Tuesday, January 27, 2015

Week 22: January 26, 2015

Dear Room 19 Families,

This week is almost “normal”! Aside from The Giver on Monday, we are back in full swing this week! One change you may be noticing is a delay in when homework is due. Next year, students will be on a block schedule so they may be assigned homework on Monday that isn’t due until Wednesday, or on Tuesday homework that isn’t due until Thursday. This is a balancing act for many students and can be very challenging. To help students prepare for the rigor and changes that are to come in middle school, we are staring to prepare now. It is imperative that assignment notebooks are being recorded in daily and checked. Please help your 5^th grader stay organized and on top of their academics.

Happenings this week:

· Skate Night on Thursday

Our learning this week continues with:

• Reading-Unit 4, Lesson 1 in Journey's-The Dog Newspaper (Autobiography)

◦ Skill: Fact and Opinion

◦ Strategy: Analyze/Evaluate

◦ Word work focus: homographs

◦ Fluency skill: phrasing

◦ New Novel Assignment: Due January 30th! FRIDAY!

• Social Science- As we finish up our unit on Colonization and head into the Revolutionary War, we will be discussing the French and Indian War. We will also be continuing to memorize the 50 states. You can find blank templates on line to quiz your geographer!

• Writing-Students Persuasive commercials were great! I am excited to see 5^th grader authors use their skills from commercials to apply to a larger persuasive pieces starting next month. The reminder of this week will be used to focus on grammar and parts of speech. • Math-Unit 7: This week, we will review graphs and data sets. We have started our next unit on graphing with linear equations on a coordinate plane. This tends to be a fun unit for students because we start using variables and what they call “real algebra”.

Assessments this Friday consist of:

• DMR Quiz

• Unit 4 Lesson 18 reading Test

Students should be using online resources every week!

Online Resources for Students:

https://www.ixl.com/signin/crookedcreek

http://www.mobymax.com

http://www.lexiacore5.com

http://www.myon.com

Username: Student ID #

Password: Last name

Please do not hesitate to contact me with any questions or concerns. Have a wonderful week!

srahrig@msdwt.k12.in.us

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Week 21: January 20, 2015

Dear Room 19 Families,

The last two weeks back have been quite the whirlwind. Between two-hour delays and snow days it has been challenging for us to get back in the swing of things and to fit in all of our content.

Although we did not have school on Monday, hopefully this week will start to feel more like a typical week of school for teachers, parents, and learners!

Happenings this week:

· English/Language Arts Acuity on Thursday

· Spelling Bee on Friday

Please note: Acuity is a measure used to show student growth and inform my instruction. I have had some parents request Acuity scores and will send those home NEXT Thursday in orange take home folders.

Our learning this week continues with:

• Reading-Unit 4, Lesson 17 in Journey's-LAFF (Science Fiction)

◦ Skill: Story Structure

◦ Strategy: Infer/Predict

◦ Word work focus: adverbs

◦ Fluency skill: intonation

◦ New Novel Assignment: Due January 30^th!!

◦ Vocabulary/Word Work Quiz Friday

• Social Science- We are finishing up our Unit on Colonization. Students should be working to memorize the first 13 colonies! (Memorize Massachusetts as Maine and Massachusetts Bay as Massachusetts.) We have been analyzing reasons for settling and looking closely at each region: New England Colonies, Middle Colonies and Southern Colonies

• Writing-Students will be using their new knowledge on Colonization to write commercials to persuade audiences to settle in one of the 3 Colonial Regions. We viewed commercials today to get ideas of what makes them so persuasive!

• Math-Unit 7: We are behind in everything, but particularly in Math because of the snow days and delays. We are currently working on Data Sets and Statistics. Simply put, we are looking at groups of numbers and finding averages in different ways. This week, we will continue to look at data sets in graphs, (line plots, bar graphs, line graphs, etc.). Next week, we will continue graphing with linear equations on a coordinate plane. This tends to be a fun unit for students because we start using variables and what they call “real algebra”.

Assessments this week will consist of:

• Friday: Mean, median, mode, range quiz

• Friday: Lesson 17 vocabulary and grammar

· Colonization (Friday or Monday depending on how long Spelling be lasts.)