February 4th

*Blog written by the students in room 14

We have had a busy week in Room 14. The weather has been crazy.  We were able to enjoy some time outside without snowpants and boots.  It looks like now we are back to winter gear for a least a few days.

Reader's Workshop
In Reader's Workshop this week, we spent a lot of time looking at persuasive and opinion writing pieces.  We worked together to find the author's angle.  We also studied these pieces of writing looking for the shifts the author used to make his or her writing more interesting.

Writer's Workshop
In Writer's Workshop this week, we continued our unit on persuasive writing.  We studied shifts that could be used in our writing and worked to integrate these shifts in our persuasive pieces.  We are now working on completing a persuasive piece on zoos.  We are using our checklist to make sure that our writing has an introduction, three body paragraphs with reasons and evidence to support, and a conclusion that echos our introduction.  

Math
In Math this week, we have continued to work with fractions.  We are working with adding and subtracting fractions.  We have been finding common denominators and using equivalent fractions when needed.  

Social Studies
In Social Studies this week, we continued our unit "Road to the Revolution."  We focused on Committees of Correspondence, Tea Act, Boston Tea Party, The "Intolerable Acts", and the First Continental Congress.  We have been watching "The Liberty Kids" to help us understand what it was like to live as a colonist in the 1700s.  


Reminders:

• All instrument forms are due TOMORROW, February 5th
• All signed math BAs need to be turned in by TOMORROW, February 5th
• All 5th Grade Camp forms and money need to be turned in by next Friday, February 12th
• Mid Winter Break: NO SCHOOL February 13th - 21st 
• 5th Grade Camp: March 2nd - 4th 

January 21st

Blog written by the students in room 14.

Reader's Workshop
This week in reading we have been looking at different character perspectives.  We decided as a class to abandon Across Five Aprils.  We were having a hard time following this book.  Many kids could not understand what was happening in the book.  We are looking forward to starting our new book The Honest Truth tomorrow.  We continued to read The Phantom Tollbooth with Mrs. Athan.  Right now are are at the part where the kingdom of Digitopoles was introduced.  This is another kingdom in the book.

Writer's Workshop
In writing we have been writing persuasive writing pieces.  We have been boosting our persuasive writing.  Today we spent time studying ways to hook our reader in our introduction.  We then tried new introductions to see which ones we liked best.

Math
In math this week we have been doing a lot with coordinate grids.  We also learned how to add and subtract with decimals.  We have played many math games to help our understanding.  We played Decimal Top-It and many more.  Next week we are going to have our next BA.

Social Studies
In Social Studies we are learning about all of the acts that led to the American Revolution.  We learned PSQSTBCTBIFB. This stands for "Please send Queen Stupid to bed cause, Tim baked insects for breakfast."  Today we learned about the Townshend Act and tomorrow we are excited to learn about The Boston Massacre.  

Science
In Science we have been working on creating pendulums.  We also have been working on changing just one variable.  We watched a video that includes independent variables and dependent variable.  Independent variables means what I can change.  Dependent variables means what I observe and controlled variables means what I keep the same.

Reminders:

• 5th Grade Camp is March 2nd-4th.  Camp packets were given out at the camp meeting or sent home today in your child's folder.
• Please return your child's instrument form by Friday, February 5th.
• January 26th: Little Caesars pizza orders due
• February 15th - 19th: NO SCHOOL Mid Winter Break

January 14th

Blog written by the students in room 14.

We completed our second round of iReady testing this week. 

Reader's Workshop
In Reader's Workshop this week we have been looking for claims, reasons, and evidence in our reading.  We have been noticing how authors make a claim and support their claim with evidence.

Writer's Workshop
We have been working on our persuasive writing this week.  We have been focusing our research on chocolate milk.  We have been collecting evidence to determine if chocolate milk is healthy or not.  Ask your 5th grader what his or her claim is on chocolate milk.

Math
In math this week we have been working with the coordinate grid system.  We have been plotting points on a graph and providing coordinates as well.  

Social Studies
In Social Studies this week we started our unit on "The Road to the Revolution."  We learned a new mnemonic to help us remember the order of events that lead to the revolution.  Ask your 5th grader if he or she can recite the mnemonic.


Reminders

• No School Monday: January 18th MLK Day - please join us for a celebration at Northern High School
• 5th Grade Camp and Graduation meeting: Tuesday, January 19th at 6:00 p.m.
• Count Day: Thursday, January 21st 

January 7th

Blog written by the students in room 14.

Read Aloud
Mrs. Faley started a new read aloud book today.  The book is called Across Five Aprils.  It is an historical fiction book that takes place in the 1800s.  We are still reading The Phantom Toolbooth with Mrs. Athan.

Reader's Workshop
In reader's workshop we are been reading persuasive articles about rats.  We have been analyzing the claims, reasons, and evidence in each article.

Writer's Workshop
In writer's workshop, we have been working on making claims and providing evidence and reasons to support our claims.  This type of writing is called persuasive writing.  WE have been reading articles and watching videos about people's thinking on rats.  

Math
In math we are learning about decimals.  We learned how to write decimals in three different expanded forms.  Also, we are using place value grids to help us determine the values of numbers.  Our grids include tenths, hundredths, and thousandths.

Social Studies
This week in social studies we finished our BA.  We talked about the people of the colonies. The colonies are New England, Middle and Southern.  

Science 
In science we have been working on the unit variables.  WE have been working with table partner on making a toothpick and clay tower to reach over our height goal.  We also worked with our table partner to try to get our ball bearing to go a certain distance.  We could only use a paper cup, a ruler, and a role of tape.  Only about four groups got up to the goal.

FAPEs
In Art we finished our school year book covers and decided to start clay homes with a theme of our choice.
In PE Mr. Cox came back from his knee surgery.  We also have a student teacher in PE.  His name is Mr. Wozny and he is helping us prepare for our 14 minute jog test.
In music we have been going over our notes and playing music bingo to help us.  Also, people get to play songs on the piano at the end.
In Media we have been working on our typing with Typing Master.  We also did Hour of Code.

Important Dates

• January 18th - NO SCHOOL MLK Day (Please join us for the MLK celebration at Northern High School)
• January 19th - Field Trip to Western High School
• January 19th - Camp/Graduation meeting at 6 pm
• January 26th - Little Caesars pizza orders due
• February 15th - 19th - NO SCHOOL Mid Winter Break

December 10th

Blog written by the students of Room 14

We have had a busy week in room 14.  We had the Holiday Shop on Wednesday.  We started using Google Classroom in our class to discuss books and post our thinking.

In Readers' Workshop this week, we have been working on making claims about characters and providing evidence to support our claims.  We also read a book called Voices In a Park by Anthony Browne.  There was a little girl (Smudge), a little boy (Charles), the mother and a father.  We were in different groups as different character perspectives. We used the book to analyze character voice and perspectives.


In writer’s workshop we are finishing our Tall Tales. Also we are working on “Voice.” We are starting our writing project. Some of us are drafting our projects.


In math we are working on fractions.  Specifically reducing, adding, equivalent and subtracting fractions.  We also played a game called "Fraction of" and it is about seeing how many times a fraction can going into a whole number.   

In science, we have been working on physical and chemical reactions.  We are doing experiments that create really cool items.  We made chalk and weird fizzing stuff that we think is Sprite.  

In Social Studies, we have been studying the first colonies in the "New World." We have been learning about The New England, Middle, and Southern colonies. This week each of us are assigned to a colony and we need to write pretending to be colonist.

December 3rd

Blog written by the students in Room 14.

Reader's Workshop

In reading we started a new book with Mrs. Athan called Phantom Tollbooth.  We are finishing Fish in a Tree with Mrs. Faley.  We have been working on using our meta-cognition while reading.  We are working on thinking about our thinking.  We have also been working on finding word study parts while reading.

Writer's Workshop

In Writer's Workshop we have been working on publishing our tall tales.  As we finish our tall tales we are starting new writing projects. This can include; fiction, realistic fiction, informational, or horror. 

Math

In math we have been working with fractions.  We have been adding and subtracting fractions.  We have been converting improper fractions into mixed numbers.  We have compared fractions on a number line.  We learned how to estimate fractions by playing a game called Build It.  

Social Studies

In Social Studies this week we have been studying the 13 original colonies.  We have been studying the New England Colonies, Middle Colonies, and the Southern Colonies.  We learned that the people in the New England Colonies were Puritans looking for religious freedom.  The Middle Colonies came to the new world looking for trade and profit and religious freedom.  They were people from many countries and religions.  The Southern Colonies were filled with people looking for trade a profit.  There were many plantations in the Southern Colonies.

Science

In Science we are learning about mixtures and solutions. There are many solutions.  These include saturated, super saturated, concentrated, and diluted.  If the solution has more dissolved salt or citric acid it is called concentrated.  When a solution has less salt or citric acid dissolved in it.  It is called diluted.

Fine Arts and PE

In Art we have been working on our yearbook covers.  Some 5th graders have started to trace their covers while other 5th graders are sharpening their yearbooks.

In Music we are working on a project with a partner.  The project is to make our own song.  

In Media we have been working on logging into our accounts and logging out properly.  We have also been working on practicing our typing in Typing Master.

Reminders

1. Friday is group picture day at WLE

2. Next Wednesday, December 9th our class will shop at the Holiday Shop

3. Don't forget to read at home every night.

November 19th

*Written by the students in room 14.

We have had a full week this week.  For diversity week, the whole school colored butterflies to show diversity.  We are all different. We all wore orange today to show our unity.  We are all different at WLE but we are also all the same.  On Wednesday, we watched the Kid President Pep Talk.  Click on the link below to see the video.  On Friday, we will work with a first grade class to create a kaleidoscope.   Ask your 5th grader about diversity week.

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-gQLqv9f4o


Kaleidoscope Activity with 1st Grade

In Writers' Workshop we have been working on creating Tall Tales.  Tall Tales are stories that are exaggerated but not fantasy.  For example, a baby could do something that an adult can do and as the baby gets older his or her powers increase.  As we finish each paragraph of our Tall Tale we are editing and publishing with illustrations.  Ask your 5th grader about his or her Tall Tale.  


In Readers' Workshop we have been using our meta-cognition. We been thinking about our thinking as we are reading.  We are working on organizing our thinking on sticky notes or in our Readers' Notebooks.  We have also been working on finding our word study word chunks in our reading.  This helps us to understand new vocabulary.  


In Math, we prepared for and took our second benchmark assessment (BA).  This took a long time!  We are going to start unit 3 today.  

In Social Studies, we worked on our BA Review and played a Jeopardy game to prepare for our BA.  We took our first BA in class today.  WE LOVE SOCIAL STUDIES!


In Science, we have been working with mixtures and solutions.  We have done several experiments with mixtures and solutions.


We had our student council election this week. Our class representatives are Joey and Dior.  Congratulations to everyone who participated in the election.