POTLATCH PARTY!!!

Our Potlatch Friday was fantastic!!! We are so thankful for volunteers and presenters who made the day go smoothly.  Thanks, families! Below you can see some pictures of artifacts we saw in our presentations. Monday and Tuesday is booked with student presentations of their Native American topics. We will be looking at displays, models, media presentations, and Native American arts and crafts made by students.  This is a great way to end our Native American learning.  Since this is our focus for this short 2 day week, there will be almost no math work today and tomorrow.  However, students know they can use extra time at home and over break to work on having 3 book shares completed by next Monday.  Book Shares will also be our in class focus if we have time between presentations.

I enjoyed talking to everyone at conferences.  Over break, I will be looking over my notes and making any changes or plans that came out of our talks.  Below are the topics we will focus on during the 17 school days between Thanksgiving and Winter Break.  Take care and have a wonderful Thanksgiving Break!

SOCIAL STUDIES: We will be kicking off our DISCOVERY theme, which focuses on the Age of Exploration and mostly European Explorers.  During this theme, we learn about explorations, mostly focusing between 1200-1700 AD.  However, we do discuss modern explorers and some ancient African/Asian kingdoms.  In class, we will also be forming "colonies" to play a role playing game highlighting the struggles of explorers, natives, and colonization of the New World.  In the game, students will forma colony and try to successfully settle in the New World on a journey from Europe.

READING: We will be in book clubs again using books that focus on characters who go on a journey. There will be weekly Literature Journal Assignments each week in December.

WRITING: Our writing focus will shift from Nonfiction to Narrative.  We will be using inspirations from our explorer studies to write narratives taking place during this time period.

SCIENCE: In December, we will begin weekly mini experiments to support our Community Project theme.  Our exact theme hasn't been decided yet but it seems it will focus on stream habitats/ecosystems.  So our experiments will be a lot about the Hydrological Cycle and weather patterns.

MATH:   We have finished lessons on multiplying decimals.  After Thanksgiving, we will have a day of practice and quiz on multiplying decimals before covering division of decimals.  After that unit, the focus will be on algebra and variables until Winter Break.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TIME TO CELEBRATE!

Not only did we have a great time celebrating fall/Halloween last Friday, we also are celebrating our hard work this 1st Trimester.  Today (Friday) we are wrapping up our division math unit and other assignments.  This weekend I will be working on Progress Reports and preparing for conferences.  Therefore, there will not be comments in the Friday Folder since I will be writing on the Progress Report which will go home next Wednesday.  Next week, we will take a break from a lot of our learning to reflect on our progress so far.  Every student will be making a portfolio of their best work from each subject and setting goals for Trimester 2.  We will look at these portfolios during conference time.  In 5th grade, we strongly encourage students to attend conferences and share their portfolios.  This is not a requirement of any sort, just encouraged.  Of course, if a family feels the need to have a private conference, that is understandable. Thank you so much to all who helped make the Halloween party go so well. You can see from the pictures below, a lot of fun was had by all.

Focus for next week:
Student Portfolios
Finish Book Club book/Book Shares
Native American rough draft