SAndrews

Can you believe this is the last week of school?!?!  The year has flown by with many great opportunities for learning. I appreciate the opportunity to work with your child and am grateful for the wonderful job you do as parents. This year has been especially enjoyable with the great group of students on the Green Team! The influence of caring parents is so evident! As teachers, we so appreciate your support.

This week will be packed with many end-of-the year opportunities. Mr. Church will be coming to talk with fifth graders about their decision to participate in 6th grade band.  One of the public librarians will be coming to talk with students about participation in the summer reading program.  I am hoping to work in some time to involve students in a variety of review investigations and work stations as well as some additional time to work with their handhelds. If possible, we will go on a Math Book Scavenger Hunt.  WIS will be mailing grade cards home next week (after school is out) rather than sending them home with students due to the hectic schedule this final week. Students will be dismissed at 12:30 on Friday.  

Again, thank you for a wonderful year! I will remember this year fondly and expect to hear great things about the achievements of the students in the class of 2016!!

Mrs. Sharon Andrews

I hope you survivied the storms with minimal damage. It made for an exciting Friday!

Math-Continue working with fractions and participate in class investigations dealing with pentominoes, fractals, and tessalations.

Word Study-Continue to work on several Latin- and Greek roots such as “phil-” meaning love, “syn-” or “sym-” meaning same, “dict-” meaning “speak.”

In Math, we have been working on fractions. We are learning to add and subtract fractions, write equivalent fractions, and reduce or rename fractions in lowest terms.

In Word Study we had our Vocabulary test and continue to practice Core Words.

Math–Students are participating in a Volume Investigation. They will predict the volume of several containers and then use the formula Length x Width x Height to find the actual volume.  Students will also be involved in a Geometry lesson using pentominoes that encourages them to use the Inquiry method of learning to make observations about these geometric figures.

Word Study- Students received a list of words on Monday that they will be tested over on Friday. They also will be taking notes on five more Core Words and five new Vocabulary words from the Latin/Greek roots “bene- and bon-” that mean “good.”

i-TIME- Students will take the DRA Reading Interest Survey to assess areas of growth in their reading choices. We will also begin testing students individually using the DRA to analyze growth this year.

Friday, April 24–MAP cookout!

Monday, April 27–Fine Arts Night  5:30-8:00 p.m.

Tuesday, May 5–Field Trip to Springfield Symphony Concert

Monday–Jeopardy game to review for MAP

Tuesday–Testing  Communication Arts

Wednesday–Testing Math

Thursday–Testing Science

Friday–(Make-up testing) 

MATH  Continue measurement unit. Monday we will work on customary and metric units of capacity (liquid volume). On Tuesday and Wednesday we will practice using units of weight and problem solving involving elapsed time. On Thursday we will finish our measurement unit and spend some time reviewing.

WORD STUDY  Students will be receiving a list of words to study this week. They will be tested over the words on Thursday. We will also receive a new set of vocabulary words from the latin roots “bene-”, “bon-” meaning “good.”

FRIDAY–Spring Mini Break–No School–ENJOY!! School will be in session on Monday, April 13. MAP TESTING on April 14-16.

MATH

We are working on a unit on measurement. For MAP, 5th graders will need to not only know and use different systems of measurement–both customary and metric, but will also need to be able to convert from one unit to another unit within the same system of measurement.  Some examples might inclue questions such as:

Customary System:    54 yards = ______ feeet   _____ inches

                                  60 inches = _______ feet

Metric System:           40 meters = _______centimeters

                                  2 kilometers = ______ meters

This week in class students are practicing measurements in length (both systems) and in capactiy (liquid volume). We will work on both customary and metric systems and conversions.

WORD STUDY

Students received notes over 5 new vocabulary words from the Latin roots “mater”–mother, and “pater”–father. We are practicing these. Students also took notes on 5 Core Words and will have dictation later in the week.

SPRING BREAK!!! Enjoy

Students had an opportunity to earn some BONUS points on Monday (the 23rd) as they put geometric nets together.    When we return we have 2 weeks before MAP testing so we will be hitting it hard and heavy!!

Math–

Monday–Introduce and begin working on types of polygons and classification of each. Learn the difference between regular and irregular polygons.

Tuesday–continue classification of polygons and learn to identify similar and congruent figures.

Wednesday–Learn about different types of symmetry.

Thursday-Friday– Learn about transformations of figures and complete notetaking and practice packets.

Here is a link to practice polygons.

Word Study

On Monday, students received a list of words. We will be working on these spelling words this week and have a test on Friday.

School WILL be in session on Monday, March 23 as a snow make-up day. The rest of the week will be Spring Break!

Math

The Flip Books were due on Monday. We began an introduction to Geometry and will be working on lines and angles (text 428-433) this week. Students will receive a note-taking packet and a practice packet that we will be working in for the next couple of weeks over geometry concepts.

Word Study

We continue to work on Core Words as well as build vocabulary with our study of word origins. Our next Word Origin test will cover aqua- hydra-,  mob- mot-, and cap- words. Students have notes on the fifteen words in their spiral notebooks. The test will be Thursday or Friday of this week.

i-TIME

Students will have another day or two to read sports books. They will be writing questions based on their reading. We will practice writing questions that are “right there” in the text as well as questions that they come up with “in my head.” Questioning is an important strategy to increase comprehension.