Good afternoon! Wow, we completed our first week of school! I am really proud of how quickly the kids have learned the routines and gotten back into the groove of being in the classroom.

We had a lot of fun learning about one another through various games, and even completed a fun Spaghetti Tower Challenge (see pictures at bottom of post). It’s been amazing! Please congratulate them on a successful first week of school!

I am so excited to be working with you and your child this year. Thank you so much for all of your support as we navigate this school year together. This newsletter/blog is a fantastic resource full of dates, details, and links that I will update each week. It’s important that you and your child review it each week so that you “stay in the know” of all the happenings in fifth grade.

9/16 Student Holiday/Staff Development- Yom Kippur

9/17 Social Studies Quiz on the surrounding counties

9/21 Science Quiz on Planets

9/22 Math quiz (prime/composite; odd/even; computation review)

9/23 Virtual Back to School Night for Adults (look for a link coming soon)

9/24 Vocabulary & Spelling Quizzes on Word List #1

Notes from Resources:

Art: Please have your child bring in an art shirt (large T shirt) labeled with his/her name for art this week (Tuesday).

Academics:

We are so thrilled to offer this great collection of sites for extra practice! Please bookmark the portaportal and use this in conjunction with your child’s notebook and Schoology files to help your child feel prepared. Thanks for your support! (This is linked on our Schoology page as well). https://guest.portaportal.com/gaes5thgrade

We will be ramping up to our more traditional homework load this week. Your child will typically have nightly vocabulary and math homework Monday-Thursday. We also ask that students read for 20 minutes a night OR complete a lesson in Lexia. We looked at digital book options in class, so your child can access e-reading material in Epic or Sora through Clever if they do not have hard copy books available at home.

Math: This coming week we will work on prime and composite numbers and divisibility rules. Please make sure your child refers to the notes in the math interactive notebook as well as the Student Resources folder on Schoology to reinforce these concepts. We will also review working through multi-step word problems.

Reading: Students will begin to work on reading and understanding multisyllabic words in word study. Each Friday students will have a quiz on the meaning and the application of the ten vocabulary words that will be introduced each Monday, as well as a second quiz in which they have to select the correct spelling of the word. Both of these will be done in Schoology and scores will be entered into the gradebook. Students will practice the words during stations in class and will have a daily homework assignment to practice learning the vocabulary. For our first list, students will receive the words on Monday, and then have the tests the following week on Friday, 9/24.

We will also be reviewing genres this coming week and aspects of poetry. Students will even get to write their own poem!

I am also going to begin reading aloud “Because of Mr. Terupt.” The students will quickly get hooked on this book about a new 5th grade teacher, his students, and the unexpected year they have together. B

Science: We are starting the year with a review of the 4th grade unit on planets. Students will learn about the nine planets that make up the two groups of planets (inner planets and outer planets). We will also be discussing revolution, rotation, as well as the order of the planets.

Social Studies: We will continue with our study of Henrico County in Social Studies. This coming week we will focus on the geography of Henrico. We will have a quiz on Henrico and the surrounding counties/city this week. Students will also have the opportunity to complete a hands-on project focused on Henrico geography.