We packed a lot into a short week! And it is hard to believe that October is already here.
Mrs. Sitter will be joining our class on Monday to discuss the application process for Moody’s IB program. I will send and link that information on Monday afternoon.
From Mrs. Lucas: I added a black folder in Schoology that says 5th grade assignments. Students just need to click on their grade level folder. The fitness challenge assignments along with detailed directions are all there. All challenges are due by 11/6/20. We are currently reviewing them in PE class each week.
HOMEWORK POLICY
We believe homework is essential for long term success with our 5th grade students. Starting next week, students will be more accountable for completing homework assignments. Teachers will be reviewing homework and entering homework grades per subject as applicable. All students start with a perfect score of 100 in the homework assignment category. Each missing assignment results in a deduction of 10 points for that subject’s overall homework grade. Parents, thank you for all the support you are providing with the virtual lessons and homework. It makes a big difference, and we appreciate you!
Teams Update
https://video.link/w/x0ejb how-to video to open Teams App on Chromebooks
Important Dates
10/7 Order of Operations Test
10/8 Exponent Quiz
10/9 Word Trek Quizzes Lesson #4
10/13 Earth Unit and Natural Resources Test
10/15 Virtual Back to School Night – Session 1 at 6:00 and Session 2 at 6:45
10/30 Mystery book report due
11/6 PE assignments due (see note from Mrs. Lucas)
MATH
There will be an order of operations test on Wednesday, October 7th. We will be continuing to practice in class and with homework to prepare for this assessment. Please remind your student to use their notes when completing homework. There will also be a quiz on exponents on Thursday, October 8th. The quiz will include perfect squares, identifying the base number and the exponent, writing exponents in standard form, and finding the value of numbers with exponents. There are notes in the Student Resources folder and in their notebooks. We will also continue to practice this with classwork and homework. On Friday, we will begin reviewing long division in preparation for dividing with double digit divisors.
Additionally, the county has provided Dreambox for students to work on math skills independently. I assign some lessons, and the program assigns others based on student progress. Our goal is to complete 4 lessons per week. We’ll have some class time to do this, but it will also be included in our homework to ensure we finish the 4 lessons.
READING
In Reading, we will continue working with Running Out of Time. The suspense of this novel is fantastic! We will continue exploring internal and external conflicts and identifying man vs. self, man vs. man, man vs. world, and man vs. nature. Discovering theme is our new skill this week. We will also continue working through elements of plot, inferences, and character traits. The mystery book report is due Friday, October 30th. If your child has not had their book approved by me they need to do so as soon as possible. They need to find a traditional mystery book for this assignment. We discussed last week that students who have caught up on classwork can work on their book reports in class. This could be reading their book or typing response questions on their Google drive account. All students should be bringing their book report book and another book to read if this one is finished every day to school. The book report requirements are linked to the homework slide each day. Please let me know if you have any questions regarding this.
LANGUAGE
The new Word Trek lists will be linked to the Friday slide found in the Student Resources folder in Past Weeks for those who are interested in getting a head start. We are going to begin working on writing five paragraph essays this week. Students will be using the Bing, Bang, and Bongo method for expository writing. This method lays out a clear plan that is easy to follow.
SCIENCE
Continuing with rocks, we will discuss the rock cycle in more detail. We will investigate fossils and discuss how they tell us about Earth’s changes. Additionally, we will remind the students of the fourth grade unit on Natural Resources. A study guide for this topic can be found in the Student Resources – Science folder. This connects nicely with the Earth unit, and the county has prepared a comprehensive assessment that includes both topics. The unit assessment for these combined topics will be on Tuesday, October 13th. Please have your child tell you facts from their notebooks, reread the digital notebook, review the study guides, and use the portaportal to supplement their knowledge. Science is amazing, and this unit is so relevant as we can see things all around us that connect to our lessons!
SOCIAL STUDIES
We will finish up Henrico’s economy this week and move into Henrico government. The students are learning a ton of information about Henrico County!