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Morning Lesson

From Ms. Kiefer:

This week in morning lesson students practiced long division with whole numbers, long division with decimal fraction dividends, and multiplication with decimal fractions.  On Friday they considered the logical progression: fractions are division problems, fractions are expandable and reducible, therefore division problems are expandable and reducible.   To test whether that checked out, we divided some equivalent fractions to see that they were all exactly the same in decimal representation. Next week we will review this big idea and use it to practice expanding away the decimal places when the divisor contains a decimal point. We will also work with converting between decimals and fractions, which lays the groundwork for working with percents next year.  We have gone over rules of divisibility for 2s, 3s, 5s, and 10s.

In morning lesson we have been singing Amazing Grace, whose words were written by a repentant slave trade worker.  On Friday for our classroom push-in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, students learned about the underground railroad through the story Follow the Drinking Gourd.  If you are unable to participate in a day of service this coming Monday, I encourage you to spend some time reading or learning about MLK Jr, Civil Rights, or slavery. The public library has books for all ages; although they will be closed on Monday, one could always do an online search and put a book on hold to pick up soon.

 

Skills Classes

In our Language Arts skills classes this week, the students worked on writing rough drafts of a composition they had brainstormed for last week. They worked hard to create written compositions with a topic sentence, such as “My Winter Break was memorable (or other adjective) for two main reasons.” Then they wrote about those reasons in more detail, before adding a concluding sentence. They had to have at least one instance of dialogue in their writing as well, and I am happy to see them utilizing quotation marks accurately. After finishing their drafts, I had them underline the topic sentence, reason #1, reason #2, and dialogue, as a way to have them check that those elements were present in their writing.

They also worked in their reading groups. I have seen their reading interest and ability really flower this year! Individually they have been reading and defining vocabulary words, and then socially they have been reading aloud, discussing the book, and setting goals for the following week’s reading. This goal-setting is a wonderful opportunity for these 5th graders who are craving independence. It allows them chances to come to consensus, plan ahead, and develop healthy reading habits. I hope that you are seeing these reading habits at home as well.  Many of the students are finishing their books before I expected them to, so I will be working on adding more books to our classroom library.

Some parents have mentioned to me that they have books at home that they would like to donate. I welcome all donations to our classroom library! Thank you to Briana Villarrubia for already donating a pile of books. I am also trying to make our library reflect diverse experiences and perspectives, so I also welcome any books written by and representing people of color, as well as LGBTQ people.

In Botany skills class, the students continued last week’s activity, using a dichotomous key to identify trees by their leaves.

In Painting class, we observed the Festival of Compassion by singing the song Follow the Drinking Gourd, discussing slavery and resistance efforts such as the Underground Railroad, and then painting a night sky scene.  The song is believed to have been a “map song,” that includes coded information for escaping slaves to find safety. The “drinking gourd” mentioned refers to the Big Dipper, which people would use as a reference point to not get lost.  So, we painted the night sky and sprinkled salt on the wet paint. As it dries, the salt absorbs some of the water and creates a star-like effect on the painting. We are excited to see what they look like when we return to class on Tuesday!

 

Class Play

The 5th graders were so excited to learn that our class play this year will be “The Lorax,” by Dr. Seuss!  The class really loved the story when I read it to them, and it fits in our theme of conservation that I have been trying to imbue our Geography and Botany lessons with.  We will learn the whole play as a class first, and then we will assign parts at a later date.

 

Birthdays!

We celebrated Joshua’s half-birthday yesterday. Thank you to Joshua and his family for bringing delicious pumpkin muffins and lemon tea to share with the class! We have a few more birthdays and half-birthdays coming up in the next couple of weeks:

  • Solwyn Bindra: (half) Tuesday, 1/22
  • Aaden Gomez Correa: Wednesday, 1/23
  • Charlotte Bushell: (half) Wednesday, 1/30

 

Have a wonderful weekend!