English Language Arts, Reading and History
We begin the week with our final test on Ancient Mesopotamia. For the remainder of the week, we will discuss the mythology of Mesopotamia with the class reading a section of the epic of Gilgamesh. Students will be practicing the elements of a story while writing a short myth based on one of the Mesopotamian gods or goddesses. We continue Massachusetts Book Award reading groups and The Lightning Thief. Math This week we will continue to study decimals and how to compute with them. On Wednesday we will multiply decimals by decimals, and on Thursday we will take the mid-chapter quiz. This quiz will focus on adding, subtracting, estimating, and multiplying decimals. Students can review lessons 1-4 in their book and notes to prepare. On Friday we will be dividing 3 and 4 digit dividends by 1 and 2 digit divisors. This skill is a review from grade 5, but will prepare us to divide with decimals next week. Science We wrap up part 2 of Space Science this week. This section focuses on our Solar System and the objects within it. Wednesday and Thursday we will be doing review pages to cover the material, and our test will be on Friday. Students should know the vocabulary and major concepts from the section. All materials (reading, notes, review pages) can be found in the binder. Math
We will begin this week in math with some problem solving. Students will solve released MCAS questions that pertain to ratios and/or percents. This is not only a great review, but also a great way to ensure our preparedness for this spring's test. For the remainder of the week, we will begin working on chapter 3. Chapter 3 begins our 3 chapter study of The Number System. Our main focus for this chapter will be computing with multi-digit whole numbers and decimals. Science Throughout the week we will continue to learn about our Solar System in science. There will be a matching vocabulary quiz on Thursday. All students created flashcards last week, and have the words in their reading packets. English Language Arts, Reading and History We are finished with the writing, revising and editing of our big 5 paragraph paper on "Some Things You May Not Know About Me" personal narrative. Today some students have begun using Chromebooks to publish their work. In addition to our class writing, we continue the "Gecko Glue". Reading groups using the Massachusetts Book Award books and class reading of The Lightning Thief continues. In History, we've done a class assignment on resources of the Ancient Middle East. We'll do a class activities on Hammurabi's Code and Mesopotamian art as primary sources with follow up assignments. Test #3 on Mesopotamia is scheduled for next Tuesday. Math
This week in math we are wrapping up chapter 2! On Monday, we will solve problems with percents. On Tuesday and Wednesday we will review for our math test. We will be playing a review game, as well as taking 2 practice tests to prepare. Our chapter 2 test will be on Thursday. Students can study for this test by reviewing chapter 2 lessons 1-8 in their books, reviewing their practice tests, and utilizing available online videos and practice tests at the McGrawHill website. Don't forget that Friday will be our awesome trip to UMass! Science We will begin lesson 2 of our study of Earth and Space science this week. Lesson 2 is all about our solar system. We will watch a video and take notes, create vocabulary flashcards, and begin reading about the objects in our solar system this week. English Language Arts, Reading and History We are wrapping up our 5 paragraph class paper on Some Things You May Not Know About Me this week. By Wednesday, we'll be revising and editing and all set to begin publishing on Chromebooks. We're reading the Treasures story "Gecko Glue" to practice identifying main ideas and supporting details in a non-fiction article. Grammar this week is about identifying and writing complex sentences. We continue Massachusetts Book Award books for reading groups. On Wednesday, we will have lesson on Hammurabi's Code with an assignment due on Friday. English Language Arts, Reading and History
We've been working on a formal writing project in class that is a form of a personal narrative. This week we work on the introductions, conclusions, revisions and editin as students prepare the work for final drafts on the computer. Our focus in reading will be identifying the main ideas in non-fiction. We will start with a class activity designed as an Escape Room for students to find all the clues about main ideas. Later this week, we will read the Treasures story called Gecko Glue for practice on main ideas. We continue reading groups based on Massachusetts Book Award books and The Lightning Thief. Grammar this week discusses complex sentences. Students are studying the second set of Flash facts for Mesopotamia (11-20) for the next test on Thursday. If time permits, we will study the Code of Hammurabi. Math This week in math we will be studying "percents of" and "percents off." These lessons can be found in chapter 2, lessons 6-8. We will begin by estimating in order to find a reasonable percent. Next, we will work on strategies to find exact percents of a number. Most often, this will be turning the percent into a decimal, and then multiplying by the base number. Last, we will be solving for a missing base number by using the percent and an amount. These lessons might feel challenging at first, but with continued practice students will be successful. Solid multiplication facts are a must! A chapter 2 test is scheduled for next Thursday, October 19th. Science This week we will be finishing up lesson one on Earth and Space Science. The focus for this lesson has been the Earth, Sun, and Moon system. We will begin the week learning about eclipses and watching a short video. Wednesday and Thursday will be used to review the material from the lesson, and Friday will be our test. All materials to study can be found in each student's binder in the form of a reading packet and corresponding activities. Math:
This week we will continue working our way through chapter 2. We will look at changing between percents and decimals and working with percents greater than 100 and less than 1. There will be a mid-chapter quiz on Wednesday which will focus on lessons 1-4. Thursday and Friday we will work on strategies to compare and order fractions, decimals, and percents. Science: Week 2 of Earth and Space science. This week we will be focusing on the phases of the moon and what happens during an eclipse. There will be a matching vocabulary quiz on Friday. English Language Arts and Reading This week will be a writing week, so there is no new story, vocabulary or test on Thursday. Our first formal writing assignment begins this week and is a personal narrative called “What You May Not Know About Me.” We’ll begin with organizing ideas (like “what do you love to do?”) on a graphic organizer and work on the remaining 3 paragraphs of a rough draft for the rest of the week in class. There is no homework associated with this assignment, after the graphic organizer is done. Rough draft, revision,editing and publishing is completely done in class. Reading slips are due on Wednesday. Spelling homework and test are due on Thursday. We began Reading Groups last week. In these sessions, students will work on fluency, discuss and write about different components of literature. In PowerSchool, the journal grade is shown as classwork and done individually, although the group will often discuss the work together. History Our first quiz on Mesopotamia is on Tuesday. The questions are based on the first 10 FlashFacts sheet. We made flash cards to study for this quiz. I will plan on returning grades for the History Presentations to notebooks on Friday. Students get 3 separate grades for this 3 week assignment. There are 2 group grades for the presentation and the poster. The individual grade is what each student has done for the project, including how they have taken research notes, and is part of the reading grade. We begin a discussion of the difference between facts, opinions and beliefs. |