#3 This Week in 5th Grade

WHAT WE'RE LEARNING IN CLASS

Math: We are continuing on in our place value unit. By the end of the unit, students will know how to read, write, and compare decimals to the thousandths.

• Write decimals in standard, word, and expanded form
  • Standard form: 5.67
  • Word form: five and sixty-seven hundredths
  • Expanded form: (5 x 1) + (6 x 1/10) + (7 x 1/100)
• Compare decimals
  • 6.78 > 6.078

Literacy (Reading & Comprehension): In 5th grade, we focus heavily on text evidence to answer comprehension questions, as well as include in our writing. We are using the "formula" ICE a Quote to answer literal and inferential questions. I stands for Introduce (credit the author/text), C stands for Copy (copy a sentence from the text using quotation marks), and E stands for Explain (explain the evidence).

Here is an example of a question and answer using ICE a Quote.

• Question: How did Nina solve her family's problem?
• Answer: The text states, "Nina remembered back to her rafting lessons." Nina was able to remember that they needed to pull the raft from the rock in order to keep moving forward.

Writing: This week we started opinion writing. We will be focusing on opinion writing till January. Right now, we are specifically focusing on writing a great introduction paragraph. This includes having an engaging hook, a thesis, background information, and three reasons that support the thesis.

Social Studies: We are learning about explorers and Native Americans. This week we read about Native American homes, and next week we will read about Juan Ponce de Leon.

We are also starting practice on Mondays for Hope of America! Hope for America is an awesome opportunity for 5th graders all over the area to come together and sing songs about our country - which is directly aligned with our Social Studies curriculum, U.S. History. This will be taking place in May.