We will be welcoming our advanced learners soon!

ELA: We are working on Chapter 9 of The Chicken Squad.  We will be answering questions about the story and working on alphabetical order to help determine guide words on a page of a dictionary.  Vocabulary: hightailed, expose, distract, begonia

Math: We are starting our project Road Work: Friction! We creating a ramp that will allow a toy car to travel as far as possible and determine what types of surfaces cause friction.

ELA: We are reading chapters 17-18 of Rump: The True Story of Rumplestiltskin and answering questions about the story.  Vocabulary words: stalwart, vigilant, famine, scarcity, gilded, wench, calamities

Math: We are exploring geometry by creating pyramids out of regular classroom objects.  We are learning what makes the triangles so important to a pyramid.

ELA: We are reading pages 222-255 in The One & Only Ivan.  Our new vocabulary is strut, elegant, protestors, gleam, and undaunted.

Math: We are continuing our activity that focuses on the ability of animals to camouflage.  Students will be creating a habitat for a creature that is well camouflaged from both air and ground predators.

ELA: We have finished reading The Bridge to Terabithia.  We will be watching the movie to compare the book and movie versions of the story.

Math:  We are working on testing our bridges made of craft sticks by stacking textbooks on top of them.  We will reflect on the process.  If we have time we will be starting our new project Cardboard Car where students will create a car out of a toilet paper tube.

ELA: We have finished reading From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.  We are watching the movie to compare and contrast the different versions of the story.  In the Wednesday group we are working on projects that show our understanding and knowledge of the story.

Math/STEM:  In the Monday group we are starting our project Have a Seat where students will explore the different types of pasta and determine what qualities each type has that would give strength to a chair (made from the pasta) that makes it able to hold a full water bottle.

In the Tuesday group we are starting our next project Team Marble where we will be exploring friction.

In the Wednesday group we are working on our project Keep Me In Suspense where students will create a suspension bridge that can hold a can of soda.

ELA: all groups are working on showing their knowledge and understanding of the story through book activities.

Math/STEM:  In the first and last groups, we are working on building freestanding towers out of 30 pieces of spaghetti and small marshmallows that can support a large marshmallow at least 12 inches off the ground.  We are exploring the specific qualities that go into the engineering of freestanding towers.

In the second group we are continuing to work on creating scale replicas of the 3 pyramids at Giza using exact measurements.  We are doing a lot of research in order to learn about proportional relationships between real size objects and scale models.  We are scaling down the measurements so our pyramids have a proportion of 30 meters=1 centimeter and using the Pythagorean Theorm to determine what the side of each pyramid will equal given the base length and height of each pyramid.

 ELA: We are learning about conflict types using the action in the arena.  We are reading chapters 16-18 in The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins.  Vocabulary words: condenses, void, botched, rejuvinating, dispersed, lapdogs, gall, hoist, inprudent, dynamic, scarcity

Math/STEM:  In the first group we will continue learning about the mythology of Greece by creating a rolling Trojan Horse that has the ability to hide something inside it.  

In the second group we are continuing our Greek Mythology unit by building a marble maze.  This activity connects to the myth of the Minotaur.

In the last group we will be finishing our Greek Pottery project where we will be piecing together broken pottery like Archeologists.  

ELA: We are continuing our story Murder on the Orient Express by reading the first few chapters of part 3 (chapters 1-2) We are continuing to track our clues and making predictions about "who done it".  Vocabulary words are abominable, implore, trucculent, acquiesced

Math/STEM: In the first group we are starting our next project Digging a Well that focuses on the various types of pulleys.

In the second group we are starting our Pioneering Town unit by creating and testing water filters out of household items.

In the third group we are starting our Star Wars unit with a lesson on electrical circuits by building working light sabers.