December Newsletters

December 21, 2018

Dear 5B families,

We have made it to Winter Break! The fifth graders performed beautifully at Winterfest today. The fifth grade teachers and music teachers were so proud of their hard work and maturity!

This week we finished Tuck Everlasting! While reading this book, the class would often ask if they could take home the book and read more--that's what comes from cliffhangers at the end of every chapter! But when we got very close to the end and I offered to let them finish the last two chapters at home, I loved that they said no so that we could experience the end of the book together. This book brought up so many profound thoughts and questions, and it really made the class dig deep and reflect! Some of the questions brought up either in discussions or in written reflections were:

• What would it be like to live forever?
• Should we be given the choice? What would it mean if someone else chose for us?
• Did Winnie make the right choice?
• Is murder ever justified?
• Would I choose to live forever?

When we come back from break, fifth graders will be writing an essay on Tuck Everlasting, detailing how Winnie changes and matures over the course of the book. We have already begun the process of brainstorming ideas about how Winnie changed to support our work in January.

This week we also practiced writing cause and effect paragraphs to prepare us for our essay. Students read cause and effect paragraphs, and analyzed how they were written. Then they wrote their own paragraphs. Their topics included the effects of: smoking, playing football, discrimination, and forest fires.

In math we did a mini-unit on division word problems, focusing on interpreting the remainder. The kids did a great job improving both their interpretation and division skills.

To begin the mini unit, 5th grade mathematicians solved word problems with remainders in their groups and then presented them to the class. This springboard helped them discover the different ways that a remainder can be interpreted.

To continue practicing interpreting remainders, we played Division Connect 4, which was quite fun!

If kids want more practice with division over break, there are several IXL lessons in 5th grade, section D.

On Thursday our class went to play with our Farmhouse friends. They had a blast! Here are some adorable photos :)

I hope you all have a happy and restful winter break. See you in 2019!

Best,

Rebecca

December 14, 2018

Dear 5B families,

We only have one more week until Winter Break, and we are definitely making the most of our time! The class continues to LOVE Tuck Everlasting. We are speeding through it because they are so excited to read more! Who wouldn't be excited when every chapter ends in a cliffhanger?!

Read on to find out more about what we did this past week!

Math

This week in math we continued order of operations by working on The 1492 Problem. Using just the numbers 1, 4, 9, and 2, it is possible to create every single number between 1 and 100. To do this, however, students need to use parentheses, order of operations, exponents, and even factorials (which we will learn about later). When I first introduced the problem, the class was a bit skeptical, but now they are really into it! They are now trying to find all of the numbers, and are working hard individually and in partners to create expressions for the numbers we haven't yet found. This is a great activity because students can work at different levels. For example, some students are ready to use exponents in their expressions, and some aren't, but everyone is getting exposed to them!

Then on Friday we played Order of Operations BINGO. It was a great way to wrap up the lessons, and the kids had fun! We will keep up the 1492 problem so that kids can continue to add to it as they find solutions throughout the year!

Last week fifth graders returned their math tests and reflections. I was impressed by their thoughtful responses. I was mostly curious what they would think about the correction process. What kid doesn't want extra points to improve their grade!? But I was curious if they would understand the deeper reason behind the correction process, and based on their reflections, they understood that corrections helps them learn, and also helps their classmates learn. Below are two excerpts from test reflections that really demonstrate their understanding.

"Most of the time when you do a test, you would just get it back and the score you got was the score you got. I think that is useless because you don't really get to check what you got wrong and why. I think that the correction process expands your mind because you get to do hard work that you might've gotten wrong the first time, but your synapses can fire when you correct a wrong answer! Your brain will grow more if you build on your mistakes and redo something than if you just do something and get it back with a score on it. You also get to think deeper about about questions that puzzled you with a partner who most likely has ideas and a new perspective and I feel that even a new perspective helps you solve a problem." (Maddie)

"I think the correction part really helps because you get two sources of how to get the correct answer, and it makes you feel good to work with a friend because you can help them get the correct answer and make them have an aha moment." (John)

Social Studies

In Social Studies we are continuing to study various perspectives and conflict in history through the days of early America. We have moved chronologically forwards to King Phillip's War in the 1670s. Though this King Philip might sounds British, he is not! He is a Wampanoag leader who had had enough with the Pilgrims taking his people's land, resources, and religious freedom. His father, Massasoit, was the peacemaker who first helped the needy Pilgrims when they arrived in Plymouth years earlier, in 1620.

Students found our discussion of Metacom's Rebellion/King Philip's war especially interesting. We broke into small groups and had deep discussions about motivations behind both sides of the battle. Students grappled with two deep questions, which led to a bigger full-class discussion. The questions were:

1. Was the battle or war between Native Americans and English settlers inevitable? Why or why not?
2. You are Massasoit. It is 1620. You can see the future and know what will happen to your descendants. Do you still offer kindness and help the Pilgrims? Why or why not?

See photos from this spectacular brainstorm and discussion the students had.

Fifth graders also practiced summarizing historical motivations using the Somebody Wanted But So Then format. They did a great job remembering some of the things they have learned so far this year. They were also very excited because I used the Apple TV (which we are piloting in my room) to project their work. I took a photo using my phone cropped it, and mirrored their writing to the screen in the front of the room. Suddenly everyone wanted to share :) Here are some examples of their summaries.

Until next week!

Rebecca

December 7, 2018

Dear 5B families,

It has been a fun and busy week in 5th grade! We played some games both inside and outside (loved that warm weather on Monday!), had a visitor, had many discussions, learned more about some of our classmates through shares, and did some art! The class continues to love Tuck Everlasting, and they have asked me on several occasions if they could read more! I love when they get into a good book! Fifth graders are also almost done writing their Pawtuxet Perspective Projects, or PPPS. They began the cover art for their journal entries this week and they had the chance to peer edit with their classmates and middle schoolers. They will be finishing up the project next week!

Read on to learn more about our interesting activities in math!

In math we began our investigation into order of operations, which will continue into next week. We started with an activity called subitizing, which is the ability to "see" a small amount of objects and know how many there are without counting every object. The class was shown the image in the top right of this photo for only a couple seconds and then they could all tell me there were 7 dots, but they all saw them in different ways! Subitizing helps with visual thinking skills, and the class was blown away by the creative and numerous ways their classmates could see the dots! They kept coming up with more and more ways as we continued to share.

Next we looked at a more complex image. As students explained their thinking, I color coded their explanations and wrote an expression that matched their explanation.

The following two days we mixed it up with the other fifth grade classes and students had to complete the same type of activity more independently. It was a challenge for students to really explain their visual thinking in color, words, and numbers. Going forward, we will be continuing the discussion about the order we completed the math, which will lead us to learning the rules for order of operations.

Until next week!

Best,

Mrs. HK

I hope you all have a wonderful break! See you in 2019!

Best,

Rebecca