Class activities for Tuesday, September 25

Spelling: We reviewed homographs, which are words that are spelled the same, but have different means and sometimes are pronounced differently. Can you read these homographs correctly the first time?

  • Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present .
  • bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
  • When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
  • I did not object to the object.
  • The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
  • There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.
  • They were too close to the door to close it.
  • The buck does funny things when the does are present.

Here are more homophones!

Cursive: Ten cursive sentences, seven or more words each, are due Fridays. 

Reading: We started to read a new realistic fiction story about scavenger hunt.

Writing: We talked about how to make a list during prewriting. One way is to make a list of the people, places, and plot of the story. Those are the three main ingredients of any story. Students also worked on their prewriting. A personal narrative is due Friday, October 12.  Homework is to work on writing for 15 minutes.

Math: None today due to a reading assessment time. Homework is to practice math for 15 minutes using MobyMax or Khan Academy.

Science: We read more about how animals eat matter and use that to grow their bodies, make energy, and get rid of wastes.

Social Studies: We read about the Mayans, Aztecs, Mound Builders and Anasazi civilizations.

Character Strength: We are learning about teamwork this week.

Notes:

Our Mission:
All students in Room 130 will do their best and get ready for 6th grade.

Class activities for Monday, September 24

Spelling: We reviewed suffixes, which are letters added onto the end of a base word. We also practiced irregular verbs. Most verbs can be made past tense by adding -ed: packed, fished, opened. Irregular verbs involve a change of the base word: hold/held, run/ran, draw/drew.

Cursive: Ten cursive sentences, seven or more words each, are due Fridays. 

Reading: We read some stories today about families who got stuck in some natural disasters and had to rethink some ideas in order to be safe.

Writing: We started work on our second piece of writing, another personal narrative. We will work on this for three weeks, so the minimum length is one page. Today, students started prewriting a list of topic ideas or a list of events from the topic they selected. A personal narrative is due Friday, October 12.  Homework is to work on writing for 15 minutes.

Math: We practiced comparing decimals today. Homework is to practice math for 15 minutes using MobyMax or Khan Academy.

Science: We used a scale tool again to think about the sizes of different objects down to individual atoms. We also read about how everything is made of matter, and matter can be connected together to form molecules.

Social Studies: We read about how American Indians developed their own cultures and languages and developed into civilizations over time.

Character Strength: We are learning about teamwork this week.

Notes:

Our Mission:
All students in Room 130 will do their best and get ready for 6th grade.

Class activities for Friday, September 21

Spelling: We finished a spelling pretest today.

Cursive: Ten cursive sentences, seven or more words each, are due Fridays. 

Reading: We practiced Literature Circles reading groups today. Today we reviewed making connections by thinking about something a story reminds us of.

Writing: Students worked on editing and publishing their personal narrative. A personal narrative is due Monday, September 24.  Homework is to work on writing for 15 minutes and to finish publishing.

Math: We had a shorter work time today due to a false-alarm fire drill. Homework is to practice math for 15 minutes using MobyMax or Khan Academy.

Science: We used a scale tool to think about the sizes of different objects from people, to jellyfish, to grains of sand, to cells. We are going to use this information to try to answer how animals grow their bodies so that we can figure out why the animals in our study rainforest aren’t healthy.

Social Studies: We read about how American Indians might have migrated to North America and then spread out to eventually live in different parts of North and South America.

Character Strength: We are learning about curiosity this week.

Notes:

Our Mission:
All students in Room 130 will do their best and get ready for 6th grade.

Class activities for Thursday, September 20

Spelling: We started a spelling pretest today.

Cursive: Ten cursive sentences, seven or more words each, are due Friday. 

Reading: We practiced Literature Circles reading groups today. In Literature Circles, students will read a small book and write notes on one day, and then discuss their notes a following day.

Writing: Students shared their writing with a partner to give each other revising and editing comments and suggestions on how to improve their writing.

Students should be editing for spelling, capitals, sentences, periods, and paragraphs at this point. A personal narrative is due Monday, September 24.  Homework is to work on writing for 15 minutes.

Math: We worked on decimal place value today, focusing on writing numbers in standard form, expanded form, and in words. Homework is to practice math for 15 minutes using MobyMax or Khan Academy.

Science: Students work in groups to make a terrarium with soil, grass seed, and alfalfa seed. We’ll use it as model to observe an ecosystem.

Social Studies: We read about how American Indians might have crossed over a land bridge during a past ice age to reach North America.

Character Strength: We are learning about curiosity this week.

Notes:

Our Mission:
All students in Room 130 will do their best and get ready for 6th grade.

Class activities for Tuesday, September 18

Spelling: None today.

Cursive: Ten cursive sentences, seven or more words each, are due Friday. 

Reading: We talked about rereading when things get confusing, and how to think about the sequence of a story. We also read some of a a realistic fiction story about a boy that raised chickens to support his family.

Writing: We talked about the three main details of story writing:

  • talking: what the characters say
  • action: what the characters do
  • visual details: what the characters and places look like.

Every story should have a mix of these details over and over.

Students also started revising their personal narrative today by adding parts, taking out parts that don’t fit, improving ideas, and finishing unfinished thoughts. A personal narrative is due Monday, September 24.  Homework is to work on writing for 15 minutes.

Math: We practiced decimal place value using Khan Academy today. Homework is to practice math for 15 minutes using MobyMax or Khan Academy.

Science: We learned about a rainforest ecosystem that isn’t thriving and we will investigate reasons why in science in the coming days.

Social Studies: None due to extra science today.

Character Strength: We are learning about curiosity this week.

Notes:

Our Mission:
All students in Room 130 will do their best and get ready for 6th grade.