Wednesday, September 30th, 2015 – A LOOK AT TODAY AND TOMORROW… We’re really getting going now! There is just so much to share, but I can’t (nor do you probably want me to) share it all in one post. So…below is an overview of what we’re up to with many of our endeavors IN CLASS (none of which are homework, but there could definitely be applications of in-class learning at home). I’ve also added several attachments that give clear examples of the types of experiences your kids are or will soon be having.
In writing we are drafting and crafting our Small Moment personal narratives and conducting peer-editing (student-to-student feedback). We will begin publishing within the week. The purpose of the Small Moment is to learn specific techniques and writing strategies (ex: figurative language and sensory description) that effectively pause the plot and stretch the moment, as well as to learn how to embed a life lesson into the heart of a story. Each day, I have also been teaching lessons on conventions related to paragraphing, comma usage and sentence structure, which the kids can execute in their drafting and free-writing at home. Below is a poster that all the kids have taped inside their writing journals, which outlays the types of strategies they’ll use, not just for this genre of writing, but for future genres as well. I’ve also attached the peer-editing form, so that you can see what types of feedback kids are asked to give each other, and a mentor text of a small moment, written by Yours Truly…
Morning Has Broken my Slumber…
In math we’ve been dipping our feet deeper into the pool of double- (or more) digit multiplication. A reminder: STUDENTS WILL ULTIMATELY BE USING TRADITIONAL ALGORITHMS FOR LONG MULTIPLICATION AND DIVISION, as these are most efficient when “executing” in math. (Expect double-digit homework starting next week.) Attached is the Unit 1 Family Letter though, which gives a few examples of how we reinforce the efficient models with creative thinking in number sense. These other models do really help students to see how it all works, and they can ultimately transfer that understanding to their more efficient model. But remember, you can help your child understand however you see fit – THERE IS NO WRONG WAY!
In science and social studies, we have an overlying theme for the year: FORCE CAUSES MOTION, AND MOTION CAUSES CHANGE (ask your kids to show you the chant/dance; there will more about this in future posts). In science we are really getting into our unit on Sound, and the kids have already discovered that sound starts with a FORCE at the source; the vibration is the MOTION or pathway of the sound; and the sound itself is the CHANGE. Attached are several “snapshots” of the investigation we explored yesterday, which asked kids to discover the relationship ship between the length (and ultimately speed) of a vibrating object and the sound’s pitch. Using home-made “instruments,” students learned the following terms: directly proportional, inversely proportional, vibration, pitch (vs. amplitude), among other terms from past investigations.
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