September 10, 2012

5^th Grade Newsletter
Mrs. Sandusky’s Class

Important Dates:

·         9/11-9/12; Acuity Testing

·         9/14- Mid-quarter

Monday	PE 2
Tuesday	Music 1
Wednesday	Art
Thursday	PE 1
Friday	Music 2

ELA (Sandusky)- This week we have Acuity testing Tuesday and Wednesday. Please make sure your child is in attendance if at all possible. These tests give us results that help drive our instruction. We will be focusing on drawing conclusions and inferences this week in reading. This week we will also start DRA’s that tell each child’s instructional and independent reading level. We will not have spelling due to the 2 days of testing, and the additional testing of the DRA.
Memorial Library cards are coming home in today’s folder. They are orange index cards. It is very important that you fill these out (address, phone number, name, AND signature) and return them as soon as possible. We will be going on the 27^th, all card have to be in before this date as they have to be inputted into the computer system. Going over to the library will help students in an upcoming assignment and is very beneficial to them. If your child does not bring their card back they will stay at school with another teacher. Even if you have a family card, it is still necessary for your child to bring this back.

ELA(Shultz)- This week, we will start a new spelling focus--er, meaning person or thing that does something and re meaning back or again. We will be building on what we have already learned with this suffix and prefix. We will also be taking our first benchmark test in English/Language Arts. Encourage your student to do his or her very best, so that we have an accurate picture of what we excel in and what we need to review. We are continuing with our look at conjunctions and using connecting words like and, but, or, and neither...nor, to make our sentences more complex and interesting. All students are responsible for including the correct capitalization and end punctuation in their work now. Mid-quarter ends on Friday. All students should be at 40% of their goal at that time. The quarter is flying by and I am making connections almost daily with every student regarding his or her AR goal

 SCIENCE: We will continue working on Body Systems the rest of the week.  NO test this week.  I will give students an opportunity to re-test on Cells this Friday

Math: This week we are taking our first Benchmark Assessment. Students will have their Math Benchmark Assessment with Acuity on Wednesday, September 12th. It is VERY important that all students are at school this day, so we have scores for all students. It is much easier for a student to take the assessment the day we give it, rather than having to attempt to make it up and miss class time and instruction. We are going to still be working on writing numerical expressions and move into order of operations, Unit 1 of Buckle Down later this week. Grades will be coming home on Wednesday, September 19th. Please note that MATH GRADES are weighted for students in 5th grade. 70% of their math grade comes from Test Scores, and the remaining 30% will come from classwork and any homework students may have. We are already entering the last week of Mid-Quarters for First Quarter.  Time is already slipping away.