November 3rd Newsletter

5th Grade Newsletter
November 3, 2014

Upcoming Dates:

• November 11th -Veteran’s Day Assembly 1:30pm Elementary Gym
• November 13th- Skate Night at the Zone 5:30pm
• November 11th- PTO Meeting (Mash house)

Homework: We are working on a letter to a Veteran for morning work. Students can work on this at home if they do not finish in class. We are asking that every child bring in the address of a Veteran that they know. If you know of more than one, please send in those addresses as well for those who do not know of one. We will be mailing letters and invitations in the next few weeks.

Information regarding opportunities in relation to our Service Learning Project (Veteran’s Day) will be coming home as well. Students can choose to write an essay for extra credit, or draw a patriotic image with the chance to have it published on our programs.

MATH:

Ms. Blankenship - This week we will begin our unit on Numbers and Base Ten. We will be covering powers of 10, place value, and reading and writing decimals. Students will be bringing home copies of their lesson to help them review. If you are not getting these, please let me know. Job applications are due Wednesday. If you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to contact me at bblankenship@stjschools.org or 573-265-2300 ext. 4321.

Mrs. Watson- This week we will begin our unit on Numbers and Base Ten. We will begin with place value and decimals. Students will also be updating their data binders. if you would like to check out your student’s data binder, you may do so on Friday and return it on Monday. If you have questions or concerns, please contact me at swatson@stjschools.org or 573-265-2300 ext 4319. You can also check out our class webpage to explore the topics we’ve been covering in class.

SCIENCE:
Tuesday, students will be taking their assessment over Characteristics of Living Things.  This test will be done online through a program called ClassMarker.  Students used this same program to take their last Science Benchmark test, so they should be familiar with the online testing that will be used.

Wednesday, we will have guidance counselor visits from Mrs. Hauck.  On Thursday, we will start our unit over Weather and the Water Cycle.

ELA:
Mrs. Shultz:  www.mrsshultzsclasswebsite.weebly.com

*Homework has been sent home for the week with the reading logs. I still have SO MANY students not returning the logs. The homework is due with the reading logs on Friday.

We are continuing our study of short, fictional texts. We hope to take two big AR tests this week and begin center-styled independent work with Mrs. Weatherly and I focusing on instruction in small groups. Book logs are due on the last day of each week. Students are only required to read up to that point. Late logs are accepted for the grade, but not for the contest.  Students should have their reading time signed each day. There is no set amount, but 20 minutes a day is suggested. Students should be at 42% of their goal by the end of this week. This quarter, that translates into about 8.5  points. Please be here as much as possible and let me know what I can do for you! Please remember, if you would like to contact Mrs. Shultz you can do so by writing a note in the red folder, calling me at x4292 or emailing kshultz@stjschools.org.

Sandusky: Creative Thinker papers were due today, November 3rd. This week we will be taking our URLs that we found our information on, and turning them into MLA citations to create a bibliography. Our focus this week is informational text, we will be comparing two books about Galileo and Leonardo da Vinci. Students will be determining the objectivity of each book, along with the point of view, main idea, and presentation of information. Students will also be learning about conjunctions, interjections, and prepositions this week. Book logs are due Friday.  Feel free to contact me at: bsandusky@stjschools.org, or 573-265-2300 ext: 4294 (my plan time is 2:00-2:50, if you call during school hours I may not be available to pick up, but you can leave me a message.)

Engelbrecht: This week we are continuing wrapping up Unit 2 Inventive Thinking and beginning Unit 3 Clues to a Culture. In language we will be finishing  finishing conjunctions and reviewing personification. In reading we will be reading Trickster Tales from different cultures and discussing character traits and theme. We will be using Waggle for review over skills taught in unit 2.  Waggle can be accessed from home as well if students would like to do some extra review. Our read aloud is Island of the Blue Dolphins .  READING LOGS THIS WEEK! Due Monday!! Remember reading logs are worth 5 points and students that turn them in every week this month qualify for the Pizza Hut Book It program.  I will be having gallbladder surgery on Tuesday, so I will be out for the rest of the week. Mrs. Kemnitzer will be my sub.  If you have any questions please email me at lengelbrecht@stjschools.org or 573-265-2300 ext: 4293. Have a great week!

Week 1

	PE 1	Art	Music1	PE 2	Computers	Music 2
Monday	Watson	Blankenship	Siders	Shultz	Sandusky	Engelbrecht
Tuesday	Blankenship	Siders	Shultz	Sandusky	Engelbrecht	Watson
Wednesday	Siders	Shultz	Sandusky	Engelbrecht	Watson	Blankenship
Thursday	Shultz	Sandusky	Engelbrecht	Watson	Blankenship	Siders
Friday	Sandusky	Engelbrecht	Watson	Blankenship	Siders	Shultz