January 19th

It's a bittersweet day for me. I am so sad leaving this wonderful class. Tuesday they surprised me with a going away party for lunch. They have rained out pourings of love and gifts beyond deserving. I will truly miss seeing them everyday. I leave them in good hands with Mr. Harrison.

On a positive note, I am looking forward to working with them during my sabbatical. We will have some amazing learning ahead of us!


Here's what we have been up to

• Order of Operations; PEMDAS- Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally
• We actually had a math teacher from the high school in during this time and she was totally impressed with our thinking skills 
• exponents
• we learned to read through more difficult nonfiction text and have a set of game cards of strategies to help us when we get stuck
• we've had a test on the location and spelling of the Thirteen Colonies
• we have explored the three colonial regions are beginning to compare and contrast them
• we're are into our Words Their Way and should be sorting words nightly
• we have explored the importance of content vocabulary, learned to put what we are reading into our own words, take notes and put our knowledge into summaries.

January 9, 2017

Welcome  to the New Year!

I can't believe it, I am holding on tightly for my last eight days with this wonderful class. Last week I asked,  "What makes are class great?" The overwhelming response was: We are all friends and kind. 

My sabbatical will begin on Friday the 19th and that will be Mr. Harrison's first day. Mr. H. and I taught fifth grade here together so I am reassured 5C is in great hands. Over the next two weeks we will work on a transition plan where Mr. H. will come in, see what we are working on, observe how we work together as a class, learn our systems, and do some team teaching. Mrs. Foss will continue to be here to support us daily.

Our First Festive Friday went right to the very end so folder did not get home.

5C News              

We are learning about:

• how to divide with a decimal in the dividend
• working on word lists in spelling
• three early settlements

Some activities we did:

• completed our Settlement essays- a clean copy has been sent home in the folder
• sorted our words and reviewed Words Their Way for spelling
• First Festive Friday!!!

Notes and Reminders:

• January 16th No School MLK Day

Contact Ms. Craig dcraig@sau16.org

December 22, 2016

We have had an awesome week planning our school on MARS. Take a look at our final products:

5C News              

December 16

We are learning about:

• Three ways to utilize a remainder: ignore, report as a fraction, round up
• Dividing with zeros
• two digit divisors
• Language used in different text structures to help identify the text structure being read
• Taking notes from complex text and recording on computer documents
• Researching Roanoke, Jamestown and Plimoth
• Discerning implicit main ideas
• How morphology can help with specialized vocabulary

Some activities we did:

• Began a 5th grade MARs project where we research and design a school on Mars
• Got our scooter licences
• Read about animal defenses and found text structure of each chapter
• Worked on our Movie Math project

Notes and Reminders:

• MARS project 12/21 1:30
• Vacation 12/26-1/3

Dear Families,

The fifth grade has taken on the challenge to build a school on Mars. We are sharing out with the school next Wednesday at 1:30. Today we discovered a miscommunication on our team about inviting parents. So, I am sorry this is so late; please come and join us to view the MARS schools with the rest of SMS on Wednesday at 1:30.

Time Flies by in 5C. We have been very busy reading, writing, solving problems, learning and creating. Take a peek:

Words

• completed all the syllable principals
• looking at prefixes and suffixes to encode words

Multiplication

• estimating
• using estimates to find reasonable answers in multiplication
• multiplying multi-digit numbers
• multiplying by decimals
• learning to read, solve and explain word problems with multiplication

Science

• Why does the sun rise and set?
• Who set the first clocks?
• Why do stars change with the seasons?

History

• 5 themes of geography
• What was happening in Europe, Africa and the Americas prior to 1490's
• How the three continents engaged with each other
• The Columbian Exchange and the impact it had/has on Europe, Africa and the Americas

Reading

• Finished Pax and The Best Christmas Pageant Ever
• defined theme
• learned how to develop new ideas from multiple plots
• took quality notes to generate new ideas, explore and develop themes
• expanded these ideas in writing supported with evidence from the text
• participated in two book groups

Writing

• wrote two personal narratives
• wrote 1 fiction story
• developed ideas using
• snapshots
• thoughtshots
• flashbacks
• shrinking time
• exploding the moment
• dialogue
• figurative language
• worked on the conventions of
• paragraphing
• commas
• using quotations in dialogue

Other

• innovation day
• First Festive Friday

October 24th

We have been so busy! We:

• learned the continents and oceans
• continue measuring our shadows
• are creating experiments about the rotation of the Earth and sun
• learned two principals of syllables
• are adding, subtracting, comparing and ordering decimals
• explored the powers of 10
• worked on problem solving skills in math
• followed ideas and tracked them with evidence through our reading
• supported our ideas from reading in writing
• reviewed the elements of a story
• developed a story idea using story elements
• are working on personal narratives showing growth mindset
• have been reading Pax  and noting similarities to The Honest Truth
• had a great day at Stratham Hill Park building community and our mindsets (the best building of a shelter ever!)

Here are some picture of developing our ideas with evidence:

See you at conferences.