Updates and announcements

Can you believe the year is almost over? Our students are coming up to a well-deserved summer break. It has been an honor teaching our students this year. At our end of the year party, students will get a more eloquent sending off letter from all of the 5^th grade teachers.

Wednesday is the 5^th grade Promotion. Students should be in the gym at 5:15 and the ceremony will start at 5:30.

Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday are half days.

Our end of the year party is Friday!

Just a reminder that I will not be at school on Thursday and Friday. I will be back in Montana for my brother’s graduation. I am so excited to bring them back to Arizona with me next week and celebrate my brother’s new adulthood, my birthday, and mourning the departure of my mid-twenties.

Our week in learning

This week, students will continue composing their myths or tall tales in class. On Tuesday, they will complete their final drafts and have the opportunity to illustrate their stories. On Wednesday and Thursday, students will share their final stories with the class. 

This week in science, students will finish their children's biography and turn it in by the end of the day on Monday. On Tuesday, science block will be a study hall, so students should come prepared with homework to complete.

Students are finishing up our last unit in History! In groups, students are writing plays based on the Russian Czars Ivan the Great, Peter the Great, Ivan the Terrible, and Catherine the Great. Students have Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday to write and rehearse their plays, then will present their plays on Thursday.

In our last week of school, students will be finishing out the year in math with a variety of fun brain teasers and group activities.

Updates and announcements

I can’t believe we are already in our second to last week of school! This last quarter flew by.

We heard some absolutely incredible speeches students wrote for Promotion. In fact, they were so well done, I invited Mr. Gillingham to listen and help me decide which speech would be given for Promotion. All students should be very proud of their hard work.

Just some housekeeping, I will be gone from school the last two days (next Thursday and Friday) to attend my brother’s graduation back in Montana. My last engagement with the students will be Promotion. I am so sad to miss out on the end of year celebration, but I will get to see them off to middle school during Promotion. No worries, I will be back early the following week with my siblings to take care of the classroom and I look forward to watching our students grow next year on the Prep side.

5^th Grade Promotion is next Wednesday, May 23^rd. Students should arrive by 5:15 to get in their places.

Our week in learning

This week in Language Arts, students will take their end-of-year grammar test and begin learning about myths, legends, and tall tales. At the end of the week, students will begin composing their own such fiction!

In Across Five Aprils, students will add finishing touches to their literature project on Tuesday to turn in on Wednesday.

• A title
• A summary of a Civil War battle or event (2 paragraph minimum)
• An opinion article (see handout for prompt; must include 2 quotations; 2-3 paragraph minimum)
• A Civil War era photograph to accompany the summary
• An advertisement of a Civil War era product

The project will be due on May 16th.

This week in science, students will take their final unit exam of the year over the nervous system. On Tuesday, students will watch a short film about the chemist Percy Lavon Julian, and will have the opportunity to use biographical material to research his life and contributions to science. In groups of two, students will produce an illustrated children’s book about Julian’s life. They will have two full in-class days to complete this project, and should not need to work on it at home. The finished book is due next Monday.

Students are beginning their exciting unit on Native Americans: Cultures and Conflicts. Students will learn about the Indian Wars, the Battle of Little Bighorn, Custer, Wovoka, and the Battle of Wounded Knee. The study guides are due Wednesday, 5/16 and the test will be on Thursday, 5/17. On Friday, students will begin our final, short, non-tested unit on Russia.

This week, students will be assessed on their cumulative knowledge of math facts and skills from throughout the year. This will not be taken for a grade-just a check in to see where our students are after a year of hard work! We will take the assessments Monday and Tuesday in class. Students do not need to prepare or review at home. On Wednesday, we will do some fun brain teasers in math groups, and on Thursday and Friday students will have some fun, introductory lessons into ancient Babylonian and Greek mathematicians.

Updates and Announcements

We are nearing the end of the school year! Students are having so much fun learning our rich curriculum without the looming state tests. Their leisure in learning is an incredible sight to see.

This week, the Phoenix Symphony is coming to perform on Monday.

Clubs: The final day of clubs is Friday, May 11 (exception: K-1 Art).

The Prep tour will take place on Friday, May 11^th.

We are looking forward to honoring our fifth-grade scholars promotion to sixth grade at the Arete gym on Wednesday, May 23rd at 5:30 pm. Students should wear semi-formal clothes of their choice to this event. Boys should wear trousers, a collared shirt, and dress shoes, and girls may wear an outfit appropriate for a religious service or wedding, such as a nice dress. Students’ clothing should cover the same amount as their uniform polos and shorts. If ladies would like to wear a strapless or spaghetti strap dress, they should wear a cover as well. Students should arrive by 5:15 and will be directed to sit with their class.  We will have a ceremony for the students and the PSO will have refreshments to enjoy after it is over. Please let me know if you have any questions or if you know your child will not be able to attend. We are excited to celebrate with you!

Our week in learning

This week in language arts, students will be reviewing their grammar notes from throughout the year in preparation for their end-of-year grammar test. In addition to reviewing their classification and diagramming skills, they will review parts of speech, predicate adjectives and nominatives, direct and indirect objects, pronouns and antecedents, rules for making a word possessive, and using colons and semicolons. On Wednesday, students should take home a practice test that will serve as a study guide for the test next Tuesday, May 15th.

In Across Five Aprils, students will finish the book and begin their final literature project: creating a newspaper page which contains:

• A title
• A summary of a Civil War battle or event (2 paragraph minimum)
• An opinion article (see handout for prompt; must include 2 quotations; 2-3 paragraph minimum)
• A Civil War era photograph to accompany the summary
• An advertisement of a Civil War era product

The project will be due on May 16th. Students will be given some time in class throughout the week, but this project should be largely completed at home.

This week in science, students will finish learning about the nervous system by learning about the lobes of the brain and their functions. The study guide is due on Friday, and a review game will take place in class on Thursday. This will allow students to correct and clarify questions on their study guides before they are due. The nervous system unit test will be on Monday, May 14.

Students are beginning their exciting unit on Native Americans: Cultures and Conflicts. Students were separated into groups on Friday to read chapters about specific regions of Native Americans. In these groups, students will prepare a short 15-minute lesson with notes about their chapter. Presentations will take place on Wednesday. We will also learn about relations between Indians and European settlers before the American Revolution, revisit the Louisiana Purchase, and the Trail of Tears. Students will also learn about the effects of European diseases on the Indian population, and the Sand Creek Massacre. Students already have their study guides for this short unit. The study guides are due Wednesday, 5/16 and the test will be on Thursday, 5/17.

Students will be completing their study of angles this week by studying the properties of quadrilaterals, as well as getting in some protractor practice by teaching each other how to draw quadrilaterals. To help review for the Friday test, students will be reviewing Thursday in class as well as creating a geometry toolkit  with all of our important concepts from this unit.