TWIG5: THIS WEEK IN GRADE 5...
WEEK OF FEB. 18TH TO FEB. 22nd
Welcome to week 25 of learning, exploring & having fun!!!
Ten students will go on to the finals which will be held on Feb. 20th in the ES Hall following the assembly. We wish all of our participants the best of luck!!!
REMINDERS
- This is the last week of Trimester Two ASA activities. There are no ASA's next week.
- Memorial Service on Monday, Feb. 19 at 3:30 in the theater: Our CAC community is hurting as we deeply feel the loss of one of our Middle school students, Amna Hussein. We mourn the friend we have lost and desire to support her family who continues to be a part of our community. Amna has a younger brother who is in 2nd Grade and an older sister in 9th Grade. A memorial service will be held in honor of Amna Hussein. Parents are welcome to attend.
- ES Talent Show dates will be May 3rd from 5-8 in the theater. Auditions will take place the week of March 18th during lunch times.
- Shelter Drill: We will have a shelter drill on March 12th. More information will be shared as the date approaches.
- Core Value Creativity Celebration on Thursday, Feb. 22nd.
- Girls Get Strong! Ms. Riddle will be in our classes on Wednesday to speak to the students about the Girls Get Strong program that is available to Grade 5 girls.
CURRICULUM CORNER
Language Arts
Reading Workshop & Writing Workshop: Fantasy Book Clubs are in full swing and students are continuing to have interesting discussions based on their reading. Book clubs are using jottings to help conversations and thinking develop. Students have reflected on the question: “How can I raise the level of our Book conversations?” Students have used evidence from the text to support their thinking to gain a deeper understanding of the elements of Fantasy. Paraphrasing, pausing and active listening skills are developing and many rich conversations can be heard in classrooms.
Our talented authors are enthusiastically engaged with the task of writing a Fantasy Picture Book. Students have built upon their ’16 box’ plan, crafting interesting stories full of villains and heroes, daunting quests and magical lands. Writers have developed nuanced characters who often have a steep learning curve as they overcome the difficulties in their ‘quests.’ This week, we are focused on blending action, dialogue, summary and a character's inner thinking into our stories as well.
Math
Students build on their new understanding of fraction equivalence as multiplication by converting fractions to decimals and decimals to fractions. The word form of twelve hundredths will then be used to notate this quantity as a decimal. Students will apply the concepts of the topic to real world, multi-step problems.
Science
Our exciting new unit is on Earth Changes. Our essential question is: "How does the Earth's surface change over time?" All work will be documented on the students' blogs. This blog will show evidence of each student's thinking and observations as the unit progresses. Students will have opportunities to add their experiment videos- carefully documenting the process and outcomes. Students will ask and answer questions as well on reflect on their learning and collaborate with others. Communication is an important element of being a great scientist and so students will have opportunities to practice this skill, along with organization, record-keeping, and making careful observations.
There are both rapid changes (earthquakes, volcanoes etc.) and slow changes (erosion, weathering)... our experimental focus will be on the slow changes of erosion, weathering and deposition. In the upcoming weeks, we will be working in the science labs using stream tables to investigate water flow over earth materials. Students will observe and record the processes of erosion, deposition and stream flow using the Scientific Method. These stream tables are a model to represent what happens in real life over millions of years! Our case study will be the Grand Canyon in the Southwest of USA. The students will investigate such questions as, "How do you think the Grand Canyon formed? What happened to the earth material in the stream table that once filled the area that is now the canyon? How are your stream tables like the picture of the Grand Canyon? What do you think happened to the material that once filled the Grand Canyon?"
Important vocabulary that will come into use this week and beyond, include: landform, erosion, plateau, canyon, delta, valley, floodplains, mouth of the stream, deposition, sediments, drainage basin, meanders, and channel.
Circle Solutions
Students continue for participate in circle solution activities around the themes of respect and creativity. The core value we are focusing on this month, as a school, is creativity. We have common core value books that we read that help spark conversations around what it means. Students are encouraged to take the core value books home so that they can be read and discussed together. We will have a creativity Lego celebration on the afternoon of Thursday, Feb. 22nd.
* Core Value of the Month: CREATIVITY
It’s February, let’s be CREATIVE!
CREATIVITY - Be inspired to imagine and explore.
Creativity is the process of making something of value that hasn't been made before, be it a painting, an idea, a solution, a relationship or a new dance move. Creativity is a skill to be learned, practiced and developed, just like any other. Any sport such as football, tennis, or basketball takes practice. Creativity is no different. The more you make creativity a part of your daily life, the more it will grow.
Creativity is innovation.
Creativity is thinking outside the box.
Creativity is improvisation.
Creativity is being a risk taker.
Creativity is passion and much more...
In Guidance students are learning ways to manage peer conflicts and prevent/respond to bullying. We began with a focus on healthy versus unhealthy friendship groups and the difference between normal peer conflict and bullying. This unit is designed to prevent all forms of bullying, including physical/verbal, relational and cyber-bullying. Through the use of the Second Step curriculum, various read-aloud books, videos, discussions and role-plays, students will:
- Recognize the difference between a group of friends and exclusive cliques
- Learn and practice specific assertiveness skills to refuse the exclusion of peers
- Recognize that bullying is different from conflict
- Learn strategies for refusing bullying in different ways
- Understand bystander responsibility to help stop bullying
- Decide on and practice positive bystander responses to bullying
- Recognize and identify different ways of cyber bullying
- Demonstrate ways to support and/or stand up for a person being cyber bullied
Girls Get Strong will host its third health and fitness conference on Saturday, March 17th. This year we are excited to have other schools in Cairo and our region joining us! This year’s theme is Girls In Action and it is without a doubt we have assembled a wide variety of experts to help our young women put skills needed to lead a healthy lifestyle "In Action".
Details of the event are as followed:
Date: March 17, 2018
Time: 8:30-3:00
Location: Cairo American College
Grade Level: 5th-12th Grade
Registration Deadline: March 8, 2018
Registration Link: https://goo.gl/forms/
More information about the conference can be found here:
Becky Riddle
Physical Education
Cairo American College
MS Drama Showcase Performance
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