January 30th, 2017

Today students answered the following question in their Writer's Notebook: What is something you've done only one time so far in your life that you can't wait to do a second time? Students had some really interesting answers. Remember, you can always view or review our Writer's Notebook questions by looking at the updated slideshow on the "Writing" page. Afterwards, students continued to work on their reading fluency using "Cinderella" as their text. Students did NOT read through "Cinderella" twice with the TOC last Thursday as I had previously thought; they had read it through once. So, today students read the text through again, practicing improving their ability to follow the text's punctuation marks and making choices about their reading rate. Tomorrow we add more expression to our reading! Students also practiced identifying the key story elements of this Fairy Tale (problem, solution, character traits, etc.). Students were also asked to draw conclusions about the characters - this is building off of the inferring strategy that we used earlier this year. Some of us really struggled to draw conclusions about the characters from the text. We had practiced making inferences about what would happen in the story, but this was a new form of inferring for us. This is something that we will continue to practice in upcoming classes. Don't forget that tomorrow is the due date of January's Book Talk! 

In Social Studies today we put together the final components of our ongoing Geography projects. I am so excited to have finally reached the end of this unit and to be able to share what students have been working on! This was a new way of teaching this unit for me. Instead of direct instruction using lessons, textbooks, etc. this unit was done almost entirely through student research and student project work. Students will be sharing their work with the class throughout the week and I will be posting their work to the "Geography" page as well so that parents and families can see what they have been working on. Thanks for your hard work everyone! On to History and Identity (which I teach as a combined unit instead of two separate units). 

In Science today we reviewed the parts of a battery and students were reminded that the negative terminal and the positive terminal of a battery need to be connected with a conductor in order for electricity to be produced (in order for the electrons to flow from the negative to the positive terminal). Today we discussed the parts of a light bulb and began an experiment called "Will it Light?" that is meant to help students identify what parts of a light bulb need to be connected in a circuit in order for electricity to pass through the light bulb. We will be completing this experiment tomorrow. 

Agenda
Language Arts:
- Read 20 minutes
- Book Talk (January 31st)
- Book Orders (due January 31st)

Math:
- Practice 8x, 9x, 3x, 6x, 12x, 5x, 10x, 7x, or 11x tables

Health:
- PEAK Basketball (Tuesday)
- FRIENDS, pg. 71 (Tuesday)
 
Music:
- Recorders (Tuesday)

Tech & Trades Academy - Mondays (3:00-4:00 pm)
Grade 5/6 Guitar Club - Thursdays (2:45-3:45 pm)
CG Recyclers - Day 1 (lunch recess) and Day 4 (lunch)
Girls Basketball - Mondays, Wednesdays (2:45-3:45 pm)
Boys Basketball - Tuesdays, Thursdays (2:45-3:45 pm)
Healthy Snack Sale for Bay d'Espoir - Wednesday, Thursday, Friday ($2)
Toonie Toss for Bay d'Espoir - Monday, February 6th ($2)
Winter Walk Day - February 1st (10:00 am)
Toque Tuesday - February 7th
Valentine's Family Dance - February 9th (6:00-9:00 pm)