First off, an important change in calendar dates. Please note this down as it is not on any calendar. Our PYP Coordinator is leaving at Christmas break so we wanted to have our PYP Grade 5 Exhibition Parent meeting prior to her moving on. The new date and time is as follows;
Grade 5 Exhibition Parent Meeting - December 19th 9:00-10:00 am - place to be determined.
This will work out well since the Holiday Band concert is immediately afterwards starting at 10:30 in the Lyso Theatre. More on this as we get closer to the time.
Also a reminder that for PE all students will be swimming. This means they need to bring swim suit, towel, goggles and swim cap on PE days. Next week this is Thursday. I have talked to everyone in the class how important I feel this is since the earth is covered 60% with water. We also discussed some of the options of the future if they are good swimming. Things like Kayaking, sailing, SCUBA, diving and synchronized swimming will all become available if they already know how to swim. I also personally feel it is the best long term fitness sport since it is non-weight bearing, aerobics and strength training all rolled into one.
Our writing is coming along quite nicely. We have now started to look at writing the first draft of our research report. Lessons last week included more work on the outline, adding in a bibliography, presenting and citing pictures and URL’s. This week we look at crafting the report in a more formal tone and also making sure that explanations are complete. I expect that first drafts will be done by Friday.
Reading lessons continue to look at the three step process for summarizing complex nonfiction books; 1) finding main ideas, 2) combining them into a central big idea, 3) finding evidence to support the big idea. After all that is done then students can write a summary. We have done this as a class for the first three books in the Scientific Process using them as examples of what this should look like. Students have also started to use their own books in this process.
On Monday students will bring home the chapter 3 math assessment. While it was not a surprise to me, I am finding that students are having a great deal of difficulty in interpreting mathematical word problems. We will continue to work through this in the next unit. I have added in more math problems to our daily lessons as well in an attempt to strengthen this. Chapter 4 is the multiplication and division of fractions. It introduces two models; area model for multiplication and ribbon model for problem solving. We have just started these and will continue to work with them throughout this unit. I have included the parent letter for this unit with this newsletter.
Next week students have the opportunity to work with Inspired Citizens, listen to a real author talk about the writing process and listen to a band concert with students from all over the Asia-Pacific region. Should add a lot of interesting learning to their repertoire.
If you have any questions please feel free to contact me.
