Friday, September 28, 2012

5V News

Thank you to all of the parents who were able to make it to Curriculum Night!  It was great to connect with so many of you.  For those of you who didn't make it or who would like to see the class video again, here it is:


We are learning about:
  • Prime Factorization
  • Blogging
  • Gathering "seeds" in our writer's notebooks
  • Monitoring thinking during our reading   
Some activities we did this week:
  • Made factor trees to find the prime factorization of numbers
  • Unsquared square numbers
  • Made factor rainbows
  • Discussed logical consequences for our classroom
  • Made "reading salads" during reading- text + thinking = real reading
  • Reviewed fix up strategies for reading
  • Created timelines of important events in our life
  • Searched for model blog posts on other class sites
  • Explored how titles can bring more readers to blog posts
  • Spent Friday morning inside doing team building challenges 
Notes and reminders:
  • Unit one math test on Tuesday, October 1st
  • NECAP testing begins Wednesday, October 2nd 
  • No school on Monday, October 8th 

Thursday, September 20, 2012

5V News

Curriculum Night
Please feel free to come to 5V anytime between 6:15 and 6:30 pm on Thursday, September 27th.  During this time parents are invited and encouraged to come to chat, look at their child's work and become familiar with the room before the official curriculum night begins.  
At 6:30, I will begin my presentation (a movie created by your kids about how 5V works).
At 7:00, we will go to the library with all of the 5th grade teachers to discuss 5th grade curriculum. 

Global Read Aloud
Our class has just signed up for Global Read Aloud!  We will be reading The One and Only Ivan along with thousands of other kids around the world.  We will connect with others through blogging and Skype about our read aloud experience.  You can watch this video for a little more information:   

Have you checked out Mr. Fosher's new blog???
http://storiesfromstratham.blogspot.com/

We are learning about:
  • Prime and composite numbers, factors and divisibility 
  • Reading and Writing workshop routines
  • Blogging
Some activities we did this week:
  • Learned divisibility rules
  • Drew arrays for square numbers
  • Created factor rainbows
  • Decorated our writer's notebooks
  • Began crafting our "I am" poems
  • Discussed the differences between, easy, just right and challenging books
  • Met with our second grade reading buddies
  • Prepared for our Mystery Skype
  • Mystery Skyped with another 5th grade classroom to guess their location
  • Decided what our classroom rules look like and sound like 
Notes and reminders:

Friday, September 14, 2012

5V News

Comment on our blog!
Every Friday students will be blogging about their week in 5V.  I'm hoping this will be a chance for families to get a glimpse of what's happening in 5V from the student's perspective and an opportunity to engage in conversations- either on the blog or at home.  I encourage you to comment on your child's weekly reflections as often as you'd like and I invite you to share the link with your extended family! The students love getting comments on their posts. 
www.kidblog.org/msvalentisclass

Home learning:
We are easing into our homework routine (or home learning as we're calling it!).  Students should be bringing their binder with assignment book back and forth to school each day.  Most weeks students can expect the following activities to do at home:
  • Reading each night
  • Everyday Math study link or math practice each night
  • Weekly vocabulary search for 5 words
  • Weekly blog post (minimum 2 paragraphs)
  • Weekly comments on other students' blog posts
  • Weekly spelling routine (to be added in the next couple of weeks)
We are learning about:
  • Classroom routines and expectations
  • Factors and divisibility 
  • Blogging
  • Google docs
  • Reading and writing workshop
Some activities we did this week:
  • Made videos on classroom rules using iMovie on the ipads
  • Voted on our classroom rules
  • Found factors of numbers
  • Played "Factor Captor" during math
  • Began sharing during morning meeting
  • Created heart maps in writing workshop
  • Discussed how readers choose books in reading workshop
  • Celebrated International Dot Day by creating dot murals
  • Practiced commenting on blog posts
  • Reflected on our week by blogging
  • Created a "wordle" during computer time
  • Started familiarizing ourselves with Google docs 
Notes and reminders:
  • Early release on Wednesday, September 19th 
  • Curriculum night on Thursday, September 27th at 6:30
  • We would love donations of tissues at any time during the year!
Have a great weekend and please don't hesitate to contact me with any questions, concerns or feedback!
jvalenti@sau16.org 

Friday, September 7, 2012

5V News

We have been hard at work in 5V getting to know each other, building our community, creating art and setting up our classroom together.  I hope you've had a chance to check out our Flickr page with our class photos. 

Today, students blogged for the first time on our class blog about their hopes and dreams for fifth grade. Students are proud of their work and they would LOVE to receive comments on their posts.  I encourage families to check our kidblog often.  We have spent several class periods discussing digital citizenship and how we can safely and respectfully engage with each other and others online.  All posts and comments are approved by a teacher before they appear on our kidblog site.   

I look forward to sharing more with you about digital citizenship, the curriculum and everything about 5V at Curriculum Night on Thursday, September 27th at 6:30.  I hope to see you there!