Class News for Mrs. Scott's Fifth Grade Scholars 2024-2025!!
April:
Out like a lamb...March ends with the celebration of the students' information pieces and "Being an Expert Piece." Students wrote an informational piece about the Revolutionary War using their research skills. They also applied these skills to their sc#3. As we end this unit, students will also write a poem about the war and start examining poetry techniques. Fantasy has begun with the read aloud of our favorite (read-like-fan) author Katherine Applegate and the book-- The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane. Fantasy book clubs will begin as well as growing a garden of good writing: fantasy stories, poems, and the collection of seeds-- figurative language seeds to plant in our own pieces. Students also journeyed to the Museum of the American Revolution as a culminating end to our Revolutionary War study.
March:
February ends with students continuing to practice applying nonfiction reading and writing skills. Researching choice topics about the Revolutionary War and and other information based topics is part of the work ahead. Students will celebrate Women's History Month with a continued look at influential people in history. We will also enjoy "Read Across America" with some of our favorite authors and picture books.
February:
As January comes to an end, students are wrapping up their research for their passion projects and honing their paragraph writing skills. They will move into informational writing and reading as we apply and use more nonfiction reading strategies while tackling more complex text structures. As a way to be immersed in history, we will continue to use historical fiction as a bridge to understanding more about the Revolutionary War. Students will be studying about the war in social studies and writing about it in ELA.
January:
As we finish up December, our argument writing and debatable topics unit will lead students to do more research on a topic of their choice. We will continue our study of the reasons for drafting the Declaration of Independence and the Revolutionary War by reading historical fiction and learning about key people and important events on the the road to independence. They will dive deeper into historical fiction in social studies and ELA. As they begin to study more nonfiction and complex texts, students continue applying strategies for nonfiction reading and text structures along the way.
December:
We ended November with the students interacting as characters from their independent books. Feast of Characters for fifth grade is always a fun day! Students began researching debatable topics for our argument unit. Chocolate milk, no homework, lengthening school days, banning plastic water bottles and other topics are on our radar for research. Students are also starting to read historical fiction as we begin learning about why colonists chose to break free from Great Britain to declare their independence...
November:
We end October writing more narratives--this time spooky stories! Students had been working on their narrative writing skills and practicing sentence variety using complex sentences while adding more sensory details to their stories. Our thematic book clubs are going strong. Students will work within their club to uncover a theme and write an "I am poem" about their main character. We will also discuss an upcoming independent book project called-- Feast of Characters. As we begin November, we will write book reviews and study argument writing. In social studies, students are presenting in News Teams the events leading to the Declaration of Independence, and they will be learning about Loyalists and Patriots--choosing a side as they pretend to be colonists living in the 1700s.
October:
As we end September, students are writing narratives and learning how stories tend to go both in their novels and in personal narratives. Students began listening to Home of the Brave by Katherine Applegate which is as our mentor text. They have also been practicing different ways to write about reading. This work prepares them for upcoming book clubs on social issues. Social studies has students reviewing geography and examining the varying regions of the original thirteen colonies. Why did colonists choose to live in certain regions? Eventually, studying the regions will lead us to the settling of Colonial America and the tensions that grew between Great Britain and the colonists.
