Last Week’s Happenings Ms. Watson’s Weekly Newsletter September 13, 2017 Last Week’s Happenings . Close Reading FUN! We had a great time with our first close read last week! Students were introduced to close reading, given a student guide that will walk them through each of their close reads throughout the year, and introduced to annotations that they will use to aid comprehension as they read. Our first close read text was about Hurricanes, since it was something that is affecting so many people right now. Ready To WRITE! Last week we prepared for Writer’s Workshop by reading a Mentor Text by John Siezka. We took some tips from him and began brainstorming techniques that authors use, that we would like to use in our own writing! Flipping OUT for SCIENCE! Last week, we took a hands-on approach to learning the steps of the Scientific Method, turning one of our favorite (and Ms. Watson’s LEAST favorite) activities into a Science Experiment: BOTTLE FLIPPING! The students had such a blast, and learned a lot, too!

Happening This Week… Spelling Math This week in Math with Ms. Crumpler, students will begin their first Place Value Pathway. The Lessons from EnVision Math that will be covered are HW: Envision workbook pages Lesson 1-1, 1-2, 1-3 HW pages. The common core standards that will be covered are NBT 1, NBT 2, NBT 3 and NBT 4. Reading This week, we will start our first William and Mary TD Unit, where we will be introduced to the concept of “Perspective”. We will generate examples of perspective, categorize these examples, generate non examples of perspective, and create generalizations about Perspective. Writing This week, we will read more mentor texts by John Siezka in order to study his craft as an author. We will then begin drafting our very own fractured fairy tale. Our main goal this week is to focus on brainstorming, and building our stamina as writers. Spelling This week students will learn about prefixes and suffixes. They will receive time in class to work on their word work contracts, and will be tested on Friday. Content This week, we will be introduced to our first Genius Hour project that will cover many SS Common Core Standards, and that will also serve as a service project for citizens affected by Hurricane Irma. We will also begin our first unit on Weather Important Dates -9/15 Muffins for Mom 8am -9/15 PTA Meeting 5:30pm -9/15 Pajama Jam 6:30pm -9/15 Vocabulary Quiz -9/15 Math Homework Due -9/20 Curriculum Night 6pm-7pm for 5th Grade – held in the Media Center. -9/21 Teacher Work Day NO SCHOOL -9/22 Teacher Work Day NO SCHOOL Notes from Ms. Watson  -Don’t forget to check our class website for any questions about schedules, procedures, homework, etc! www.mswatsonsfifthgrade.weebly.com -Please please PLEASE check your child’s homework folder each night. You should be signing their checkbook so that I know you are seeing your child’s behavior each day. -If you are able to do so, please send in a few highlighters for our class! With all of this text annotating we are doing, we really need them! -I still have about 9 parents that have not yet joined Class Dojo! I sent home letters with instructions and log in information on the first week of school. By logging on and downloading the app, you are able to check your child’s behavior throughout the day, and even message me with questions! Please take advantage of this! If you misplaced your instructions, email me and I will send them home for you again. Thank you for your efforts in this! -Big shout out to Mrs. Tildon for coming in to help me put together Genius Hour folders for our class! -I need a volunteer who can commit to coming in on Thursdays at 3:30 to help stuff and pass out Thursday folders. I’m looking for someone who can do this somewhat consistently. Please shoot me an email if you can!