Week of May 17

As the year winds down, we are working collaboratively on lots of projects.  In the beginning of the year, many of the students had difficulty working with one partner, let alone a small group.  Now, I love watching them problem solve and work together in groups of 2, 3, 4, even 5 classmates. 
In Social Studies/Writing, the students have created Revolutionary websites.  You can click on the links below to see them.  We are also going to be learning about the Constitution and how our government works with checks and balances.
The children are putting the finishing touches on poetry books in writing.  They researched a specific type of poetry and then taught it to their classmates using a collaborative jigsaw model.  For kids who initially complained about writing, they sure do love it now!
Now that were finished with Math MCAS, we will be creating fractions clotheslines to reinforce comparing and performing operations with fractions.  This will be an in school project.
In Reading, the students are participating in Historical Fiction book discussion groups.  In conjunction with this, they are creating a life-sized character study and time line that mixes true historical events and events from their book.
In Science, we will be starting a unit on engineering that teaches the children about properties and materials.  The students will be working with a partner to create working sailboats and windmills.

FYI, Graduation invitations will be coming home in the Friday folders shortly, but mark your calendars for June 15 at 9:30 am.

Week of May 10

• This week, we have MCAS testing in Math. 
• In Reading, the children are creating life-sized character portraits of the main character in their Historical Fiction book.  They will identify 10 character traits and place them onto the cut-out. Lastly, they will be creating a time line using the computer program Inspiration that mixes fictional events from their book and real events from history.
• In Science, we have been watching several videos to help us prepare for next weeks Science MCAS tests.Next week, we will be starting our engineering unit.  The kids have been anxiously awaiting this unit all year!
• In Writing, we are using the collaborative jigsaw model to learn about different types of Poetry.
• In Social Studies, we have been creating our own Web sites on the American Revolution.  You can click on the links below to see how they look so far!
• In Open Circle we discussed the new anti-bullying law in Massachusetts.  The children were very engaged in the conversation!