Winter Break News

We all know how important reading is, so it is important to maintain good reading habits even on a break. Today, your 5th grader came home with a decorated Ziplock bag containing a choice book, a self-selected goal, and their Winter Reading Challenge!  The Challenge has your 5th grader choose at least 10 different marshmallow reading challenges from their Reading Challenge sheet. Students are encouraged to post a picture of themselves on Google Classroom to encourage reading and discussion about books!  Once they complete the challenge, they should glue it to the mug on their task sheet. Finally, they should decorate their mug in a creative way!

The Winter Reading Challenge was designed to get your 5th grader to spend time relaxing, reading books, magazines, ebooks, and/or audiobooks. I talked about the importance of having a purpose for reading. Students have chosen a reading goal that they feel they need to focus on. Their goal sheets have their goal is written at the top and a strategy with direction to help them achieve their goal. The reading challenge sheet has a mug for students to decorate and on each of the marshmallows is an activity to do while reading. Ex: read while sitting next to the fireplace, read a magazine, or read next to a tree, etc. The challenge is not a requirement, but more of a fun activity to do while reading over break.

When we come back from break, we will be celebrating all of the reading we all did over break. This will take place on Friday, January 5th. Some of the celebrations choices we have come up with are: reading in PJs, reading with flashlights, read to stuffed animals or a combination of all of them :)!!

*** Supplies needed for the new year***:

~Pencils

~Post-its

~Expo Markers

See you all in the New Year!

5C News December 18-21

I hope you have a great Winter Break! Enjoy time with your friends and family. I could not be more thankful for the wonderful families in our Room 501 community! Happy Holidays!

We had so much fun square dancing during Country Western Day. Thank you to all the parents that joined us and go out on the dance floor too!!!!

We also got a chance to Skype with Elly Swartz the author of Finding Perfect and Smart Cookie (comes out in January). She sent our class an advance copy at the beginning of the school year. We were able to pass it around before talking with her last week!!!

I am hoping to give our class the opportunity to talk more author about the importance of reading and writing before the end of the school year. Stay tuned!

Winter Parties: We will have our winter parties the morning of December 21st beginning at 9:45 am and concluding at 10:30 am.  We honor a food-free celebratory environment in accordance with Parkway's food policy, so no candy or food is allowed.  If you are joining us for the celebration, please be sure to sign in before going to your child's class.

Half Day: We have a half day of school this Thursday, December 21st. We will dismiss from school at 1:05 pm.

Winter Reading Challenge: Your child will be coming home with a Winter Reading Challenge over break. Be on the lookout for an email outlining details of the challenge later this week! :)

Activities for the Family Over Break in St. Louis!

• Free Winter Events and Activities in the St. Louis Area!
• https://www.tripsavvy.com/free-winter-events-and-activities-in-st-louis-3137255
• St. Louis Kids Out and About
• http://saintlouis.kidsoutandabout.com/

December

21: Winter Parties, 9:45 am, Half Day - school dismisses at 1:05 pm

22 - 31: No School, Winter Break

January

1-3: No School, Winter Break

4: School Resumes

10: Late Start, School begins at 11:05 am, Spirit Day - PJ Day

11: All Read, 3:25 pm

15: No School, Martin Luther King, Jr., Birthday

16-19: Abilities Awareness Week

17: Parkway Board of Education Meeting, 7:00 pm, Central Middle

22: Spelling Bee, 2:30 pm, MPR

23: Kindergarten Registration, 7:30 am - 6:00 pm, MPR

     West Middle Parent Orientation, 7:00 pm, West Middle

24: Choice Informational Meeting, 6:00 pm, South High

25: Snow Date for Spelling Bee, 2:30 pm, MPR

     Snow Date for West Middle Parent Orientation, 7:00 pm, West Middle

  PSO Meeting, 7:00 pm, MPR

29: Land of Smiles Dental Presentation, Grades K-3, 2:00 pm, MPR

January 29 - February 2: Stuffed Animal Drive

Reading: This week in reading, we will be wrapping up our Social Issues unit by assessing what students have learned. Students should feel comfortable asking and answering questions like…

• What issue(s) are you starting to notice? Write about what you’re noticing the text seems to be saying about the issue? Use evidence from the text to support your answer.
• How does the character react to certain events, respond to challenges, and grow and change throughout the text?
• How does this story apply to the world around you?

Writing:  This week in writing, we will continue our study of Memoirs.  Students will draft, revise, and edit their final memoir piece. At the end of the week, we will share our pieces as a class. Students can access their piece and work on it at home via Google Drive.

Math: This week in math we will be reviewing and assessing Unit 2: Multiplication and Division. Throughout the unit, students worked to deepen their computational understandings with whole numbers by studying the U.S. algorithm for multiplication and by dividing larger numbers through sense-making strategies based on place value and properties of operations. Students extended their understanding of multiplication and division of whole numbers by performing all four operations on decimals to the hundredths. Our test is tomorrow.

Social Studies: This week in Social Studies, we will learn a little bit about the geography of the United States.

Science: Remember: Students will rotate every Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday for science. Our class is currently studying Mixtures and Solutions with Ms. Epstein.

Have a wonderful winter break!

5C News December 11-15

Fun with Fred Bird at the Bee Healthy Assembly!

Writing Notebook in Google Drive: Do you want to see what your child is working on as a writer in school?! Ask them to use their Parkway email to login to Google Drive. They have a folder titled, 5th Grade Writing, with all of the writing they have produced so far this year!

Country Western Day: Country Western Day is this Friday from 9:20-10:20. You’re welcome to join in on the fun!

Lost and Found: If you thought our Lost and Found items were "lost", they were just relocated! The new location is in the hallway right before the cafe. The coats and jackets are hanging on the hooks and other items are on the table. Please encourage your child to check this location for lost items. As the weather gets colder, it would be great if these items find their original owners.

Science Fair Sign Up: This year, Parkway’s Science Fair will be held at Southwest Middle School on March 2nd -3rd, 2018. The Parkway website has information and resources available at …https://www.parkwayschools.net/Page/3331 Or: Visit www.parkwayschools.net. Click on: Academics and Character, scroll down on the left hand side to Science Fair. We will have a Highcroft Science Fair in order to see who qualifies to move on to the Parkway Science Fair.  Please have all projects ready and bring them to the Highcroft Library on Monday, February 12th. If you would like to participate in the Science Fair, please complete and return the bottom portion of the attached form to the office by Monday, December 18th.  If you are a parent who would like to judge projects at the Parkway Science Fair, please complete the bottom portion of the form and return it to the office as well. When we receive the bottom of this form, we will send home an Science Fair information packet with your child.Please contact one of us if you have any questions.Thank you! Sarah Swanger and Stacy Wright Science Fair Form

December

6: Late Start, School begins at 11:05 am, Cardinals Day - wear Cardinal Red, Parkway Board of Education Meeting, 7:00 pm, Central Middle

11: Last day to drop off gifts for Adopt-A-Family

13: Chorus Concerts at 3:00 pm and 6:30 pm, Highcroft's MPR

14: All Read, 3:25 pm, PSO Meeting, 7:00 pm

15: Country Western Day

21: Winter Parties, 9:45 am, Half Day - school dismisses at 1:05 pm

22 - 31: No School, Winter Break

January

1-3: No School, Winter Break

4: School Resumes

10: Late Start, School begins at 11:05 am, Spirit Day - PJ Day

11: All Read, 3:25 pm

15: No School, Martin Luther King, Jr., Birthday

Reading: This week in reading, we will continue our study of Social Issues.  We will be analyzing the way different authors address and craft similar social issues in both literature and current events.  Please remind your student to come prepared for his/her reading book clubs.  This includes reading the required pages and having talking points on post-its or in his/her journal.  While we read our books, we will practice asking the following questions: Who has power? Who is powerless? How is power maintained? Who maintains it? Whose voice is heard? Whose is missing?

Writing:  This week in writing, we will continue our study of Memoirs.  Our class has taken the time to read mentor memoirs and have determined our seed ideas.  Now we are ready to draft by digging deep into the topics.  This will require selecting personal narratives that can be included in our memoirs as supporting evidence.  Also, we will focus on punctuation and capitalization while editing our work.

Math: This week in math, we will continue to divide decimals.  We will learn what to do when dividing by a decimal and practice determining where to place the decimal in the answer.  Also, we will practice figuring out whether a word problem needs to be solved by multiplication or division.  Please practice multiplication and division (with and without decimals) with your student.  Practice work will be sent home this week to prepare for our next Tuesday, December 19th.

Social Studies: This week we will review our Native American test. It will be going home by the end of the week. Please sign and return to school by Monday, December 18th.

5C News December 3rd - 8th

Thank you Mr. Slaughter from KSDK and Sarah Atkins from the National Weather Service for teaching us about Hurricanes! We're ready to prepare presentations to teach our younger students!

Mr. Slaughter

Helpful Math Websites: Do you want your 5th grader to practice math skills at home in a fun and interactive way?! Here are two websites we use in the classroom that your child knows how to access and utilize to support their thinking and learning as mathematicians!

Prodigy! (will be setting up by winter break)

Greg Tang Math

Writing Notebook in Google Drive: Do you want to see what your child is working on as a writer in school?! Ask them to use their Parkway email to login to Google Drive. They have a folder titled, 5th Grade Writing, with all of the writing they have produced so far this year!

Late Start Wednesday: We have a late start this Wednesday, December 6. School will start 2 hours later than usual and buses will pick up 2 hours later. Late Start Days are designed to allow teachers to collaborate in Professional Learning Communities and commit to helping every child be more successful in school.

Cardinals Day:  Wear Cardinal Red on Wednesday, December 6th

Lost and Found: If you thought our Lost and Found items were "lost", they were just relocated! The new location is in the hallway right before the cafe. The coats and jackets are hanging on the hooks and other items are on the table. Please encourage your child to check this location for lost items. As the weather gets colder, it would be great if these items find their original owners.

Science Fair Sign Up: This year, Parkway’s Science Fair will be held at Southwest Middle School on March 2nd -3rd, 2018. The Parkway website has information and resources available at …https://www.parkwayschools.net/Page/3331 Or: Visit www.parkwayschools.net. Click on: Academics and Character, scroll down on the left hand side to Science Fair. We will have a Highcroft Science Fair in order to see who qualifies to move on to the Parkway Science Fair.  Please have all projects ready and bring them to the Highcroft Library on Monday, February 12th. If you would like to participate in the Science Fair, please complete and return the bottom portion of the attached form to the office by Monday, December 18th.  If you are a parent who would like to judge projects at the Parkway Science Fair, please complete the bottom portion of the form and return it to the office as well. When we receive the bottom of this form, we will send home an Science Fair information packet with your child.Please contact one of us if you have any questions.Thank you! Sarah Swanger and Stacy Wright Science Fair Form

December

6: Late Start, School begins at 11:05 am, Cardinals Day - wear Cardinal Red, Parkway Board of Education Meeting, 7:00 pm, Central Middle

11: Last day to drop off gifts for Adopt-A-Family

13: Chorus Concerts at 3:00 pm and 6:30 pm, Highcroft's MPR

14: All Read, 3:25 pm, PSO Meeting, 7:00 pm

15: Country Western Day

21: Winter Parties, 9:45 am, Half Day - school dismisses at 1:05 pm

22 - 31: No School, Winter Break

January

1-3: No School, Winter Break

4: School Resumes

10: Late Start, School begins at 11:05 am, Spirit Day - PJ Day

11: All Read, 3:25 pm

15: No School, Martin Luther King, Jr., Birthday

Reading: This week in reading, we will continue Unit 3, Social Issues. Students will continue to study issues that exist in the world that authors have woven into their texts. Students will read looking for the problems and injustices that affect not just the character and the reader but entire groups of people in their communities and beyond. Students will notice connections between issues, and comparing and contrasting how different characters deal with problems and what important lessons they can learn about these topics.

Writing:  This week in writing, we will continue Unit 3, From Essay and Narrative to Memoir. Students will continue to use their notebooks to research their lives, collecting both entries and idea-based writing. That is, they will learn that writers write both “big” and “small,” writing about large ideas or theories and then zooming in to write about one time when that idea was true. After a bit of collecting and pondering, children will be ready to select one of these entries as a “seed idea.”

Math: This week in math, we will continue to divide decimals. Students will use mental math, place value patterns, estimation, models, and the standard algorithm to find quotients. Below you will find a few examples of the strategies students will be using as they divide decimals.

Social Studies: This week in Social Studies, we will continue our Native Americans unit. Sorry due to unforeseen circumstances we will be canceling the fashion show for tomorrow. Students will still be presenting their artifacts to the class at a later date. The study guide for the test on Native Americans will come home Monday and need to be completed by Wednesday. Our test is Friday, December 8th.

Science: Remember: Students will rotate every Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday for science. Our class is currently studying Mixtures and Solutions with Ms. Epstein.