|
|
|
August
24, 2010 Smiling
faces greeted me as my students entered the classroom ready to face their
second day of the fifth grade (smiles are always a good sign for a teacher).
I was pleasantly surprised when Jacob H. handed me a freshly picked tomato.
I love tomatoes and can’t wait to eat it later on today. After completing our ADD books and reviewing some math rules the students worked on today's Self-start and then we corrected it. Today Mystery State hint is...The explorer John C. Fremont helped obtain this land for the United States. A few of the students said that they already know what the Mystery State is. While we were working on our Self-start page, the music teachers came and explained the music program this year. Some of the music instruments they can learn are flute, clarinet, trumpet, trombone, baritone, tuba, violin, viola, cello, and percussion. The students were very excited to go home and talk to their parents about what instrument to learn. Those students who come back with their music form completed will go to music on Thursday morning. Once we were finished with our self-start page, we took a Fluency Maze Assessment test. I explained to the students that this test was not going on their grade, but would help me know where they were in reading. Once the reading fluency assessment was out of the way, I passed out the 50 state and capital study guide and USA Weekly Newspapers. Each student received 9 weeks of newspapers. They will keep them in their Social Studies folder. They were very excited to have their own newspapers. The students took turns reading the newspaper using the microphone. It is great to be able to hear everyone's voice clearly. We learned about U.S. Geography. Did you know that the North American continent is the third largest in the world and is about 9,355,000 square miles? Wow that is big! The students were assigned to unscramble 12 words on a world map. When morning recess time arrived, we were all excited to have a break. I had recess duty so I was able to go outside and enjoy the fresh air and watch the student talk and play games. After recess, the students had time to complete their USA Weekly assignment. Then we corrected yesterday's math assignment. The students did very well. I was proud of all of them. Today's assignment was simple multiplication and division. Lunch was next. The students went down to the lunchroom, ate lunch, chatted with classmates, and went outside to play. After lunch started with Lesson One on Heredity. We discussed that a trait is a characteristic that determines how an organism looks, acts or functions. We also learned an inherited trait is a characteristic passed from parents to their young. The students wroted 15 traits that they have such as hair color, shape of eyes, nose, and mouth, tall, short and etc. We also talked about traits we inherit from our parents. The students had fun drawing a father and mother cat and their five kittens. The drawing showed traits the kittens received from each of their parents. We also went over the Heredity vocabulary words. I told the students that the test for vocabulary words will be September 9th. I showed them where they could download flashcards on our website to load onto an iPod, Zune, DS, or computer. What a fun way to study! Following afternoon recess, the students continued working on their Heredity unit. Many of the students really got into drawing the kittens with traits from their father and mother. I can't wait to see them tomorrow. While they were working on their heredity packets, I continued reading Nightmare Mountain. The students were trilled to listen to the story as they worked. It is getting very exciting! We ended the story with Molly and Glendon being covered up with an avalance. Oh no! Will they survive? Many groans came form the class when I had to stop reading for the day. At
3:10, we cleaned the room and the students got their backpacks ready to
go home. The bell rang at 3:20. The second day of school has come to an
end. Two days down, 178 to go! |