Important Dates
Nov. 26-27 No School
Are you snow ready?
Colder temperatures are here and snow is coming. We continue to go outside each day for recess (unless it is raining or unless the temps are below zero) so your child should dress appropriately for the weather. Once we have snow on the ground- students will follow these guidelines:
-without snow boots, students will remain on shoveled sidewalks only
-snow boots are not to be worn all day long; students must bring other shoes to wear
during the day while inside (likewise, snow boots are not fashion boots)
-if a student wants to play in the snow (make snow men, go down the slide, etc.), they must have on both snow pants and snow boots
Celebrate History Writing Contest
The local chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution is sponsoring the annual Celebrate History Essay Writing Contest. One winning essay from this area will advance to the state level. Local winner will receive a certificate and a medal.
This year’s topic: “March 22, 2015 marked the 250th anniversary of the Stamp Act. Passed by the British Parliament in 1765, this new tax required all colonists to pay a tax on every printed piece of paper they used. The Stamp Act was viewed by the colonists as “taxation without representation.” Describe a colonial family’s discussion about the new Stamp Act and what role it played in organizing the colonists against the British King and Parliament.”
Requirements: Grade 5: 300-600 words/Grades 6-8: 600-1,000 words. Essays must be typed and include a bibliography of sources used. Deadline for the essay to be submitted to Mrs. Nowack is January 7, 2016.
The Old Creamery Theater 2016 Writing Contest
Each year students are encouraged to participate in the Old Creamery Theatre writing contest. Students are invited to write a creative, original story about a character or characters that learn a lesson involving one or more of the Six Pillars (Trustworthiness, Respect, Responsibility, Fairness, Caring, and Citizenship). The selected winners will receive gift cards up to $100 and become the basis for Character Chronicles, a show that will be seen by tens of thousands of students all over Iowa (including Decorah Community Schools). Please visit the following website for requirements, story writing tips, and information about how to enter the contest. All entries must be postmarked or emailed no later than January 15, 2016.
Tech Tip of the Week
DMS now has a safe reporting online form. Students have been trained on how to use this. The form can be found on the DMS web site (and can also be found on the 5th grade symbaloo page: http://dms5.weebly.com/symbaloo.html
NEWS FLASH!!
From Mr. Peterson: In science we have been looking at physical and chemical changes in matter and a fundamental “law” of science: conservation of matter. In reading, we have been studying the nonfiction website, Wonderopolis, as a way for us to read more nonfiction text and practice pulling main ideas and details from text. In writing we are beginning a research project modeled on the work we are doing in our Wonderopolis study in reading.
From Mrs. Nowack: Thank you to all who were able to complete the shadow activity last weekend; we’ll wrap that up on Monday, so there’s still time to complete it if you haven’t already! Please continue to have your child make observations of the moon (and document this on their calendars). This week’s learning in science class focused on the planets (we created a model to show both the size of the planets as well as the distances each planet is from the sun), movements in space (rotation, revolution, orbit), what causes day and night, what causes seasons, and time zones! Whew; it was a fun week! In reading class, we started new guided reading groups- students are reading historical fiction novels. With these novels, we will focus on comprehension, understanding vocabulary, and a few literary devices. You should see your child reading about 20-30 min/night (their IR book and Keynote presentation should be done no later than November 24th). This week in language class, we have taken identifying main idea and supporting details to the next step of summarizing. This is a still we will continue to work on throughout the year.
From Mrs. Suhr:
Social Studies Alive! books are due to be returned!!!! - In Mrs. Suhr’s social studies classes, we have a classroom set of textbooks. These books are allowed to be checked out when students need to finish homework at home. All of my extra texts have been checked out, and there are none left to be checked out by other students. Please check at home to see if your child has one of these texts and send it back to school. Thanks in advance!
Social Studies - We will test on chapter 5: Routes of Exploration to the New World on Wed., Nov. 25.
Language - Students will need to have their Memoir drafts ready for typing on Monday.
I will be sharing information about the Old Creamery Theatre writing in class next week.
From Mrs. Halweg: This week we reviewed the skills we learned during the first two math units this school year. If your student received a 1 or 2 on their rubric, they met with me in a small group to review and practice these skills. They then completed a mini assessment to demonstrate their understanding of the concepts. We will continue this next week with units 3 and 4.
From Mr. Kelley:
Reading and Language - Students finished their first large informational writing piece mimicking the style used in Wonderopolis.org. In reading we had several collaborative activities in which students worked to identify main ideas within informational text articles. At the end of the week students took a quiz over finding the main idea and writing a summary.
Social Studies - This week we began studying the early English settlements of Roanoke, Jamestown, and Plymouth. We discussed how the pilgrims wanted to separate from the Church of England. Also, we are reading a book about the Mayflower Compact. Next week we will be taking a virtual tour of Plimoth Plantation as we discuss the first thanksgiving - see link here.
Nov. 26-27 No School
Are you snow ready?
Colder temperatures are here and snow is coming. We continue to go outside each day for recess (unless it is raining or unless the temps are below zero) so your child should dress appropriately for the weather. Once we have snow on the ground- students will follow these guidelines:
-without snow boots, students will remain on shoveled sidewalks only
-snow boots are not to be worn all day long; students must bring other shoes to wear
during the day while inside (likewise, snow boots are not fashion boots)
-if a student wants to play in the snow (make snow men, go down the slide, etc.), they must have on both snow pants and snow boots
Celebrate History Writing Contest
The local chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution is sponsoring the annual Celebrate History Essay Writing Contest. One winning essay from this area will advance to the state level. Local winner will receive a certificate and a medal.
This year’s topic: “March 22, 2015 marked the 250th anniversary of the Stamp Act. Passed by the British Parliament in 1765, this new tax required all colonists to pay a tax on every printed piece of paper they used. The Stamp Act was viewed by the colonists as “taxation without representation.” Describe a colonial family’s discussion about the new Stamp Act and what role it played in organizing the colonists against the British King and Parliament.”
Requirements: Grade 5: 300-600 words/Grades 6-8: 600-1,000 words. Essays must be typed and include a bibliography of sources used. Deadline for the essay to be submitted to Mrs. Nowack is January 7, 2016.
The Old Creamery Theater 2016 Writing Contest
Each year students are encouraged to participate in the Old Creamery Theatre writing contest. Students are invited to write a creative, original story about a character or characters that learn a lesson involving one or more of the Six Pillars (Trustworthiness, Respect, Responsibility, Fairness, Caring, and Citizenship). The selected winners will receive gift cards up to $100 and become the basis for Character Chronicles, a show that will be seen by tens of thousands of students all over Iowa (including Decorah Community Schools). Please visit the following website for requirements, story writing tips, and information about how to enter the contest. All entries must be postmarked or emailed no later than January 15, 2016.
Tech Tip of the Week
DMS now has a safe reporting online form. Students have been trained on how to use this. The form can be found on the DMS web site (and can also be found on the 5th grade symbaloo page: http://dms5.weebly.com/symbaloo.html
NEWS FLASH!!
From Mr. Peterson: In science we have been looking at physical and chemical changes in matter and a fundamental “law” of science: conservation of matter. In reading, we have been studying the nonfiction website, Wonderopolis, as a way for us to read more nonfiction text and practice pulling main ideas and details from text. In writing we are beginning a research project modeled on the work we are doing in our Wonderopolis study in reading.
From Mrs. Nowack: Thank you to all who were able to complete the shadow activity last weekend; we’ll wrap that up on Monday, so there’s still time to complete it if you haven’t already! Please continue to have your child make observations of the moon (and document this on their calendars). This week’s learning in science class focused on the planets (we created a model to show both the size of the planets as well as the distances each planet is from the sun), movements in space (rotation, revolution, orbit), what causes day and night, what causes seasons, and time zones! Whew; it was a fun week! In reading class, we started new guided reading groups- students are reading historical fiction novels. With these novels, we will focus on comprehension, understanding vocabulary, and a few literary devices. You should see your child reading about 20-30 min/night (their IR book and Keynote presentation should be done no later than November 24th). This week in language class, we have taken identifying main idea and supporting details to the next step of summarizing. This is a still we will continue to work on throughout the year.
From Mrs. Suhr:
Social Studies Alive! books are due to be returned!!!! - In Mrs. Suhr’s social studies classes, we have a classroom set of textbooks. These books are allowed to be checked out when students need to finish homework at home. All of my extra texts have been checked out, and there are none left to be checked out by other students. Please check at home to see if your child has one of these texts and send it back to school. Thanks in advance!
Social Studies - We will test on chapter 5: Routes of Exploration to the New World on Wed., Nov. 25.
Language - Students will need to have their Memoir drafts ready for typing on Monday.
I will be sharing information about the Old Creamery Theatre writing in class next week.
From Mrs. Halweg: This week we reviewed the skills we learned during the first two math units this school year. If your student received a 1 or 2 on their rubric, they met with me in a small group to review and practice these skills. They then completed a mini assessment to demonstrate their understanding of the concepts. We will continue this next week with units 3 and 4.
From Mr. Kelley:
Reading and Language - Students finished their first large informational writing piece mimicking the style used in Wonderopolis.org. In reading we had several collaborative activities in which students worked to identify main ideas within informational text articles. At the end of the week students took a quiz over finding the main idea and writing a summary.
Social Studies - This week we began studying the early English settlements of Roanoke, Jamestown, and Plymouth. We discussed how the pilgrims wanted to separate from the Church of England. Also, we are reading a book about the Mayflower Compact. Next week we will be taking a virtual tour of Plimoth Plantation as we discuss the first thanksgiving - see link here.