Ms. Reid's Class

Welcome back!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving break! We have a short but busy 3 weeks to finish up this 2nd 9 weeks of school before our next vacation. Here are the highlights for the upcoming week:

On Wednesday morning the chorus students will be performing their Holiday program for the school. I know they have worked hard and I look forward to hearing them sing!

The school Spelling Bee is on Friday morning. We have a class full of excellent spellers, but the winners of our class spelling bee were Vera and Meredith. We all wish them the best of luck on Friday.

Math: All classes will continue to study adding and subtracting with fractions and mixed numbers. We will also learn about different types of graphs to use for data including bar graphs, line graphs, and circle graphs.

Social Studies:  We are still studying life on the Great Plains after the Civil War in chapter 7 of the textbook. This week we will learn about cowboys and cattle drives.

Science:  Our class will now go to Ms. Horton to begin a unit about the Earth's constructive and destructive forces including plate tectonics, earthquakes, volcanoes, and erosion.

Language Arts: Reading and writing lessons will continue to focus on informational text. We will also review and learn about different types of figurative language (similes, metaphors, personification, and onomatopoeia).

Our spelling words will be Words Their Way unit 7 with a word quiz on Friday.

**The mandatory book report is due on Monday, 12/7.*

Have a great week!

Week of November 16

It's hard to believe that the holiday season is already upon us! I hope everyone has some time to relax during the Thanksgiving break. I am looking forward to a trip to visit my family in south Georgia.

Here is a brief outline of what we will be doing in class this week:

Social Studies:  We are beginning a new unit in Social Studies which focuses on our nation's growth in the late 1800's. Topics include immigration, the Transcontinental Railroad, new inventions, and life on the Great Plains. We will start chapter 7 this week and continue after Thanksgiving break.

Math:  All math classes will begin to study adding and subtracting fractions with like and unlike denominators. Working with fractions requires a lot of practice so please check with your child to make sure they are doing the homework!

Language Arts:  Reading progress reports will come home on Monday. Please sign and return them on Tuesday. I also sent home the book report information with students on Friday. This time they will pretend to interview a character from a fiction book. I hope it will give them a chance to be creative!

We are continuing to work on informational (nonfiction) reading and writing. Ms. Doherty will teach our writing lab on Monday.

I will be reviewing parts of speech this week and will teach the students about adverbs. On Friday we will have a short parts-of-speech review for a classwork grade.

Science:  The students did a great job on their cell projects last week! Mr. Glass and I were both impressed by their creativity and hard work. Please check your child's agenda for test information. The student will take science end-of unit tests on Friday. It will be at the end of the day so please do not check students out early that day unless it is an emergency! They will probably need the entire class period to finish the test.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving! :)

Character Education winner for Citizenship

Congratulations to Zack S. for being our character education winner for citizenship this month! Zack is a responsible member of the Kincaid Safety Patrol as well as one of our class representatives on Student Council. Thank you Zack!

2nd 9 weeks Book Report Information

Download Book Report interview

Thanksgiving Lunch

Please note that our special Thanksgiving lunch will be on Wednesday, November 18th. On that day our class will eat lunch from 11:41 - 12:11. We will have 3 tables so there will be room for everyone!

Week of November 9

We have another full week coming up! Wednesday is Veteran's Day and Mr. Henry Landers will give his presentation to all the grade levels that day. This is an important day for all of us to take the time to remember the brave men and women who have served our country.

Before outlining our other activities for the week, I would like to take a moment to thank some families for sending goodies in for our class. Thank you to the Mannelly, Simpkins, and Alavi families for the wonderful Fall treats! We all enjoyed them! I would also like to thank the Starkers for sending in snacks to replenish our snack basket. They sold like hot cakes to those hungry 5th graders! :)

Here is a brief outline of this week's plans:

Math:  All classes continue to study fractions. Right now we are learning how to find a common denominator in order to compare and order fractions. This is an important skill that students will continue using as we move on to adding and subtracting with fractions next! Those students who are in my math class will have a quiz on Friday on improper fractions, mixed numbers, and comparing/ordering fractions.

Language Arts:  I will be returning the graded narrative essays on Monday to be signed and returned. I was very impressed by the descriptive language and creativity in all of their writing! We will continue working on informational writing strategies this week.

Students will study Unit 6 of Words Their Way with a word quiz on Friday. We will also have our class spelling bee on Thursday afternoon. Two students from each 4th and 5th grade class will participate in the school spelling bee on December 4th.

Grammar lessons will continue to focus on verbs, helping verbs and verb tense. We will have a quiz on verbs Thursday.

Reading lessons will focus on distinguishing fact from opinion and locating information in non-fiction text.

I will be sending home reading progress reports very soon! Please check in with your child to be sure they are making progress toward completing 5 books during this 9-week grading period. I will send home details on the mandatory book report toward the end of this week.

Social Studies:  We will finish our study of Reconstruction with an open-book quiz in class on Tuesday. Later this week we will begin studying the growth of our nation after the Civil War.

Science: Mr. Glass gave the students a cell project to work on this week. Encourage them to be creative and put forth their best effort!

I'm looking forward to a great week!

Week of November 2

I hope everyone enjoyed the weekend! Here are a few highlights and reminders for this week:

Student Holiday on Tuesday

Math: We will continue to study fractions. Our focus now is on renaming improper fractions and mixed numbers.

Language Arts: I am working on grades for the narrative essay the students wrote for their post-test last week. We will write our first informational essay as a pre-test on Monday.

Later this week we will learn about helping verbs and using "strong" verbs in writing. On Thursday ask your child about the "Helping Verb" song!

To practice reading comprehension I will give two assignments on Skillstutor on Monday to be completed by Wednesday. Both are non-fiction stories about Frederick Douglass and incorporate a variety of reading skills and strategies. We will also practice comprehension skills in class with an article about Reconstruction after the Civil War.

Please check in with your child to see that they are making progress on the reading requirements for this 9 weeks! I will be sending home progress reports soon.

Social Studies: I was very pleased with the grades on our Civil War test last week! We watched an interesting video about Abraham Lincoln's life on Friday. We will spend this week learning about Reconstruction.

Science: Our class will learn about cells with Mr. Glass for 3 more weeks. After Thanksgiving break the students will go to Ms. Horton to learn about the Earth's constructive and destructive forces.

T-shirt orders: Please send your orders in as soon as possible so that students can get their shirts in time for the Holiday party in December.

Have a great week! :)

Online Textbook Access

We have finally been able to access all 3 textbooks online! I gave each student a copy of the website information today for their binders, but I have also put a page link here on the blog so that you could download it yourself. Please let me know if you experience any problems! :)

Week of October 26

I hope everyone had a relaxing weekend! Here are the highlights for our upcoming week.

Math:  We divided into new math classes last week and the students began switching classes on Thursday. All the classes are beginning by studying equivalent fractions and simplifying fractions.

Language Arts: Our focus will continue to be on writing this week. The students wrote a practice narrative essay last week on a memorable moment they have had in the past year. I am very impressed by the great writing they turned in! I will be getting those back to them with comments early in the week. We will have our post-test on narrative writing in class on Thursday.

In reading we will continue to work on the reading skills of cause and effect and questioning strategies with some reading comprehension activities. Thank you for signing the home reading logs every week! Please remind students to fill this out as they do their reading instead of waiting until Thursday night.

For spelling we will begin Unit 5 in Words Their Way with a word quiz on Friday.

Social Studies: I will be sending home a study guide on Monday covering the first three sections of Chapter 6 on the Civil War. We will review on both Tuesday and Wednesday and have a quiz Thursday. On Friday we will begin studying Reconstruction.

Science: I am hearing great things about science with Mr. Glass! The students will continue to learn about cells in science.

Donations needed: Any donations of snacks would be appreciated! Our basket is almost empty.

Have a great week and enjoy this beautiful fall weather!

 

Character Education Winner for Responsibility

I am happy to recognize Jacob H. as our character education winner for responsibility. Jacob is a responsible member of Safety Patrol and a motivated student who has a positive attitude toward school. Congratulations Jacob!