Quail Run Elementary School - 5th Grade Curriculum News

5th Grade Curriculum News

5TH GRADE CURRICULUM NEWS

Reading Workshop - As we begin the school year, we are working on assessing the students to determine their Guided Reading Levels and fluency levels at the start of their 5th grade year.

Once assessments are completed, we will begin Fiction Book Clubs where we will be diving deeper in our understanding of fiction reading by looking at Author's Message / Theme. We will look at Author's Craft by analyzing the techniques and goals these authors have used in their stories. We will also study characters more in depth, and form opinions which we can back with evidence from our books during discussions. Students will have discussions and grow their thinking about the books chosen by their book clubs.

Students will "Stop and Jot" their thinking, and will work on being more in depth with their writing about reading. Development of thoughts and ideas with examples and evidence will be the focus.

Writing Workshop - We will soon begin our writer's workshop lessons, starting the year off with a personal narrative. Students will work on developing leads, expanding details and bring their readers into their story, as well as fine tuning conclusions. Students will continue to work on editing skills such as: 1.) Rereading work word-by-word 2.) Checking for complete sentences 3.) Capitalization 4.) Punctuation 5.) Verb-Subject agreement (i.e. I am running; They are running) 6.) Spelling 7.) Common mistaken words (i.e. two, to, too; they're, their, there) 8.) Paragraphing, and 9) improving word choice to better description.

Math - Eureka Math is our district adoption. The school year is starting off with assessments to determine students' needs and recall from previous years, to help us guide our instruction.

Here are Module Parent Tip Sheets and Math videos for each lesson of every Module.

Symbaloo

Science -- Science Labs are twice a week for each 5th Grade class. In the first part of Semester 1, September and October, we are studying about Physical Science. We will learn about the properties of matter, mixtures, solutions, compounds, chemical reactions, artificial materials, states of matter, and how to model the states of matter.

Here is the NGSS Life Science Page. We recently finished studying Physical Science about atoms, elements, and physical and chemical changes.

We will be emphasizing the new Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) which include an engineering aspect to teaching science. The Engineering portion of the standards will be taught within the Science Lab. The curriculum standards "Core Ideas" will be taught by the homeroom teacher.

Social Studies - In the first half of Semester 1 we are learning about early North America, first peoples, and then move into European explorers of the "New World".

We will be emphasizing the newly adopted Social Studies state standards.

P.E. - It is important to wear appropriate close-toed shoes each day so students may be prepared to run around. 5th Grade as a whole will run a mile once a week. Please help your students remember to be ready to run and to drink plenty of water each day.

It is important that students not only learn all of the academics in school, but students must also practice good eating habits and have plenty of physical activity each day as well, to ensure a happy and healthy life.