Mrs. Hickson's Class

Please find below the note for instrumental music sign up for this year. Students had a meeting with the instrumental teacher today and were given a hard copy of the note also. This note is due with payment on Monday September 9th. Please pay with a check, if at all possible, and please have it made out to Dearborn Public Schools.

As a former band member, I encourage all students to join instrumental music. It a valuable and rewarding experience. Please be aware that I make sure that in my classroom students are NOT missing content area instruction when they are at instrumental class.

Our new instrumental teacher’s name is Mr. Kwiecien. His email is kwiecim@dearbornschools.org

***Students who show up for school tomorrow morning (9/5/19) with their signed planner and the answer to this riddle written on today’s (9/4/19) page will receive a special surprise.

*****Who’s the king of all the school supplies?

 Our PTA meeting was a great success last night and lots of new info was discussed.  We are excited for a new year and also establishing some new rules that will help make things move more smoothly for all of us.  Our families voted to implement our new PTA code of conduct which all members are required to follow.    
  A new requirement for our PTA this year is that all Homeroom Parents have a 2019-2020 paid PTA membership and a current background check.  Due to dealings with cash, payments, donations and access to our tax ID form and our students, our HRP’s must follow the mission and goals of the PTA and be safe for our students.  All HRP memberships must be paid and forms turned in by Monday, September 9th, 2019 to be considered for the HRP role.  All background checks and memberships will be validated with our records.  Our first mandatory meeting will be Friday, September 13th.  You can attend either the am mtg (8:45am) OR pm mtg(3:15pm) in the cafeteria.  More details to follow on the mtg.  

Room 205 still needs Room Parents. This is a very important job in fifth grade as we have many special activities.

Please be sure you have subscribed to my blog and Remind account.  For instructions click on class info.

Open House is September 12th from 6:00 – 7:30 pm. Please join us for this special night. I look forward to meeting all of you.

We will be taking the Reading and Language NWEA this week. We will take the Math NWEA next week.

We will begin the DRA reading assessment this week.  This assessment involves a fluency assessment read aloud with the teacher and a written portion to assess comprehension.

Students are allowed to bring in birthday treats.  The treats should be easy to serve to individuals for example cupcakes instead of a cake and juice boxes or water bottles instead of cups and large bottles. We have 28 students in our class. Per school guidelines, our celebrations will take place at 3:10.

Remember that on any given day your fifth grader should be able to tell you what we did in school. The planner is a good reminder for them to help with this narrative. Sharing what they have learned each day is an excellent way to help students review.
The planner should be signed by a parent or guardian every day.

Homework might not always be a worksheet!!!!!
**Students should be working on multiplication facts every night.
**They should be working on Spelling City 10-15 minutes per night Monday – Thursday.
**Students should be reading 30 minutes each night. Their comprehension can be checked using the question sheet given to students.
**Moby Max or Khan Academy- at least 20 minutes should be done each night.
**Students can use Ducksters, History.com, and Ben’s Guide to the Government to review social studies and/or science topics covered in class.
**Students will have assignments which need to be completed on Readworks.
**Content binders should come home every night so students can study and review that day’s lessons.
Math, social studies and science material in the binder should be studied each night to prepare for upcoming tests.

Math

 We are beginning Module 1 on Tuesday Sept. 3rd.

In Module 1, students’ understandings of the patterns in the base ten system are extended from Grade 4’s work with place value to include decimals to the thousandths place.  In Grade 5, students deepen their knowledge through a more generalized understanding of the relationships between and among adjacent places on the place value chart, e.g., 1 tenth times any digit on the place value chart moves the digit one place value to the right (5.NBT.A.1). Toward the module’s end, students apply these new understandings as they reason about and perform decimal operations through the hundredths place.

Social Studies-

Unit 1: Our Government

Test Date September 19th.

This unit provides students with an opportunity to review essential civics and government concepts learned in previous grades. It also establishes a common foundation that sets the stage for deeper discussions about government throughout the year as students explore the question: Why is the federal government organized to give and to limit power? Students begin by examining what life would be like in the absence of government and hypothesize about the reasons people form governments. Next, students review core democratic values and principles upon which our government is based and investigate how they are rooted in the organization of the federal government. In doing so, concepts such as limited government, popular sovereignty, rule of law, and individual rights are stressed. Students analyze and explain how the Preamble to the Constitution reflects the purposes of government and explore other parts of the Constitution for evidence of federalism, limited government, and individual rights. In learning about federalism, students compare the powers delegated to the federal government and those reserved to the states (or the people). Contemporary examples of government in action are used throughout the unit. Moreover, this unit provides teachers with the opportunity to connect classroom rules with ideas about government, including why people form governments, what happens without rules or laws, and the importance of the rule of law. Finally, this unit allows for a seamless connection to Constitution Day, which is required by federal law.

Science-

In this unit on matter, students will be involved in activities that hone the following skills:

Develop a model to describe that matter is made of particles too small to be seen.

Measure and graph quantities to provide evidence that regardless of the type of change that occurs when heating, cooling, or mixing substances, the total weight of matter is conserved.

Make observations and measurements to identify materials based on their properties.

Conduct an investigation to determine whether the mixing of two or more substances results in new substances.

Writing–

The Common Core State Standards require Fifth grade students to write narratives in which they orient their reader by establishing a situation and introducing a narrator or characters with the event sequence unfolding naturally. Additionally, students are expected to use details including dialogue, descriptions of actions, thoughts, and feelings, use temporal words and phrases to signal event order, and provide a sense of closure. The goal of this unit is for students to write personal narrative stories that elaborate the tension or problem and focus upon an important message or heart of the story. Students will immerse themselves in age-appropriate personal narrative mentors to discern how these texts tend to go and to gather possible story ideas from turning points within their life experiences. They will draw on everything they’ve learned from writing small moment stories from Kindergarten- second grade, as well as personal narrative writing in third grade and fourth grades. Additionally, students revisit qualities of good writing and craft to write personal narratives. They will select their best work to revise, edit, and publish.

Reading-

We have begun the implementation and organization of our Daily 5 routine.

Lessons will emphasize students’ ability to identify key ideas and themes in a text, whether in print, graphic, quantitative or mixed media formats.

The focus is on reading to understand, during which students focus on what the text says.  The premise is that students cannot delve into the deeper meaning of any text if they cannot first grasp the surface meaning.  Beyond merely identifying ideas, students also see how ideas and events connect and evolve over the course of a text.

Grammar – We will review the parts of speech. We are starting with nouns.

Spelling – Please see Spelling City for the current spelling list and activities.  Click on the Spelling City in the links list on this page.  There is no list this week.

Please click on the link below to view the District Safety Zone Letter

file:///C:/Users/hicksol/Downloads/Signed-School-Zone-Safety-Letters-2019-3%20(1).pdf

Welcome students,

If you are reading this you are probably one of the students in my class this year! If you are an adult reading this alone please go get your student so they can read my blog with you! This blog will be addressed to the students, for the most part, all year.  It will be expected that students will check the blog on a daily basis during the school year.  Please subscribe to this blog by typing your email in the subscribe box.

PARENTS-I subscribe to Remind. This is a service which delivers short messages to you through texts. Please subscribe to Remind and my blog. I use both as important communication tools for my class. To subscribe to my Remind you will need to text @gc46c3 to 81010 or 313-908-5518. Here is a link if you wish to join that way https://www.remind.com/join/gc46c3.  I cannot receive messages through Remind. Please email me if you need to speak to me at hicksol@dearbornschools.org I promise to respond within 24 hours of receiving your email at school.

I am very excited about the upcoming school year! We will have a learning community of fifth graders! It should be a terrific year!

The first day of school is Monday August 26th. School begins at 8:35 and ends at 11:45. Students will line up on the upper elementary black top. I will meet you there at 8:35. I can’t wait to begin our fifth grade adventure together!!

*The usual pencils, pens, and highlighters. You will use black, blue, and red pens this year.

*A small personal pencil sharpener. It saves time and I think sometimes that the sharpener in my room has a pencil eating troll living in it. 😀

*Loose leaf paper. Wide-ruled is probably best. It gives you more room to write neatly and besides…I have older eyes than you.

*You will need a couple of folders. I have plain ones, but if you want folders with Frozen, Star Wars (YAY), One Direction or something else on them you will need to go shopping.

*You will use three binders this year to stay organized. They should all be 1″ binders so they fit in your desk easily. One should be white and will be used for your Leadership Binder. You probably already have one from last year. The second one will be used for literacy. The third one will be used for the content areas (Math, Science, and SS.) I do not care what these two binders have on them…kittens, Red Wings, Star Wars (YAY again)…whatever. They can be soft side or hard side.  Then soft side binders will fit in your disks more easily.

*You will need a couple of packs of dividers to be used inside each binder.

***We will be organizing our binders on Thursday August 29th. Please be sure you have these items on or before that day.

*You also will be using crayons, markers, and colored pencils throughout the year. I have some, but if you want the crayons with names like Sunglow and Pink Carnation you will need to buy a big box.

*Dry erase markers are a must!! They don’t have to be fancy colors. Also, if you want to erase with something other than the baby socks I buy at the dollar store that I have you will need to bring that in too.

*We also always need lots of classroom size boxes of facial tissue and classroom size bottles of hand sanitizer.

*Headphones for the computer…we will be doing a lot of computer work this year. These do not have to be the most expensive ones.  (But I guess that’s up to your parents.)

***Please note that we WILL be having time for a snack on the first day. Your snacks need to be healthy ones such as fruit, veggies, cheese & crackers etc. Please don’t bring in cookies, candy, pop, chips or other junk food for snacks. This is the rule for snacks for the whole year. Also, please avoid bringing nuts on the first day. I don’t know yet if this will need to be a rule for the year or just the first few days. I will let you know as soon as I find out. I do not keep a supply of snacks in my room for the class. If you want a snack, you will need to bring one with you.

Dearborn Public Schools Student Code of Conduct
To the right is a link so you may read the Code of Conduct for the Dearborn Public Schools. There will not be a hard copy of this passed out to fifth graders unless they are new to the school district.

We follow the Lindbergh School Expectations in our classroom and throughout the school. We use PBiS at Lindbergh which involves monthly rewards for students who do not move their clips. Moving clips happens when a student chooses not to follow our Lindbergh School expectations for behavior. If your student has a clip move, there will be a note in their planner from me. Please sign it so I know you are aware of the clip move.

Student behavior at school is used to determine which students will be able to take part in 5th grade trips and activities.

Safeties
*****

*Morning corner safety patrol-

please report to the cafe at 8:20 am on 8/26/19.

*Bus safety patrol-

please report to your bus stop at your usual time.

*Afternoon corner safety patrol- 

meet at room 205 at 11:35 on 8/26/19.

I can’t wait to see all of you on Monday August 26th!!! This is going to be a great year!!!! I am very excited and I hope all of you are too!!!!!*************

*Morning corner safety patrol-

 please report to the cafe at 8:20 am on 8/26/19.

*Bus safety patrol-

please report to your bus stop at your usual time.

*Afternoon corner safety patrol- 

meet at room 205 at 3:25 on 8/26/19.

Don’t forget about tomorrow’s pool party!  Students need to bring their swim suit, a towel, all sports equipment they may  want to have while at the park, sunscreen, and a beverage.

Parent drivers need to be at school between 9:15 and 9:30.  Please report to the office to fill out necessary paper work.  Students will begin be driven to the park around 10:00.