Hello Everyone,

I hope everyone had a great weekend and was able to enjoy the first snowfall of the year. We have a short week this week with the break so we will not have spelling this week.

For the Thanksgiving Feast, please make sure you have the food you signed up to donate, at the school before 12:45. We will be eating at 1:00 so warm food should be brought in around 12:45. We will not have kitchen access so everything must be prepared.

Math-This week we are finishing unit 3 and will have our unit test tomorrow morning.

Spelling-We are reviewing previous spelling patterns

Reading-Students are continuing to work on their reading strategies and will be presenting their book report posters to the class.

Science-Students are collaborating through Google Docs with the class on developing information which will be used to publish solar system books.

Social Studies-We are having our Pilgrim and Native American feast.

Our monthly PBIS celebration is on Tuesday and students will be encouraged to bring board games from home, with their names on them. They will have an one hour board game celebration with the 4th and 5th graders who also met the 80% positive points on Class Dojo.

Homework over break. Students will be bringing home new requirements for the nightly reading homework assignment and we highly encourage all students to practice Mobymax Reading, Math and Vocabulary daily over break.

Have a great week and a Happy Thanksgiving!

Hello Everyone,
Thank you for all of the responses so far for the Thanksgiving Feast, next week. I wanted to send an update for what we still need. We need mashed potatoes, gravy and stuffing still. If you would like to send in one of these items next week, please comment on this post with what you would like to bring so we can see what has been donated already.

Thank you and have a great weekend!

Good afternoon everyone!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful start to their week. In the next two weeks we have lots happening. Tomorrow is picture retake day. We also have Nowlin/Blue shirt day for spirit week. Tomorrow is our first chess club meeting at 8:00 in room 26. We also need Thanksgiving Feast permission slips and the $2.00 turkey fee cost turned in before the end of the week. If you plan on donating a food item, it must be brought up to the school on the day of the feast, before 1:00 and it needs to be ready to serve. We will not be able to cook/warm any food at school unfortunately.  We are holding a school wide canned food collection for Gleaner’s Food Bank so please send in any canned food or non-perishable items you can spare. Every donation goes to a family in need.

Here is our week:

Spelling- We are working on oi, oy, ow and ou chunks. Our spelling words are fountain, invoice, announcement, empower, voyage, congruent, parallel, perpendicular, intersecting, and Mayflower.

Science-We are starting our second unit-Exploring Planets, Stars and Space!

Math-Students are still working on geometry and learning how to sort polygons based upon different characteristics.

Writing-Students are writing compare and contrast pieces. They are comparing the first Thanksgiving to our current Thanksgiving.

Good Morning everyone,

I wanted to send out a reminder that tonight is the first night of Parent/ Teacher/ Student conferences. Please have your child come with you to conferences as we are following the student led format. I look forward to meeting with everyone.

Secondly, I wanted to let you know that students have a book report project that is due Next Friday. They have been working on filling out an information sheet about their book this week and the sheets will come home tonight. They are creating a movie poster to highlight the features of their books. All of the requirements are on their sheets. If you are unable to get poster board, please let me know and I will send home a large sheet of paper.

Have a great day!

Mr. Hawkins

Hello Everyone,

Today there are a few information sheets coming home on our 5th grade Thanksgiving Celebration Dinner, a Lansing field trip and Empty Bowls. Please review this information and send back the Lansing survey tomorrow so we have an idea of whether to try to run the field trip or not.

This week:

Spelling: We are looking at the vowel-consonant-vowel pattern. Our spelling words are demonstrate, vanishing, prevent, heritage, teachable, solar, system, colonization, government and migration.

Math-We have started Unit 3-Geometry and we are working on classifying shapes.

Writing-Students are working on the planning and drafting stage of an informational piece on Thanksgiving.

Reading-Students should have finished reading their book club books and will be creating movie posters for the books. They will each be creating a poster that gives enough details about the book to make someone want to read it, without giving away any spoilers.

Science-We are beginning our unit on the planets and solar system. This unit will take us through January.

Have a great week!

Good Morning!

I hope everyone had a safe and fun Halloween weekend!

A few quick reminders-

Candle Sale sheets and money for camp are due Wednesday morning.

Chess club money and permission slips are due back by Thursday.

Students have no school tomorrow.

This week:

Spelling- Students will learn about homophones and our spelling words are witch, which, whether, weather, through, threw, slave, plantation, velocity, reference. Even with no school tomorrow, students are still responsible for their spelling sentence homework on Tuesday.

Math- We are beginning unit 3-Geometry.

Science-We are finishing forces and motion and will be taking our test towards the end of the week. Watch for the review sheet to come home.

Social Studies-Students are learning more about the colonies.

Writing-We are starting informational writing and students are publishing their opinion pieces.

Reading-Students are finishing their book club books this week and will be getting their next assignment.

Have a great week!

Hello Everyone,

I hope everyone is having a wonderful week. I want to say thank you to everyone who has sent in or pledge an item for our Mad Scientist Halloween Extravaganza. The students are really going to enjoy the activities that are planned. I wanted to send home a quick note about a really easy way to have the students get extra practice in almost any subject. Mobymax.com is a website that is used by the district that requires a login. Each student knows their login and password. Once they log in, they click on a subject and the program has them pick up where they left off. The practice is individually leveled and increases as the student practices and has success. If you do not have computer or internet access at home for practice and would like your student to get extra practice time, please let me know and we can arrange for a before or after school practice session. Ask your student to login in and show you how it works. They are free to try any subject as much as you would like. They even have a reading section where students can read their choice of books and unlock new books as they progress. Each practice session they have registers a score and I monitor their progress frequently. I encourage you to have your student practice reading, vocab and all three of the math practices at home. I will be able to show reports from this website during our conference, if the student is practicing frequently.

I hope you all have a wonderful Thursday!

We are still looking for supplies for the Halloween Mad Scientist event or we will not be able to have it. The glue has been donated and a vegetable snack has also been pledged. If you plan on sending in something for the event, please go to the previous blog post and comment what you are bringing so everyone can see what has been pledged or sent in already.

Lastly, we are asking for camp permission slips to be sent in by tomorrow along with the $30 deposit if possible. If you are having reservations about sending your student for financial reasons, please contact myself or Mrs. Abou Arab and we will work with you. We would both love to see as many students attend as possible so please at least send in the permission slip if you are considering it or plan on speaking privately with one of us.

Thank you and have a wonderful week!

Mr. Hawkins

Happy Halloween!

We have a great week ahead of us. On Friday we in the morning and into the after noon we are going to have a going to be doing S.T.E.M. Halloween activities in the areas of math and science. The students will be doing many different hands on activities and to help make the event as fun as we can, we are in need of some items. Please comment on the post if you will be able to provide any of the supplies listed below.

List of needed items.

1. Pumpkin Towers- 2 boxes of toothpicks.
6 bags of candy pumpkins.

2. Frankenworms- 3 bags of gummy worms.
– 1 gallon of vinegar.
– 19 clear plastic cups
– baking soda

3. Halloween Slime- 19 bottles of glue.
– 1 package of food coloring.

4. Pumpkin decorating supplies

5. Munch time- 1 bag candy corn
1 bag small pretzel twists
2 bags of M&M’s
2 bags of Chex-Mix.

As for the rest of the week and our topics we are covering the following:

Math-We are finishing up Unit 2 and we will be wrapping it up with decimal multiplication, decimal place value on number lines and decimal story problems. Review and Unit test will be coming up as well.

Science-Forces and motion continue as students learn to combine and subtract forces as they head in different directions.

Writer’s Workshop-Students are finishing up their opinion pieces and their historical narratives. They are working very hard on writing about one of the homes from Greenfield Village. We will also be having a writing prompt practice and our daily journal writing will continue.

Spelling- This week we are focusing on diagraphs. A digraph is a single sound, or phoneme, which is represented by two letters. In digraphs, consonants join together to form a kind of consonant team, which makes a special sound. For instance, p andh combine to form ph, which makes the /f/ sound as in phonemic. Our words are:

abolish
graphic
southern
establish
although
geometry
range
maximum
mode
range

Reading- Students are continuing to work on their reading strategies and they are starting week two on their book club books.

Have a great week!

Mr. Hawkins

Hello Everyone! Happy Back to the Future Day!

I hope everyone is having a great week. We have a wonderful day in the classroom today and we accomplished a ton. Students are off and running in their reading groups during Daily 5. They are also working very hard on two pieces of writing right now. I resisted the urge to make our opinion writing piece about Michigan State or Michigan despite our fun and active morning discussions on the topic! They are writing on a different topic. They are also finishing up writing their historical narratives that I think are going to be very interesting. They have rubrics for each writing piece and will be self assessing their writing with me. I’m excited at how they are progressing. In math we students are working very hard on decimal place value. If you get a chance, ask them questions to help their thinking. Ask them to read decimals using the correct place value terminology. They are doing great on this even with it being a tough topic to work on.

I have started assembling a resource page for each unit on this blog for math. I am working on adding resources and games that can be played at home or during any times that students finish their work early. The link is posted on the right hand column of this page. Check out the Math Resources. Our next unit is geometry and there are some really fun games on the site that you can play with your child. If you find this helpful, or useful for extra practice at home, please let me know.

I am hoping once this unit is finished to have some parent volunteers to come in during Math Workshop and assist with some of the different stations the students rotate through. I explain each task before the rotation so even if you aren’t extremely comfortable with math, you will be helpful at answering questions at the station, while I am working with a small strategy group. There will be more on that coming soon, but I wanted to mention it because you need to have your background check completed with the office to volunteer in the room. If you are interested in this opportunity or others to come in and assist in the room, please complete the forms with the office so you are ready to go. I look forward to working with you soon!

Mr. Hawkins