Grade 5

As this year in fifth grade comes to a close, we reflect on how much we have enjoyed getting to know all of your enthusiastic children.  We would like to say thank you to all parents who have helped to make this a wonderful experience, from hosting our classroom parties to volunteering as chaperones for movies and field trips. We truly appreciate all of your support.

In social studies classes, students have completed learning about our national government, and now they are learning about economics. Students have had fun experiencing supply and demand through “Popcorn Economics,” choosing houses based on specific criteria, complete with trade-offs and opportunity costs, and learning the difference between craftsmen and specialists in  “widget”-making companies. Students culminated the year with a high-energy Market Day, for which they teamed up to create new products to market attractively. Fun was had by all as the students competed with their classmates to see who could make the most transactions with Eskeland/Scupp dollars!

READING, READING, and MORE READING!  It is great to hear the students practicing fluency while reading aloud during our Partner Reading project. After learning fluency strategies, they enjoyed reading books together and discussing them. This directly followed our Great Stone Face Challenge for which fifth grade students read over 600 books in a six-week period of time. It is amazing to see how their reading ability and fluency has improved after reading so many books. We hope that fifth graders will continue to read and enjoy many great books this summer.  

Have you thought about spin-offs lately? Spin-offs are technologies or materials used in everyday life that were originally developed for the U.S. space program. They’re all around us. Our grade 5 scientists researched how spin-offs have made our lives more efficient on Earth. Who knew that bar coding was originally designed to track satellites in space? Today, our food products move more rapidly along the grocery conveyor belt because of this spin-off.

We also researched the Age of Space Exploration and made timelines beginning with the 1957 launch of Sputnik, the first manmade satellite. Our 3-D projects showcased some of the most interesting satellites, space probes, rockets, and space stations. The Voyager 2 space probe, launched in 1977, is one of the most remarkable space stories. This mission to the planets was designed to last only a few years. Amazingly, not only has Voyager 2 left our solar system, but it is also expected to continue transmitting data until 2020! Imagine—an ordinary laptop computer has more power than the computers aboard Voyager 2! 

Thinking beyond our solar system, we learned about constellations and created our own mythological star patterns and drawings. Imaginative thinkers, writers, and artists all!

Back on Earth, our study of climate change has made us more conscious of what we can do to help our planet’s environment. We hope to reduce our carbon footprint simply by changing everyday behaviors: recycling more, shutting off computers and lights when not in use, unplugging devices to reduce phantom power loss, walking and bicycling more (instead of driving), and planting trees!

Working in teams of four, we discovered how to be environmental consultants. Each team was responsible for redesigning one or more rooms in a customer’s home to make the space more energy-efficient. The final, diversified results were practical, science-based solutions to energy-efficient living.

Special note:  Thank you to the parent chaperones who helped to make our visit to the Montshire Museum of Science fun-filled and unforgettable!

Grade 5 mathematicians have been hard at work developing their fractions skills!  We have explored and practiced greatest common factor and least common multiple, as well as simplifying fractions and changing mixed numbers and improper fractions. We also spent time converting between fractions, decimals, and percents and comparing and ordering fractions. Currently, we are adding and subtracting fractions and mixed numbers and will finish the year with some geometry concepts.

In language arts classes, students have been focusing on learning the intricacies of various parts of speech, including nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, articles, conjunctions, and prepositions. We created color-coded sentences with each color representing a different part of speech. These colorful representations demonstrated that parts of speech truly link together to create sentences.
           
Students have also been applying all of the writing skills they have learned this year to "Free Types.” This gives them the opportunity to choose what they would like to write about and practice their leads, sentences, descriptions, etc. As we listen to these interesting pieces of writing, we are amazed by what wonderful authors they have become.

As the lazy days of summer approach, your child is encouraged to continue to use his/her math skills throughout the summer months. Skills such as multiplication and division and working with fractions and decimals can naturally fit into everyday activities. In addition, it is essential that sixth graders know their multiplication facts!  Hopefully, some time can be found (perhaps on a rainy day) to practice flashcards and/or to visit an online site for practice of facts and other skills.

It has been an exciting and productive year filled with many accomplishments. We wish everyone an enjoyable summer and hope that your children are looking forward to sixth grade and all they will learn.