Yesterday marked the first of three winter sports days at eldora Resort. We were blessed with beautiful weather and wonderful learning opportunities.
Language Arts: Our recent writing focus at ⅚ has been around expository (or informational) writing. We have reviewed the elements of strong and interesting writing - using a variety of topic sentence strategies; introducing new ideas by using transitional sentences/expressions; making sure we have enough details to support each idea so our thoughts are communicated as thoroughly as possible; and concluding in a way that challenges both writer and reader to next steps or “calls to action”. Some students have been mastering the “stand alone” single paragraph and others have been working on building those paragraphs into longer essays. The content or topic of this writing practice has been around a deeper reflection on student Well-Being Progressions. Our reading work for the next number of weeks will be around literary analysis through an exploration of the Hero’s Journey story through two different texts. In Rachel’s, Lauren’s and Lynn’s classes, The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan will be used and in Peter’s class Gareth Hinds’ graphic novel version of The Odyssey will be used. The Hero's Journey is a pattern of narrative identified by the American scholar Joseph Campbell that appears in drama, storytelling, myth, religious ritual, and psychological development. Math: Lauren’s class: Students have been learning how to express and use ratios to compare values and solve problems. They are using the skills and strategies that they learned earlier this year, applying knowledge of common factors, primes and multiples. This week we have been concentrating on modeling ratios to solve complex problems. Using visuals helps students decipher the steps necessary to solve problems. Rachel’s class: Following break, our class reviewed multiplication strategies. It is clear that some students do not have fluency with multiplication facts. Practicing with flashcards daily would greatly improve their ability to solve multi-digit multiplication problems. We have practiced flashcards in the classroom and additional practice at home would really help. So far, we have utilized the array model and partial product as strategies for solving multi-digit multiplication problems. In addition, we began exploring the shifting patterns when multiplying by 10, 100, and 1,000 and 0.1, 0.01, and 0.001. Our math journey will continue with multiplication of decimals and eventually move towards division of multidigit numbers and decimals. Lynn and Diane’s Classes: Since returning from Winter Break, students have been studying addition and subtraction of fractions (Module 3 in the EngageNY curriculum). We use number lines to visualize fractions and fraction operations. We also use rectangular models to aid in finding equivalent fractions with like units to facilitate the arithmetic. This provides students with a concrete understanding of equivalence. Students demonstrated their understanding on the mid-module assessment by completing an extended contextual problem that challenged them to apply much of their modeling and reasoning skills. Students are working on an extension project involving adjusting a recipe and supporting their thinking in a more formal creative presentation (including pamphlets, reports, powerpoint presentations, songs, poems, etc.). Peter’s Class: Recently, both groups have completed units of study. One group investigated visual and conceptual representations (as well as understanding the algorithms) of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division with fractions while the other group explored ratios, unit rate, rate tables, constant of proportionality, solving proportions,markups, discounts, commission, and measurement, conversion. For the next few weeks, both groups will study two and/or three dimensional measurement. Science: Due to rotations, our time in science has been limited since winter break. Students are very excited for our unit on Chemistry. We began with building background knowledge on states of matter and ways matter changes states. Our unit will progress to looking at mixtures, solutions, and compounds in order to segue into studying molecules, atoms, parts of atoms and the periodic table. Students are experiencing the material in a variety of ways. Hyperdocs, experiments, ooey-gooey labs, readings, at-home assignments, in class group work, and self-paced learning. Social Studies: Due to rotations, our time in social studies has also been limited since winter break. Our exploration of the factors that lead to the rise and fall of civilizations continue as we work our way into our case study of Ancient China. We have studied the relationship between China’s unique and varied geography and the longevity of this civilization through our own map work and critical reading. We are watching the Time Life film Ancient China: Dynasties of Power and are applying our GRAPES model of analysis to this case study. In the weeks ahead, we will explore more deeply the role of social structure and philosophy in Ancient China and influences on present day China. Español 1A with Lynn: In January, students finished their first formal oral assessment - a weather forecast entirely en español. Students infused their research and knowledge of a Spanish speaking locale with grammar/vocabulary lessons including weather, clothing, numbers, days of the week and things to do as they worked on fluency of delivery and presentation of their forecasts. We are now moving into basic present tense verb conjugations. Coming soon students will be reading and processing Casi se Muere by Blaine Ray - our first novela completely en español - to put new skills to work. Social Emotional Learning (SEL): Students have been reflecting on their Well-Being Progressions through our writing focus work. They have been challenging themselves to identify examples to support their present self-reflection as well as looking at ways they can move forward with goal setting for future growth this spring. Computer: Students are beginning a “Selfie Photo Collage” project. As part of this project, students will learn about creative commons license, how to find copyright free images, and how to edit photos using online photo editors, like pixabay.com or photoflexer.com. Students are also discussing cyberbullying scenarios and learning how to be upstanders rather than bystanders. Art: Recent art classes have been scheduled to allow for a 2-hour “block” of concentrated studio time on Wednesdays and Thursdays. Each homeroom will have 8 hours of study during this time with Kara focusing on the the use of clay and symbols in ancient civilizations. Presently Lynn’s and Rachel’s classes have been working with Kara and beginning February 14th, Lauren’s and Peter’s homerooms will complete the course of study. Students are studying a number of techniques including clay figurine work in the style of ancient Babylonian votive statues and copper tooling techniques replicating some of the work found on bas relief carvings from Ancient Mesopotamia. As we move into March, students will be using knowledge gained from this study to illustrate, in clay, a hero’s journey story they will write in LA class. :Dressed in our best, our learning journey today took us from a simulation about "Rediscovering America" to the Boulder Philharmonic. The author of the simulation began our time together with this introduction: "Today we’re going to experience a little of what American history has been like for the Native peoples – the original inhabitants of this land. There is a lot of suffering and injustice in this story...During this exercise, we’re going to imagine what it was like for the people who lived here before Europeans arrived. Back then, some of the Native people called this land “Turtle Island.” These blankets on the floor represent Turtle Island before the Europeans arrived, and you are going to represent the Indigenous people – the people who lived here before the Europeans came. You can stand up now and walk onto these blankets. Move around until you find a place that feels like home to you. (When they have settled). This is your homeland. It is the homeland of your ancestors and of your children and your children’s children.
Within a few hours, we were off to Mackey Auditorium to experience the Boulder Philharmonic. In an engaging presentation led by Michael Butterman, the maestro, and one of the CU science wizards, the orchestra explored the science of sound (pitch, volume, how sound is produced) and highlighted various sections of the orchestra thourgh demonstrations and pieces by Bizet, Bach, Prokofiev, and other composers. Short videos of the demonstrations and pieces are posted here: Bach (analyzing pitch with the whole orchestra) Brahms (demonstrating sound produced by the strings) Prokofiev (illustrating volume, watch the decibel meter) Verdi (showcasing brass) Marquez (demonstrating percussion) Garden House French Horn On Friday, the students began the first of two sessions of their art, music, movement, and technology rotations. When we designed the 5/6 program three years ago, we wanted to create opportunities that go beyond exposure and provide students with specific skills in the arts, movement, and music. Based on the choices they made earlier in the year, students will experience many of the following offerings: Marimba, African drumming, choir, keyboarding (piano), coding, hip-hop dance, ancient civillization pottery, and fitness bootcamp.
There will be two performances when students will showcase their talents and skills: February 14 and March 14 @ 6:30pm. Thanks to your generous donations, we are able to have highly qualified and dynamic instructors teach their passions. Their impressive profiles are below: Ellen Moeller has been a choir teacher at Horizons for many years and this is her third year teaching the 5/6 choir rotation. She is a professional singer and voice teacher as well as a mother of three Horizons graduates. Ellen has performed with the University of Colorado Opera, L’Opera Piccola, Chicago, and Depaul Opera Theater. When she is not singing or teaching, you can find her running on the beautiful Boulder trails! Warren Hammond is teaching circus arts. He was a virologist and genetic engineer for a few years after college, but then decided to drop everything to run away with the circus. Warren has been on the Late Show with David Letterman, toured with the Off-Broadway show, Lazer Vaudeville, and currently tours with his two-man show, SMIRK! Warren has received numerous awards, including the International Jugglers’ Association Excellence in Education award (shared with his wife, Bekah Smith). His former students have gone on to have successful performing careers spanning the streets, fairs and festivals and even Cirque Du Soleil. Scott Mast is teaching African drumming. He has been teaching and performing rhythms of Africa and the diaspora for 20 years. Scott currently lives in Boulder CO. Although most of his own learning has taken place in the USA, he has also studied and traveled in Cuba, Zimbabwe, and Ghana. For more information about Scott's drum classes and performances, visit his website at spmast.com. Cory Potash is teaching marimbas with Diane Michel, Calen’s mom. Cory Potash has taught marimba and Zimbabwean music for 12 years in public schools and privately. She is passionate about the music and sharing it, as well as, using it as a vehicle to create community and inclusivity. Cory loves the aural tradition which affords the magic of working with beginners and creating beautiful music almost instantly. Diane Michel is again co-teaching marimba class with Cory Potash -- they have team-taught marimba at Horizons since 2010. Before Horizons she taught marimba in year-long programs in private school and has been playing marimba since 2002. It takes a village to create a marimba song! She loves the way kids rely on each other and even begin to look at each other differently as they make cooperative music. Diane is mother to two boys, including Calen in sixth grade at Horizons. Alice Shuffield is teaching the keyboards class. She studied the piano and flute performance at Davidson College in Davidson, NC. She continued her studies at The Tanglewood Institute and The Aspen Music Festival, and later taught music at The Williston Northampton School in Easthampton, Massachusetts. Alice then pursued a career in the law, but she always kept her music close. In addition to teaching private lessons, she played with a chamber music ensemble in Washington, DC, recorded 3 CDs with her folk-singer sister, and has played at numerous weddings, festivals and events. Alice is also mom to Clara, June, John, and Will. Nonie Rand will teach the Fitness Bootcamp class with Rachel. She is the founder of Mind Body Spirit Vacations, mbsvacations.com, a company that hosts wellness retreats all over the world. For over 23 years, she has been a fitness pro who teaches yoga, pilates, dance, TRX, land and water aerobics. She began volunteering in BVSD schools 4 years ago, leading all school movement for various campuses, pure joy! Nonie’s daughter, Haven, is a sixth grader and her son, Noah, is in seventh grade. Erin Tunbridge will teach the hip hop dance class. She was born and grew up in Australia and has taught dance for early childhood, elementary, middle and high schools, private dance studios, and universities. In 2015, Erin joined the Boulder Ballet as Education Outreach Manager, delivering educational programs to middle schools in Colorado. Recently, she has been commissioned to set a choreographic work for Joy of Motion Dance Center (Washington DC), Glade Dance Collective, and Ailey Citigroup Theatre in New York City. Kara Priest will be teaching ancient civilization pottery. Lauren, Lynn, Diane, and Peter will be teaching coding. So much has happened since our last update:
Language Arts: Wrapping up Seedfolks, each classroom culminated the study of Paul Fleischman’s novelette in unique ways. Rachel’s class took the theme of community from the book as a way to explore individual backgrounds and heritage. Students were asked to research their own heritage to create a bio board. These will be on display next Friday during a Harvest Festival. In the second to last chapter of Seedfolks, an impromptu festival takes place in the garden. This will be emulated in the classroom as students share their family traditions, practices, foods, and culture. Lauren’s and Lynn’s classes have been using the book to explore community, diversity and writing genres. We began building background knowledge by learning about Cleveland, Detroit, and urban decay and renewal. Students crafted poems, and engaged in some socratic seminar work. Our work as readers included: learning about prosody and repeated reading, analyzing character and citing text evidence, writing e-journal responses to critical thinking questions, crafting several creative writing responses, and finally learning how to craft an argument by making a debatable claim. As we enjoyed the stories about a diverse group of characters in the novel, we made connections, practiced inference, practiced summarizing what we read, and grew as readers, like small sprouts in a garden if you will :) In addition to learning more about using writer’s craft for narrative stories, learning about line breaks, figurative language, and imagery in poetry, and learning how to organize an argument, students have worked on organization as they reflected upon artwork through expository writing. The writer’s process of planning, drafting, revising, editing and publishing has infused all of our work. Another poetry piece in November was drafted in response to a short film entitled Everything is Incredible exploring the ideas of hope and resilience. Lauren’s current read aloud is Skellig by David Almond. On Thursday, kids drew scenes to illustrate their visualization of a dream sequence in this magical realism novel. Peter’s Class: After a Socratic seminar, students applied the Well-Being Progression Rubric to the characters they followed in Seedfolks. Using evidence from the text, they supported their claims about their characters in terms of identity, growth, belonging, and control . Over the past two weeks, students applied this rubric to themselves and used experiences from their young lives to analyze their social emotional well-being. As students conducted this investigation, daily lessons helped students plan, draft, and practice strategies to write topic and concluding sentences. They plan on sharing this essay with you by the end of the week. I’m sure interesting conversations will follow after they read their piece to you. Math: Rachel’s 5th Grade Math Class: After returning from Thanksgiving Break, our class transitioned from adding and subtracting fractions to a unit on decimals. Students generally enjoy this change as decimals tend to be less abstract than fractions. We’ve talked about equating decimals and fractions, place value, money, comparing decimals, adding and subtracting decimals, and rounding. Next week we'll wrap it up with an assessment on decimals and after winter break, we will talk about multi-digit multiplication and division. Lynn and Diane’s 5th grade math classes: Students continue to work on deepening their understanding of multi-digit whole number and decimal fraction operations. They are becoming quite skilled at explaining why and how traditional multiplication and division algorithms work the way they do using a broad range of strategies like tape diagrams; place value tables; number discs and checking their work by using the opposite operation. In the week before and after the winter break, students will be demonstrating their mastery of these concepts on their Module 5.2 End of Module Assessment. Lauren’s 6th grade math: We’ve been using Pear Deck about once weekly. It’s an online presentation platform, that teachers build to engage and assess students as they learn math skills and concepts. Kids are loving days when we use technology, days when we build models with manipulatives, and days when we get to write all over the whiteboard tables for pictorial representations. Following our unit test for Prime Time (Factors and Multiples) students made corrections to their tests, identifying their errors as either accuracy or understanding, and solidifying their ability to demonstrate their understanding. This often involves some reteaching. One thing that can be done at home and will move mountains, is automaticity with multiplication and division facts: practicing five facts per day, until mastered, and then moving to the next five facts. Our new unit of study is called Comparing Bits and Pieces and explores fractions, decimals, and percentages. Automaticity with multiplication and division facts helps students apply their thinking to higher order tasks. We have spent the past two weeks refreshing basic skills and concepts for fractions. All students have a Khan Academy account and can practice daily if you are able to support this at home, it will absolutely help them as mathematicians. Peter’s 6th grade math: We just completed the unit Comparing Bits and Pieces about developing skills in using fractions, decimals, ratios and percents to measure and to compare quantities. I will be returning the unit tests and the subsequent “repairs” on Monday. Please have your child share their assessment with you. This week, we began the next unit, Let’s Be Rational. Your child will develop an understanding of the four basic arithmetic operations with fractions, including mixed numbers. They will also describe strategies for using these operations when solving problems involving fractions. Next week your child will learn how to: Use benchmarks and other strategies to make reasonable estimates for results of operations with fractions, include mixed numbers; develop ways to model sums, differences, products, and quotients, include the use of areas, fraction strips, and number lines; and look for rules to generalize patterns in fraction operations. The other group finished the unit on extending their knowledge of negative numbers; using parentheses and the Order of Operations in computations; using the commutative properties of addition and multiplication; and applying the Distributive Property to simplify expressions and solve problems. We are now exploring ratios, proportions, and proportional reasoning; analyzing comparison statements for correctness and quality; using ratios, rates, and percents to write comparison statements; and distinguishing between and use part-to-part and part-to-whole ratios to make comparisons. Science: We’ve begun a new unit of inquiry in science: Things that float and fly, which explores buoyancy, density, and Archimedes’ Principle. To investigate these concepts, and to learn how to measure accurately, students have been building and exploring a variety of things that float and fly. They’ve studied how to calculate density using a triple beam balances and graduated cylinders. Used Gummy Bears to measure mass, volume, and density, make predictions and organize results. Students have been reading and following directions to support their non-fiction reading skills. Building Cartesian Divers helped students communicate their understanding of buoyancy and density. Continuing our exploration of buoyancy, students built hot air balloons using patterns, teamwork and tissue paper and investigated how they work. We will launch our balloons next week, provided the air temperature is right for floating. To wrap up the week, Eric Larsen, from Protecting Our Winters, came to Horizons to present on Climate Change. Classes have begun a self-assessment using Google Slides or a sketchnote in combination with a short online quiz and written demonstration of learning. We’ll finish up the assessments after winter break, and head into chemistry. Thanks for sending in glass jars to use for borax crystals which will help us begin our study of solutions and chemistry. Social Studies: In social studies classes, we are wrapping up our case study of Mesopotamia. Students explored these ancient cultures in a variety of ways over the last month by discussing various readings, and analyzing a Time Life film called “Mesopotamia: The Search for Eden”, using the G.R.A.P.E.S model. Students have been working collaboratively on mapping and having discussions about factors that led to both the rise and fall of these civilizations. Students are preparing for their first open notebook written assessment which will take place the week before winter break. When we return in January, we will launch into our second case study on the ancient civilizations of the Indus River Valley. Español 1A with Lynn: Learning in Spanish class has focused on continuing to build our vocabulary - adding seasons, weather, clothing, body parts and numbers to our repertoire. Students will be using their knowledge of these words and phrases to create, write, practice and present their first oral Spanish assessment in January. Los prognósticos del tiempo (weather forecasts) about the Spanish-speaking world will be coming soon! Look for photos on our Google Classroom page! And thank you in advance for loaning your Spanish student a blazer, tie and/or collared shirt so they can “live” the part of a Spanish-speaking weather reporter! Social Emotional Learning (SEL): Each classroom participated in a Socratic Seminar surrounding a well-being progression. Students were asked to annotate the text and then share their ideas surrounding a progression that focuses on identity, belonging, control, and growth. Teachers were blown away by the depth and thoughtfulness in discussion that resulted from this text and we are excited to embark on future use of this progression as a tool for growth and development. As the year progresses, we will be guiding students to a deeper analysis of this document to help set personal goals, provide more specific direction for individual growth and open eyes (further) to the idea of what is possible. If your student has not yet shared their work and thinking on this progression with you, we encourage you to begin the conversation. We are continuing our mindfulness work with 1st/2nd grade buddies using relaxation techniques such as “mind in a jar” and guided meditation. Computer: Students finished their presentations on different presentation tools, including Prezi, Screencastify, Easel.ly, and Google Slides, and had an opportunity to learn about each tool by viewing exemplars from their peers. In December, students are participating in Hour of Code activities, using block code, Java Script and other programming languages to solve puzzles, animate characters, design games, draw pictures, and more. Art: In art class students have completed their fourth art project of the school year. Through the process of creating clay mugs, students have been perfecting their pottery skills. This week, Kara helped students explore depth and shadows in a painted winter mountain scene. Please check them out in the front display case the week before the break. Thank you all for sharing your celebrations, goals, and concerns during the conferences. We hope that your needs were met at your child's conference. If not, please let us know.
Language Arts: (completed memoirs, begin Seedfolks) Students put the finishing touches on their memoir study and we have begun an intensive readers workshop during our language arts block using the book Seedfolks as a shared novel. This novel celebrates community and connections and is told from a multitude of perspectives. Students are analyzing characters using inference and evidence from the text, as well as examining author’s language. Math: Rachel’s 5th Grade Math Class: Over the past month, our math class spent time and energy setting up math talks. Math Talks provides students an opportunity for deeper understanding through communication. Individually or in groups, students articulate and defend their ideas and analyze the reasoning of others. It has been a pleasure to watch them grow as mathematical communicators and analyzers. In addition to math talks, we practiced Mad Minutes, a one minute multiplication test of fast facts. When students achieve automaticity with these facts, higher level math becomes more accessible. We are continuing our exploration of fractions by comparing fractions and more recently conversions from mixed numbers to improper fractions and vice versa. We will begin adding and subtracting fractions with unlike denominators in the upcoming weeks. This is a challenging segment of the unit on fractions. Lynn and Diane’s 5th grade math classes: In the last week and half, we have completed our first module study of place value and decimal fractions and students have completed their first round of formal assessments and “fix ups” (revisions). We are now onto module 5.2 which focuses on multi-digit whole number and decimal fraction operations. We have been using the standard multiplication algorithm (the method that many of us were taught when we were younger people) to multiply decimal numbers by multi-digit whole numbers. Students are also applying their understanding of place value, which was covered in previous lessons, to help estimate and reason about the placement of the decimal in the answer (product). We love word problems because it helps us apply what we’re learning to “real world” situations. Have your student show you how we use Google Classroom and Infinite Campus (IC) - two online tools to help them stay on top of their work. Lauren’s 6th grade math: Students have been exploring the ways that prime factorization can be used to solve problems in math. Kids have also been engaged in a series of explorations about how to think about mathematical learning in new ways, including looking at patterns and exploring number sense. Hopefully you’ve been hearing a lot about brain research, and the ways our math experiences influence our attitudes about learning. We’ll continue exploring these math projects in the weeks to come before heading back into multiplication and the distributive property. Peter’s 6th and 7th grade math: Most students have been investigating comparing fractions and ratios and asking the following questions: How does a “for every” statement show a ratio comparison? When you fold fraction strips, what relationships do you see emerge that show how the numerator and denominator change to make equivalent fractions? How can fraction strips help you find part of a number? What does it mean for two fractions to be equivalent? What does it mean for two ratios to be equivalent? The other group has been exploring operations with positive and negative integers the following questions: How can you predict whether the result of addition of two numbers will be positive, negative, or zero? How is a chip model or number line useful in determining an algorithm for subtraction? How are the algorithms for addition and subtraction of integers related? Science: Students explored the habits of thinking as a scientist, using puzzles and experiments to understand how we inquire and investigate. Kids played games and worked with partners at science stations to practice observing carefully and thoroughly and to infer using evidence. We practiced the scientific method using mystery boxes and now are learning about things that fly and float. For conferences, students revisited six essential questions and created visual notes to convey their understanding. Our current investigation helps students understand how to build a controlled experiment, collect data, and use data to make accurate predictions - all while measuring the number of penny passengers supported by ‘paper cup’ boats! Kids have learned to make scatterplot graphs and use a trend line, measure accurately using graduated cylinders, and use Google Hyperdocs to guide and record their learning. Social Studies: In Social Studies we are watching and processing the film “Guns, Germs, and Steel: Episode 1 Out of Eden” based on the work of Jared Diamond. Diamond looks at the idea of why certain early civilizations were more successful than others and how the idea of “geographic luck” plays into the success of a civilization. We are also working on a definition of “civilization” by exploring what characteristics are present for a group of people to become a civilization. You may have heard your children talking (or singing) about G.R.A.P.E.S. over the last few weeks. This acronym - Geography, Religion, Achievements, Politics, Economics, and Social Structures - provides us a lense through which to examine civilizations - both old and contemporary. In the weeks to come, we will begin analyzing the Fertile Crescent civilization of Mesopotamia by applying the lense of G.R.A.P.E.S to deepen our understanding. Have your student show you how we use Google Classroom and Infinite Campus (IC) - two online tools to help them stay on top of their work. As an extension of the work we did over the past weeks with Peter Menzel’s Material World: A global family portrait, children have also been investigating life for children throughout the world as they prepared for and participated in a Socratic Seminar on Where Children Sleep (Atlantic). Many insightful conversations have been happening both in and outside of school around this photo exhibit. Make sure to check out the bulletin boards outside the hub. Election Learning Opportunities: Over the next couple of weeks, we will be taking time to study the election process and results. Our focus will be on the Constitutional provisions of a Presidential election along with the responsibility as citizens we have participating respectfully in such a system. Our 5th/6th graders will be hosting a mock election where each ⅚ homeroom will take on being the precinct hosts, helping students K-8 register and cast their private ballots for President. Focus will be placed on being respectful of all viewpoints and analyzing the characteristics that make up a positive leader. Español 1A with Lynn: As a concluding assessment of our work on adjectives, students wrote songs about themselves using the “Soy Guapo” song by Sr. Wooley as their mentor text. If you have not yet heard your child perform (and explain) their song, please ask them to do so - they are muy impresivo. This past week students have added the verb hay and había (there is/there are) to their repetoire. We are presently fully engaged in a cultural study on Días de los Muertos (Days of the Dead) this week and next. We have studied practices of this holiday in Oaxaca, Mexico where Lynn taught and lived. We are watching the animated film “Book of Life” and will be processing in both Spanish and English as we deepen our understanding of this very special holiday. Have your student show you how we use Google Classroom and Infinite Campus (IC) - two online tools to help them stay on top of their work. Social Emotional Learning (SEL): Across homerooms we have been exploring a number of aspects of social emotional learning to help our 5/6th graders gain further knowledge of themselves as learners. In some homerooms we have completed an activity in which students map out their time usage both in and outside of school, making reflections and gaining insights. In some homerooms we have been helping students investigate their own well-being by using the Well-being Progression and an internal google survey about stress factors in their lives. Our hope is that by helping young people understand the causes of stress in their lives as rising adolescents, we can help them also amass strategies with which to positively manage the stresses that are a natural part of our lives. Computer: Students are exploring different presentation tools, including Prezi, Google Slides, Easel.ly, and Screencastify chrome extension. After a brief introduction to the basic uses of each of these tools, students will become an expert in one and create a presentation about the presentation tool. Students will then view exemplary presentations in a jigsaw format and learn the pros, cons, and specific uses of each tool. We have also switched over to Typing Pal for typing practice. The Horizons K-8 specific link is on the ⅚ tab of the computer class webpage. Students can log in with their bvsd accounts. Art: We completed our “Andy Warhol Self Portrait Study” on line and color theory and will be writing an artist’s statement in the weeks to come. We have found the process of reflection after completion of an art study like this can help us assess that the art teaching objectives have been internalized. Kara is now leading us through a collage study, using contrasting color and patterns as students create a unique piece with a tree as the central focal point. Language Arts
What a wonderful thing to learn about our students as readers and writers! As writers we have been all been working on writing vignettes of special moments or events in our lives based off photos students brought in at the beginning of the school year. We call these “Inside/Outside” Mini Memoirs in which students have been helping each other write colorful captions to accompany their vignettes. We have also been working on reflections of moments of particular growth, challenge and/or celebration from outdoor ed. Watch for those in the hallways shortly. We are anticipating beginning our first class novel, Seedfolks by Paul Fleischman in the next two weeks. Students are enthusiastically engaging in choosing their own books to read and discuss via reading conferences with teachers and para-educators. Math Rachel’s Class We kicked off the year with a place value project. Through interpreting data and working with numbers up to the millions, students showed their understanding of working with large numbers. The project asks students to add, subtract, compare, and round numbers in the millions as well as create a table and analyze the data in the millions. Following this project, we continued with a review of rounding, adding and subtracting. This review will allow students to move into 5th grade content with a solid foundation to build upon. After returning from Outdoor Ed, we began our 5th grade curriculum exploring fractions and building an understanding of what equivalent fractions are and how to make them. We will continue working with fractions and decimals up until conferences. Diane’s and Lynn’s Classes We have 29 students between our two classes and we are using the same curriculum, EngageNY (or Eureka Math) in both classes. You can find the link to our first module (unit) of study here. We spent the first week of our math study all together as a large group collaborating and getting to know each other as mathematicians. We have settled into two smaller groups now that formal lessons have begun, and expect to come together as a group periodically throughout the year for special projects. There may also be a need to move students from one class to another. We are in daily contact with each other about students and curricular planning so this can happen with ease, should there be a need. We are now working with place value, decimal and fraction equivalents, multiplying and dividing by powers of ten and a bit of rounding. You may notice that your child is drawing place value tables, tape diagrams, and vertical number lines to help them explain/support their thinking. A consistent theme of this math class is to explain mathematical processes pictorially and not to just use the short-cuts without the understanding. We will have our first mid-module assessment next week and will use a study guide to help our students prepare for the first one together. Have your student show you how we use Google Classroom and Infinite Campus (IC) - two online tools to help them stay on top of their work. Lauren’s class We began the year practicing composing and decomposing numbers to build a magic number game. Hopefully, students have practiced this with you at home. We have also been learning and applying divisibility rules for their study of factors and multiples. Our work includes learning and using math vocabulary as we categorize prime, composite and square numbers, and recognize patterns in factors. Please review your child’s notebook and planner with them to support organization and understanding. A copy of the letter I sent last week explaining the structure of our class can be found here. The students had a quiz today for our first 6th grade work, and we begin our second unit of inquiry on Monday, building upon their knowledge to understand common factors and common multiples. Peter’s Class The class is divided into two groups--One group is investigating factors and multiples, composite and prime numbers by investigating the following questions: How can you find all the factors (or divisors) of a number? What information about a number can you find by looking at its factors? If you know one factor of a number, how can you find another factor of the number? How do you know when you have found all of the factors of a number? How can you find the prime factorization of a number? How can the prime factorization of a number be used to find the LCM and GCF of two or more numbers? The other group is delving into the shapes and designs and exploring the following questions: What properties do all polygons share? What properties do some sub-groups of polygons share? What properties do all polygons share? What properties do some sub-groups of polygons share? What are some common benchmark angles? In upcoming weeks we will cover the following: When a drawing shows two rays with a common endpoint, how many rotation angles are there? How would you estimate the measure of each angle? How do you measure an angle with an angle ruler and a protractor? In a triangle, what measures of sides and angles give just enough information to draw a figure that is uniquely determined? For more information and assignment/activity calendar, please visit Peter’s math class website. Social and Emotional Learning Before we leave for 100 Elk, each homeroom held a council around a theme -- defining and expanding our comfort zone. The practice of council comes from a number of indigenous cultures and takes place when a group or community gathers in a circle to converse about a specific topic. There are four intentions of council: “The first intention is to “speak from the heart” when you have the talking piece. This means to speak not only with your head and your ideas, but with your feelings as well. The second intention is to “listen from the heart” when another person has the talking piece. This means to listen without judgment, to listen with an open mind, even if you disagree with what the person is saying. The third intention is to “speak spontaneously.” This means that we try to wait before the talking piece comes to us before we decide what we want to say. The last intention is to “speak leanly.” Use only those words necessary to get your point or story across. We will hold weekly or bi-weekly council meetings in homeroom. In upcoming weeks, we will explore stress through taking an analyzing student stress survey. Science Science this year started with lots of hands on explorations. Students were asked to explore the properties of water with two experiments looking at adhesion and cohesion. Following that, we had the opportunity to investigate cast models of skulls showing the evolutionary traits of apes and hominids. Students examined the skulls and using calipers, measured and compared the size of ancient skulls with the modern human skull, and examined maps, artist drawings, and artifact photographs to help understand lifestyles and the fossil record. Hands-on laboratories helped students experiment with stereoscopic vision, opposable thumbs and the cooperation needed to successfully open and eat peanuts and tootsie rolls! We enjoyed the conversation and questions that grew from this study. Our next area of inquiry in science will involve things that float and fly, and buoyancy. Social Studies - Rise and Fall of Ancient Civilizations We started off the year turning the clocks back about two millions years. Our students tried their skills to survive through the challenges early humans had to face (gathering food and water and building shelter) through a simulation. Over the course of the week, we increasingly adjusted the simulations to follow the main ages of prehistory from the Paleolithic to Mesolithic to Neolithic and finally to the dawn of civilizations. Some of the conditions/tasks included creating “pottery,” more complex communication, processes to make decisions, ability to farm, creation of rituals and religions, etc. After setting this stage, we returned to our investigation of artifacts as a way to tell the story of history and investigated an article of the week (AOW) from the BBC titled A History of the World in 100 Objects. This week, we are exploring the language of time (including terminology) by developing an understanding of both historical and personal timelines. Spanish 1A with Lynn In Spanish 1A, we continued our review of Conversación Básico (basic conversation), classroom terms, and the alfabeto español. Next week we begin our study of the Spanish speaking world. Students will continue weekly quizzes. These quizzes will help us determine our level of mastery before we move onto our next topics. If your students in Spanish 1A are not singing songs at home yet, please ask them to teach you something. They have quite a dynamic and varied repertoire at this point. Have your student show you how we use Google Classroom and Infinite Campus (IC) - two online tools to help them stay on top of their work. Art Kara began a unit on Pop Art with a focus on Andy Warhol. All students are rendering a Warholl inspired self-portrait learning about the use of line, light and shadow, and color theory. Some also worked on Andy Warhol inspired cans like his famous Campbell’s Tomato Soup piece. Computer All 5-6th grade classes have been working with Carol in the computer lab on a variety of topics since the school year began. Students have re-acquainted themselves with Google email and drive so files can be used efficiently and effectively. We have taken a typing skills assessment to determine how our finger placement development, speed, and typing accuracy is coming along. We are also focusing on what makes a digital footprint, the impact of our digital presence, and conducting ourselves with integrity when online. "So, how do you feel and what do you do to get to know each other when you first meet a Jewish or an Arab camper?" asked a Horizons fifth and sixth grader.
"You just throw a frisbee and a conversation starts," answered one of the panel members from Ultimate Peace. This morning, 19 members of this non-profit made their first stop of this year's US tour --Horizons K-8. This organization builds bridges of friendship, trust, and leadership between youth who live in communities divided by conflict, using the values-based sport of Ultimate as its tool. After introducing their organization and answering questions from the students, we all went outside to do what we do best--Play! Rotations came to a close prior to Spring Break. Our daily schedule returned to the fall schedule with weekly art and computer classes. Looking ahead, our last A & S session will focus upon weekly Passageworks activities towards preparation for the May transition from 5th to 6th grade and 6th to 7th grade. In addition, students will study health education the last week of April into the first week of May.
Learning without Walls Independent learning projects are well under way. Students have created posters announcing their projects to the community which will be on display in the hallways. Students have mapped their project timelines and should begin work if they have not already. We will be checking in with students weekly to help them monitor their progress. Four week projects will be shared in the classroom the week of April 18th and again during our schoolwide museum on Friday, May 13th at 8:45AM. Longer projects will be shared in the classroom the week of May 9th and again during our schoolwide museum on May 13th at 8:45AM in the cafeteria. If your child has not yet shared with you their “LWW” google file with all documents regarding this project, please inquire about it. Please join us to celebrate self-directed learning and engaging the head, heart and hands! Language Arts Students have been working to connect reading and writing in a variety of ways. In some classrooms, students have crafted literary essays in response to short stories they’ve read in small groups. In other classrooms, students began reading Rick Riordan’s The Lightning Thief, a novel about a sixth-grade boy on a hero’s journey. In triads, students will read with a focus on the archetypal journey and close reading of the many mythical allusions. As they begin the novel, they will also read a complex informational text that explains the archetypal storyline of the hero’s journey which has been repeated in literature throughout the centuries. Students will then explain, with text-based evidence, how Percy is an archetypal hero. Next, your child will shift their focus to narrative writing skills. This series of writing lessons will scaffold students to apply their knowledge about the hero’s journey and the elements of mythology to create their own hero’s journey stories. All students have creatively responded to self-selected novels including designing book jackets, writing book reviews, creating comic strips and more. They have shared their independent reading actions with peers. All students have used writing to reflect upon their growth as readers and writers for spring conferences. Across content areas, students have been reading non-fiction, writing summaries and reflections and creating presentations for science and social studies. Our Academic Lab classes have shifted from a math focus to many students receiving language arts support in either reading or writing. Areas of study include comprehension in literature and informational text, word study, book groups, and writing skills. Math Rachel’s math class focused on graphing for the past month. Our graphing focus was around line plots and secondarily, bar graphs. Students created an experiment (such as “How long can a 5th grader stand on his/her hands?” or “How far will different types of balls roll down an incline?”), carried out the experiment, recorded the data, and then plotted the data on a graph. Graphing continued with an exploration of mean, median, mode, and range as students learned to analyze the data on a graph. Following Spring Break, our focus changed to decimal work. We will continue to work with decimals for the next few weeks moving towards multiplying and dividing decimals. Students in Lynn’s/Bede’s and Julie’s classes have been working on deepening their understanding of division and multiplication of fractions. Students continue to develop their conceptual understanding using pictorial models such as tape diagrams and arrays to support thinking and check for accuracy and reasonability. Now, when we use the traditional algorithm, students understand even better the “why” that supports it. Feel free to reference the Engageny 5th grade math curriculum for even more details. Please note that we do not use every single lesson in each module. Lauren’s math students have been continuing to develop skills in using fractions, decimals, ratios and percents to measure and to compare quantities. Students have compared quantities using double tape diagrams and benchmark fractions. We have reviewed operations with fractions and converting improper fractions to mixed numbers and vice-versa. Students have practiced finding 10% of a value using decimal shifts, and have worked to understand the meaning of division and multiplication of whole numbers and fractions using models and equations. Students have completed 3 formal assessments for this unit of study. Our next unit of study delves further into fraction operations. Peter’s math class began the week with an assessment on the decimal operations unit (decimal Operations and Estimation, addition and subtraction of decimals, multiplying and dividing decimals, and using percents). Over the next few weeks, our focus will be the analysis of data distributions, including shape, measures of center (mean, median, mode) and variability (range, interquartile range, mean absolute deviation). Science Students enjoyed two weeks of dance choreography in conjunction with our study of the Earth’s spheres. They then performed their dance for their peers and family members who could join us. Following this arts-based experience, our study of climate and climate change began. Students explored climate vs. weather and created posters of the different climate zones of Earth. Our study will target carbon’s role in climate change and the greenhouse effect. Social Studies: You say you want a revolution?! After our introductory units on geography and time/chronology and our study of Africa and the Arab world, we are exploring one of our main themes and essential questions of our social studies learning this year--What is a revolution? What is revolutionary thinking? What factors might lead to a revolution in thinking, technology, belief systems, economics, artistic expression, written expression, and world-view. Small groups read and summarized a reading on the Scientific Revolution then viewed films on Galileo and Newton to gain some background knowledge. Last week and this week, students will be demonstrating their Scientific Revolution performance assessment to their classmates. Students chose to create a science kit to demonstrate Newton’s Law of Motion; a student-written drama about Galileo; and models of the various views of universe. From the Scientific Revolution we embark on our study of the age of exploration - analyzing the justification for it, the findings, and the effects of it. Spanish 1A with Lynn: Students have finished reading and discussing our second novela Casi se Muere this past week. Students now will be working in pairs to dramatically depict each chapter in skit form. This will help with reading comprehension and synthesis, oral language fluency and bring additional creativity and challenge to our learning environment. This assignment will also provide an authentic way for students to demonstrate their understanding of verb conjugations of regular -AR, -ER, and -IR verbs along with some irregular verbs we have been learning and using in the context of the novela. |
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