Weekly Update: April 14th

Happy Spring!

Field Trip Information

The Badgers will be going on a field trip on May 1st.  Click here to download the information and permission slip.  Students all have paper copies.  Money and permission slips are due on April 12th.

Class Updates: 

Social Studies: The majority of this week was spent completing SAS testing. Students spent Social Studies classes reviewing materials in preparation for their assessment on Monday. Make sure your child studies over the weekend!

Science:  We'll wrap up our badger unit on Monday with a quiz.  Tuesday we will start working on figuring out a new phenomenon:  Why are there so many moon jellies?  

Literacy:  Students have spent a great deal of time learning about how pacifists brought about change in our country. They have watched a trilogy of movies about the the most famous acts of civil disobedience which resulted in changes under the law.  This week they learned how Cesar Chavez changed the lives of the migrant farm workers. Links to the three movies are posted on the Google Classrooms.  Next week they will begin a major writing assignment on the Art of Civil Disobedience.  Be sure to keep an eye out for the packet!    

English: Badgers spent the majority of the week completing their state assessments.  Overall, I was very proud of how diligently our students worked!  There will be a final unit test on The Giver on Tuesday, April 16th.  There is a study guide posted online to each Google Classroom.  Students should also read their independent reading books over the weekend.  Aim for an hour of reading at a minimum!

*April book orders will be sent out next week and are due back to Mrs. McGuire by Friday, April 19th!

Math: Last week students students reviewed measures of center (mean, median, and mode). We estimated how many jelly beans are in a jar and analyzed all the estimates to determine if a single person or a group are better at estimating. This week we are starting our unit on statistics, but continuing with measures of center and looking at different types of graphs.  This year we are going to primarily focus on dot plots, histograms, and box and whisker plots. 

Weekly Update: April 8th

Field Trip Information

The Badgers will be going on a field trip on May 1st.  Click here to download the information and permission slip.  Students all have paper copies.  Money and permission slips are due on April 12th.

STATE TESTING  April 9 - 12th  

**Make sure your student gets a good night's sleep and eats breakfast!  Badgers will test beginning promptly after Advisory, so it is also very important that your student gets to school on time! We will have limited classes and homework this week to allow students to concentrate all their energy on the test.  

Class Updates: 

Social Studies: Students spent the week researching and investigating the Crusades. We spent a few days learning about the impact that the Crusades had on Medieval times but more importantly the influence that they have on our world today. Students were assessed on this topic on Thursday.

Science:  We've been busy learning about how fossils are formed and how scientists keep track of all of their information.  This week we'll put everything together and answer our question..... Are stink badgers really badgers?  Early next week will be the assessment.  Students should be studying their notes this week!

Literacy:  Friday was the test on Latin Unit 10!  Only two more units!  We've enjoyed putting a star sticky note on the roots around the classroom as we have learned them!  There are only a few left!  This week we finished reading about Mahatma Gandhi, and tomorrow students will complete a review assignment using the notes they have compiled.  This week we will run a very different schedule, because of the SAS tests, so we will only meet with each group for one double block. During that time, we will watch the last of the Teaching Tolerance movies, Viva La Causa, about Cesar Chavez.  

English: Presentations have commenced and students did a wonderful job!  Please check in with your student to ask what they presented to the class and why.  This upcoming week we will be finishing the remaining skills within our Giver unit in between SAS testing.  Students were assigned their April IRP (last one of the year- woohoo!) and it is not due until mid-May. For now, students should be focused on reading their independent reading books outside of school.  Students are asked to bring their April IRP book with them to SAS testing in case they finish early!

Math: Students have a test on probability Monday, April 8th.  Study guides went home last week.    As a light review, we are going to do a lab  on mean, median, and mode to prepare for our statistics unit.  Students will not have homework this week because of testing.