Math- QUIZ TUESDAY
In math this week, students will continue to explore algebraic expressions. Monday will be a day of review, where we will go over powers, order of operations, and solving/writing expressions. This will lead us to a mid-chapter quiz on Tuesday. The quiz practice sheet from Monday will be a great source of review on Chapter 6, lessons 1-4 concepts, and should be in binders. For the rest of the week, students will be using the associative, commutative, and distributive properties to simplify more complex expressions. We are aiming to have our chapter 6 math test on Wednesday, 2/12. Science A quiz bright and early on Monday will get us started this week! Chapter 6, lesson 1 was a short lesson which focused on the three parts of cell theory, and the 4 macromolecules within cells. For the rest of the week we will start chapter 6, lesson 2. This is the most important lesson of the chapter, in which students will learn about all of the organelles within the cell. Students will be receiving information about a take home project this week and shouldn't waste any time getting started. Here is a link to the cell rap! English Language Arts, Reading and History Writing: Students will be finishing up their five paragraph argumentative/persuasive essays in Google classroom. Great job on forming opinions and developing arguments. Now, just some fine tuning for revising and editing! Reading: We continue with Massachusetts Book Award book groups and the novel "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer". Students have been practicing figurative language and poetic devices and will demonstrate their understanding as we finish the poem "The Road Not Taken". Grammar: There will be a brief reminder of the 8 parts of speech followed by a survey for the different kinds of verbs there are. HistoryWe begin the study of Greece with designing an Illustrated Timeline of some of the important events of Ancient Greece. Typically, I have broken the larger project into shorter due dates but the overview of the entire assignment is to find the required dates from the textbook or internet by Thursday and write the dates out as a rough draft due Friday. The completed final copy on oak tag is due on Tuesday. I will have the assignment paper posted in the Google classroom. English Language Arts, Reading and History
Writing: We are planning on completing our rough drafts for persuasive writing this week in class. We only have to write an introduction and a conclusion so we will see. Grammar: Appositives have been checked in Typing for Accuracy and have revealed a good understanding of the concept which will improve writing in the long run. Reading: We have been dipping our toes into poetry with reviewing figurative language and literary elements. Students read "The Road Not Taken" and have been analyzing the poem for metaphor, tone and vocabulary for deeper understanding. In addition to Massachusetts Book Groups, we are also beginning a new novel this week which is part of the Federal Core standards. We'll be reading "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" as a class activity. This book. although difficult, has traditionally been really popular because of the universal theme of growing up. I LOVE THIS BOOK and I will be throwing all my enthusiasm and passion for Mark Twain at 12 year olds who don't yet know they will love it too! Besides, they may be reading the sequel "The "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" in a subsequent grade level. History: We end the week and end our unit on Ancient Egypt with a pyramid competition on Friday. Just fun, cooperative learning! English Language Arts, Reading and History
Writing: We continue typing our persuasive writing into Google Classroom. Typing practice has done well to improve how students proofread their writing. Reading: We continue reviewing literary elements and figurative language to prepare for poetry. Students have been preparing their Greek and Latin roots assignments really well, but I realize my next step is for students to understand how those are the keys to understanding so much of our language. More to follow… History We had an extraordinary mummification ritual performed in class. It was a great opportunity for students to recognize the importance of sequence, understanding main ideas, and identifying a summarizing statement. Using the visual presentation and work on a study guide, students will be tested on this information to demonstrate how they understand specific historical content as well. They will receive a study guide on Wednesday and we will be spending time going over how to prepare for this test for next Tuesday. Presidents Tests are officially over! Learning a difficulty and, in their words last November, impossible task build confidence and sustained concentration. Thank you for any work you did to help your child to achieve this. Math Students will have a chapter 5 math test on Wednesday. On Tuesday we will review, and extra credit is due by Thursday morning. Students should be sure to focus their efforts on the skills as well as the vocabulary. The remainder of the week will be spent on make ups, catching up on old work, and previewing chapter 6. Science Lots of fun this week in science! As we are now studying Life Science, students will get the chance to view different items under microscopes in a fun game called "Alive or Not?" Blood, bone, and plant material will all reveal their cells to us as we begin to learn about the structure and function of the cell and each of its parts. Our main focus this week will be learning the three parts of the Cell Theory. Information about a take home cell project will be given early next week. Math- QUIZ TUESDAY On Monday students will take their mid-year STAR assessment in math. These assessments help us to see if students are progressing at grade level through the year's content, and who might need some additional support. Results of this assessment will be sent home with term 2 report cards in March, but feel free to contact me with questions before that if you have any. On Tuesday students will take the chapter 5 quiz. This quiz covers most of the chapter and includes lessons 1-5. These lessons focus entirely on absolute value, positive/negative opposites, changing fractions to decimals using division, and comparing and ordering integers. It is a longer quiz than usual, and is a great study tool for their test next week. A practice quiz will be done in class on Monday and can be found in binders. On the remaining days this week, we will finish the last two lessons of the chapter, which focus on graphing ordered pairs in all 4 quadrants of the coordinate plane. Science- QUIZ WEDNESDAY This week we will be wrapping up chapter 4, lesson 4 which is about fossils! This lesson focuses on 5 ways fossils are formed: mineralization, carbonization, casts & molds, trace, and original material. Students should be able to explain the difference between each type, and give an example. Additionally, this lesson talks about the differences between absolute age dating vs. relative age dating, and the geologic time scale. A study guide will be provided on Monday so students can review at home. Please see math/science links for a copy of this study guide. English Language Arts, Reading and History Writing: We will be finishing our persuasive writing in Google Classroom Grammar: Continues our work with appositives on how to improve writing. Reading:Students did very well on STAR testing as we round the corner into DIBELS testing for some students. We finished Lightning Thief earlier in January and will be seeing some sections for clarifications as we prepare an compare and contrast response. History Have you been impressed with the Presidents recitation? It's a great way to demonstrate how to accomplish a difficult task by breaking it down into manageable steps. The oral test should be done by the end of the week. We will be demonstrating the steps of Egyptian mummification. In this project, students will be in charge of performing the sequence in small groups. This has been a lesson in sequencing and summarizing as well as learning the gruesome job of getting ready for the Underworld. The Mummification Ritual will be on Thursday or next Tuesday after much practice in class. Following the performance, students will get a study guide and take a test on the sequence next week. |