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Language Arts Reading, Writing, Listening, Speaking and Viewing Reading Our Houghton Mifflin reading series has a wonderful selection of award-winning, short story literature. Beginning with the unit titled, Nature's Fury, the students in Room 24 will be reading challenging, non-fiction information about natural disasters on our planet. Later on, stories will parallel our Social Studies content with, And Then What Happened Paul Revere?, James Forten, and Katie's Trunk, for example, sharing person-to-person experiences from around the time of the Revolutionary War, and much, much more. Reading comprehension grades are not only tied to the weekly Houghton Mifflin stories, but also what's being taught in reading groups, literature circles, mid-week assignments of independent reading, and monthly Book Shares (see below).
Book Shares *Scroll down to the bottom of this page and click on the Book Share file to see and print directions for October :-) I am excited to be introducing Book Shares as a replacement for documented reading minutes. Rather than documenting "how many" minutes have been read each week, students will simply have a 20+ minutes free reading requirement nightly, culminating in the monthly Book Share, due for all on the last school day of each month that we attend school. If your student enjoys documenting their minutes read, then by all means encourage him/her to participate in our school's read-a-thon once it begins. (When it starts, all forms will be in our classroom and are collected regulary for logging and distribution of prizes.) I have determined from previous years' logs that we have an incredible school of avid readers, who, for the most part, read much more than just 100 minutes per week. That's fantastic! Congratulations to all of my readers, who I hope by now have an engrained sense of the wonder and satisfaction that comes from completing a good book. Now, we are going to take the natural next step of learning to prepare and share our reading summaries and produce a monthly "Book Share" for everyone to learn from and enjoy. Working towards the monthly Book Share assignment fulfills the nightly homework assignment for 20+ reading minutes, as well as our in-class Silent, Sustained Reading time (SSR). Book Shares are due once monthly on the last school day of every month (except December and June), but our first one will be due at the end of September. If students are truly reading 20+ minutes every evening as it is written in his/her reminder binder, there should be no trouble at all getting through a novel in time. I will be talking with the kids at length about choosing a grade level novel wisely. Slow readers should not consider a 700 page Harry Potter novel. There is nothing more interesting for me, and hopefully, the students, than listening to a succinct, yet descriptive summary of a good novel. I will give you a few minutes to hold up and show your Book Share report, while giving an oral summary. Each month will have a new set of directions to follow for the Book Share. ***Practicing for the oral presentation part is a good idea. Basically, we want to be excited about reading the book you just read. Tell us why we should be! Writing The focus of the first trimester in fifth grade is to prepare students for writing a persuasive, five paragraph essay. Learning to create an engaging topic paragraph stating the three discussion points that will be detailed later in body paragraphs will keep us hard at work each week with the writing rubric at hand. We work from a structured organizer, and from that a final essay is written. For each part of the essay, (topic, body paragraphs and a conclusion), we practice with lots of training wheels on the bike, so to speak. Each element is analyzed for their importance in the overall essay, and children share frequently with each other. As in all trimesters, we practice free-writing quick writes daily to encourage fluency, and pair writing with lots of buddy talk-shares and small group role playing to try out different perspectives for ideas. Spelling Don't forget these fun, interactive websites for studying your own spelling words via the internet! Choose from: 1.) www.yourdictionary.com/grammar-rules/elementary-spelling-games.html From here, scroll down and select: Online Elementary Spelling Games. Then, select: Word Safari. It's 6 games down. Wow! I just love how Word Safari lets you enter in your own spelling words and play a fast moving cartoon game where your hand needs to be as quick as the eye! Don't pop all of your balloons, but if you do, just try and try again! (I suggest you begin on "easy"---it's tough!) There's an 8 letter maximum on this one so it can be limiting. It's a blast! 2.) www.scholastic.com/kids/homework/spelling.htm Make your very own spelling words "Word Search" that you can play--online--once it's created! Other games are fun, too, but don't forget to do the one where you are actually studying YOUR OWN words of the week. :-) This may be my favorite one of all. How would you like an on-line voice pre-testing you with your very own spelling words? This is amazing, kids! Just enter our spelling words into the game and when you're ready to test, the game speaks to you, prompting you to spell-type your words! If you miss any, the game will help you learn. You can also play games here with your words like, "Hangmouse", and "Missing Letter". Try it out and see! (*WARNING KIDS: THIS IS NOT A REPLACEMENT FOR PARENTS!!! :-) *Don't forget that in addition to your 10x each and writing meaningful sentences with your words, you must choose games to play at home each week for extra practice and at least one PRINTED GAME SCREEN must be turned in as evidence. (grayscale okay)
Listening, Speaking, and Viewing I love how these very important components go hand in hand when the children are given a presentation task. We not only role model how the presenter shoud give a report--eye contact, head held high, loud speaking voice, practice in advance--but I also have high expectations for the listening audience. Monthly Book Shares as well as group project work in Social Studies will provide opportunities to hone our skills both giving and viewing oral presentations. Flashlight Fridays Each Friday, we can usually find the time to enjoy SSR in the dark! If your student hasn't done so already, please allow him/her to bring a flashlight and a small pillow, if they like, to keep in their cubbie all year. We curl up, take off our shoes, turn out the lights and read, read, read! (Make sure a name is on the flashlight and that the batteries work.)
Mrs. Kelly's Website Temecula Valley Unified School District Abby Reinke Elementary School 302-6610 x3824 www.myteacherpages.com/webpages/ckelly
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