8.21.15 - Day FOUR

Woooo Hooooooo, it's Friday!  These babies officially have their first week of 5th grade under their belts!  Hard to believe that the first of 36 weeks is D-O-N-E!

LANGUAGE ARTS:
We began getting ready for whole-group instruction.  I encouraged smooth transitions when coming and going to whole-group instruction by teaching my signal which is a chime on my timer.  We also made notes about Where, When, and How of the whole-group instruction takes place and how to sit during.

We then discussed the habits of good listeners and how to develop good listening habits.  I gave an example of this by asking students to tell me about their favorite books.  The first person I called on, I fidgeted with pens and was in and out of my desk, doodled, talked to others, made no eye contact with the speaker, etc.  I then asked the students to note what they observed about my listening and they pinpointed all of these negative traits.  I asked them if I appeared to be a good listener to which they all collectively shouted, "No!"  Then, I asked another student.  To this student, I was attentive, I asked questions about the book, I had my body turned towards him/ her, I made eye contact, I was easy to talk to, etc. and the students noted the difference on a t-chart. It was an obvious difference and the two students I talked with discussed how they felt about my attentiveness and the second student obviously felt much better. We discussed how this is relevant in whole-group instruction AND in small groups as well.  It is important to make our listeners feel as if they are heard and as if what they are saying is important.

WRITING: Students created a NARRATIVE piece from the viewpoint of the survivor from the survival activity of yesterday.  They were encouraged to include the dialogue in which we've been working upon and the emotional components and description we've been discussing as well.

MATH
We went over our Simple Solutions due today and learned about organizing our math notebooks. Liam even helped demonstrate Line Plots on the SMARTBoard for us...that Liam, he's so resourceful!

HOMEWORK: Simple Solutions #s 4, 5, & 6 due Wednesday, Aug. 26; #s 7 & 8 due Friday, Aug. 28th

SCIENCE
Morning flag people were taught how to do the flag (Andrew M., Adam B., and Elizabeth L.) and then we had a FIRE DRILL! After that, students went to the garden to start picking vegetables: the banana peppers, cherry tomatoes, squash, and green beans are very ripe!
HOMEWORK: Decorate science notebook and cover in tape by Monday

SOCIAL STUDIES:
Science ran over into S.S. today
HOMEWORK: none (weekend)

RELIGION:
Students completed their quilt squares
HOMEWORK: Decorate Religion notebook and cover in tape by Monday

KENTUCKY STATE FAIR started yesterday!  Will you be there this weekend?!?  I know I'll be there Saturday stuffing my face with all that fried yummy goodness tomorrow!

And we have many boys playing FOOTBALL THIS SUNDAY in their first game at 4:30 vs. St. Bernard.  Come on out and support our boys (and cheerleaders that I coach!)

GOOOOOO MONARCHS!!!

Have a wild and WONDERFUL weekend!
xoxo,
Mrs. Thomas

These kids are SELFIE OBSESSED!  ERRRRYBODY wants one :)

Add caption

and they were LOVING making fun of my BUBBLE skirt today.  Stinkers!