Libby's Solo Week!

Hi students and families! This week was my first solo week through Champlain College! Vasanthi let me be in charge for the past week and it was amazing! We began a new math unit, focusing on multiplication strategies. We also started a poetry unit. We looked at the structure of poems and each student had the chance to pick their favorite line from a "mentor text". With these lines, we created poems. Each table came up with a different poem involving the words they chose from poems they read. It was a great time! In reading groups Vasanthi and I have been working with individual reading groups to illustrate and understand specific poems. We are hoping to have a final poetry SLAM to celebrate their hard work! This has been such a fun week, I must thank you all for giving me this opportunity! Especially a shout out to the kids, they have been AMAZING! Next week, after break, I will be doing my second solo week. We are going to be working on writing more poetry and truly focusing on making each student the best poet they can be! I hope you all have a wonderful break!
-Libby

Collecting Data at McCabe's Brook

We collected our second sample from McCabe's Brook!  We were surprised to see the microsiemens measured less than last week!  We assumed more salt had been used on the roads and had made its way into the Brook!  Ask you child about conductivity!

Kinesthetic science with Mr. Miller

Thank you Mr Miller for taking the timeout of your busy schedule to teach us about the patterns in our solar system in terms of the Earth, Sun and Moon!  We are working journey through our disequilibrium with vocabulary like orbit, revolution, rotation and phases.  It was so worthwhile for us to move and act out these patterns so we could internalize them!  We now know and can explain with justifications that the sun is the center of our solar system.  We know the Earth orbits the sun while also spinning on its axis!  This is what gives us day and night, seasons and our calendar year!  The moon orbits the Earth and we always see the same face of the moon!  Ask your child about the lesson!  Not only was the science and the teaching amazing, it was an opportunity for us to meet Mr. Miller before 6th Grade!

Did you know that we will be collecting conductivity data on the McCabe's Brook this winter?

Ben Martin, a senior at UVM, has asked us to help him collect data on McCabe's Brook!  Once a week we will test the conductivity of the stream and enter the data into a spreadsheet!  We will use our data to write an article for our school newsletter, the Shelburne News and hopefully research some alternatives to road salt.  Our research couldn't come at a better timer!

Happy Birthday Abraham Lincoln!

Our President shares have been engaging and interesting!  We've loved hearing fun facts about each one and thinking about their famous quotes!  Thanks for all your effort!  We even celebrated Lincoln's 207th Birthday on Friday!  Thanks Knudsen Family!  

Our writing panel!

Thank you 7th Graders for coming and hearing our narratives and giving us feedback!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Thanks for the amazing valentines!  We are such a strong family of caring students! Hugs and Kisses!

Our narratives out in the world!

We sent our personal narratives to family and friends that we believed would enjoy reading our stories!  We hope to get some feedback!  We have already started another personal narrative and next Friday we will share them with an authentic audience made up of 6th and 7 th graders!  Our writing is getting stronger everyday!  We are using mentors to help us- our peers, other 5th graders, out teachers and famous authors!  We love going through the writing process and improving our craft!

First day of February

Yesterday we started of the day by adding fractions and finding the common denominator.  In morning meeting we played the game down by the banks.  We spent the morning editing, revising and finishing our narratives.  In guidance later that day, we started learning about relashionships.  Today we learned about deciliters, milliliters and liters.  Later today we are going to do a buddy sort in word study with our new groups and we will also read.  Yesterday was our catch up and relaxation day, but today we are back on track and are learning new and exciting things!