Poetry Unit Home of the Brave & Refugees Algebra Continued This week we began our poetry unit in language arts. We were lucky to have Lyn Hoopes, a former FA parent and awesome poet, come work with us twice this week. She shared some of her photography skills as well as poetry tips and tricks. We were able to use our photos from vacation to inspire our own poems, and it was such a valuable experience. Students will be excited to share their final works with you. We also began a new classroom novel, called Home of the Brave. This is a phenomenal story of a boy named Kek who is a Sudanese refugee. He is brought to Minneapolis (where I lived until I was 11) during winter to live with his aunt and cousin. He has lost his father and brother to war, and his mother is still missing. This story is relevant to our next unit in social studies, as we are going to be studying government, and later, specifically how government policies can affect immigrants and refugees. It also happens to be written in poetry form! We started our unit with Home of the Brave by looking at some photos of the Sudanese people, their homes, and the struggles they were facing in 2014, around the time the story takes place. Here are a few of the photos we discussed below. Through the jarring and moving photos students were given a visual tool to imagine where the main character in the story, Kek, came from. We also read articles related to refugees and shared with the class for morning meeting on Thursday. See below for the articles we read! We continue to work through our unit on Algebra in math. We continued to update our interactive math notebooks with strategies to conquer variable and expression problems, and we even worked with Mrs. H-K's class to mix it up and work on algebra together. On Thursday students worked in stations, playing matching games to identify correct algebra expressions based on sentences and word problems. Students will take a unit assessment on algebra next week. It is that time of year again for the annual Arts and Poetry Night which will take place on Thursday, April 19th. Susan Cogliano and Wendy Goldsmith are looking for volunteers to help hang and display art for this exciting event that will showcase the artwork your children have completed throughout the year. As most of you know, there is an enormous amount of work to display but with enough hands we hope to complete this set up in one day. We will begin at 8:00am on Friday, April 13th and continue working throughout the day. This is also a parent/teacher conference day (so you may be coming in already!). If you are willing and able to donate any time at all to this very worthy cause,
please contact Susan or Wendy. There will be supervised care in the library for children of volunteers (free of charge). Thank you for your support. Wendy and Susan's email addresses are listed below. Susan- [email protected] [email protected] Lastly, I want to let parents know that even though it felt like we just had conferences, I am always available to meet again and discuss the recent progress reports, goals for the remainder of the year, and summer work plans. On the afternoon of Wednesday, April 11 and on Friday, April 13 during the school day I am offering time to meet and conference again. Please let me know if you are interested in meeting during these time slots. However, we can plan on meeting before the end of the year, should you want to wait a bit! I hope you have a joyful weekend, whether you celebrate Easter, Passover, both, or neither! Best, Sarah
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Field Trip to Boston! Did you know... Wax Museum On the Road Homework for Break The fifth graders were so engaged and focused on their field trip Tuesday. William, our trusty tour guide, had their undivided attention as he touched on some facts they knew from their Wax Museum studies, and so many cool things we didn't know yet. Below are some of the cool facts they learned and shared with me after we returned to school. Did you know that... -Paul Revere was well liked and had good friends almost everywhere he went? He would borrow their horses when his horse tired out to be the fastest rider and messenger in the colonies. -John Hancock was the wealthiest man in New England at the time of the Revolutionary war. He owned 9 ships of his own at the start of the war, which was 3 times the amount of ships the Rebel army owned at that time! -Sam Adams was not a nice person, and wasn't even very good at his job! But he's well known now for his beer brand. Also, Sam Adams was a rather large and unfit gentleman, so when you see a photo or statue of him looking fit, it is actually his head with Paul Revere's body substituted! -The Battle of Bunker Hill really should have been called the Battle of Breed's hill because it took place there (accidentally). -The Boston Massacre began as a snowball fight, which led to a mistakenly fired shotgun. -The famous Boston Massacre paintings show Rebels getting attacked by strong Loyalists, but really rebels were provoking the loyalists with an icy snowball fight. This was early propaganda! -James Otis once wrote that he had a premonition that he was going to die by lightening striking him. He almost died when he was hit with the butt of a musket during a protest, but he survived that, only to die when....he was hit by lightening later in life! When his skull was examined later, scientists found that tree roots actually wove their way through the spot in his skull where he'd been hit with the gun years earlier. That blow wasn't fatal, but certainly did some brain damage. -The Massachusetts statehouse has a golden pinecone on the top of it to represent the lumber from Maine, which used to be a part of MA. -The Patriot (Rebel) army would have secret meetings, and to make sure that everyone who tried to enter was a Patriot, they would ask those in attendance what the critter was on top of Quincy Market at Faneuil Hall weathervane. Any Patriot knew it was called a "Grasshopper", but any loyalists were outed because they used the British word for it, "Green Cricket". Busted! -Boston is mostly landfill. It first had many wharfs, like fingers, and then the spaces between the wharfs was filled in with landfill. Then more wharfs would be built, and filled in. -Faneuil Hall used to be on the beach! Ships could pull right up to what we now call the Quincy Market. The sails would sometimes touch the building's windows! We were able to see the old shore line. On Thursday night we shared with the local community how truly awesome we are. We performed our Wax Museum speeches once again, sharing interesting facts and stories about unsung heroes from the Revolution War. I was so impressed, and so were the crowds and droves of people who learned from our awesome students. I told the kids today at morning meeting that they have most certainly EARNED their break. See below for photos from the museum! Yes, it is true. Students have homework over spring break. It has two parts. 1) Students must read at least ONE chapter book over the break. No listening to the book, no graphic novels, and no reading only half a book. One whole book (at a minimum). This really means they should aim to read 15 minutes a day. 2) Students must also take a few artistic photos. They can borrow your phones or use an iPad or iPod, or a digital camera, to take these photos. We will use them to inspire our poetry unit with visiting poet-in-residence Lyn Hoopes after break. Students have a detailed handout in their trappers for this assignment. The categories below are suggestions. The point of the assignment is for kids to return to school after break with ONE or TWO photos that they are proud of, and that they can use to write a poem about. I hope you all have healthy, enjoyable, and fun times with your kids during the break. I sure hope that spring is in full swing when we get back. I am off to Boca Raton, Florida to see my grandparents, and then to see Ms. Conlon in Sanibel.
Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns. Best, Sarah Wax Museum! Field Trip to Boston What a wild and wonderful day we had yesterday for the Wax Museum. I was so impressed by all of their hard work, focus, and ability to perform yesterday, even in the dark! See photos below of the figures in their element. Luckily this week I have plenty of fun photos to share. Not only did these amazing kids put on the magnificent Wax Museum yesterday, but they also dressed up and sang about freedom and the Revolutionary war on Wednesday at All School Meeting. We also had a visit from the New Bedford Symphony Orchestra to discuss their latest programming. The focus this year is salt marshes and how instruments work together in an orchestra, much like organisms in a salt marsh. See photos below! The only other message this week is about our field trip on Tuesday. We will take a bus to Boston Tuesday morning and from the bus we get onto a trolley. This trolley tour takes us to historic sites around the city that connect to the Revolutionary war. We will do a fair bit of walking too, so please send kids with:
-comfortable walking shoes -layers (including raincoat if weather is not cooperating) -water bottles -non-heat up lunch If you have any questions, please let me know. I hope you have power and are enjoying a safe and enjoyable weekend. Sarah |