This week we logged in to www.sumdog.com for the first time in the computer lab. The kids had a great time practicing math facts and playing Junk Pile!
We also had Newton's Race! The students built ramps to use to race their cars.
Then they added washers to the cars to see if it made a difference in the speed of the cars.
Friday was Explorer Day. Students dressed up like explorers and brought items to trade.
All of the 5th grade classes went to the library and traded items. Everyone had a great time!
We also started making our flipbook to learn about the layers of the atmosphere. Check out this song to help you remember the layers!
STUDENTS: What was your favorite part of Explorer Day? What were you able to trade for? How does what we did compare to what the explorers actually did?
This was a very busy week for us! We started off by learning the properties of multiplication. You can see Dalton & Ryan playing a game where they had to match the properties to problems on their game board.
Our reading coach, Mrs. James, came in this week to help us with Daily Data. One of the things we learned to do was to make inferences about the data. Then we practiced finding unrelated inferences! Check out the list we generated to explain why someone sold more lemonade from week to week.
We also participated in the OREO project from Projects by Jen.
The kids stacked OREOs and tried to make the tallest stack. There were able to make 2 attempts.
Look at the concentration taking place!
After everyone finished we recorded the data in our Daily Data notebook and used the clickers to create a graph to show their averages.
After we finished stacking the kids were able to use the cookies to create a sculpture. Some worked alone and others synergized!
This week in science we were learning about Newton's First Law. The kids tried to keep the object at rest (penny) while sliding a paper circle out from under it. It took a lot of practice and concentration but some were able to make it work. We started by cutting circles out of cardstock. Then we balanced the penny on top of the paper and put all that on our thumbs. If the students had it balanced correctly they could hit the side of the paper circle. The paper circle would fly out and the penny would stay on their thumb! If they flipped it wrong the force of the paper moving made the penny move.
STUDENTS: Give me an example of Newton's 1st or 2nd law. We talked about the penny (1st law) and riding in a car (2nd law). Give me an example that you can think of that has not already been mentioned in the comments!
I wanted to share this with all my teacher followers. I made this QR code sheet the kids used to review our math skill this week, adding and subtracting decimals. I even made the video for the first QR code. This is my first video but I'll be doing more!
This week we went outside to learn about heat transfer! We found real world examples of conduction, convection, and radiation.
Check out the girls helping each other! Way to be proactive!
This week the students started presenting their Native American projects. They had to create a doll dressed in the correct attire and it had to be in a container with facts about the tribe. These are just 2 of our wonderful projects!
We started our Newton's Laws unit. We talked about speed and velocity. Check out this song.
Then we pulled out the toy cars and calculated their speed!
I'm super excited because next week we will be participating in the OREO project! We will be competing to see how many OREOs we can stack. So...
STUDENTS: I want you to make a prediction. How many OREOs do you think you'll be able to stack? Do you have a strategy planned?
This week we learned about the properties of addition. My students used dice to create addition problems that displayed the addition properties. I found the idea at Ginger Snaps if you want to see what we did.
We also started our math groups this week and the kids had a great time learning how to use our Versatiles.
Do you know about Coin Clues? I ordered this book from Mind Ware (which I love) and we started them this week in math to earn tickets for the good job jar. The students are given clues to determine the order of the coins. It is great for critical thinking and the kids were begging to do more!
As you can see, I LOVE Dr. Pepper! Thank you Ryan L for filling my fridge! I'm not sure how the water got in there. lol I think it must be left over from field day last year.
On day on the way back from lunch a few of my boys found these boxes. They jumped inside and said they were "thinking inside the box."
This week in science we have been learning about conduction, convection, and radiation. We spend a lot of time with our heat transfer pictures. I made a Voice Thread with a few of the pictures. Check it out and add some comments if you'd like. We are going to play around with Voice Thread because I'd love to see my students start to use it. I told them they can figure it out and then teach me!
I was also excited to find our that popplet featured our class mission statement on their blog! See it here.
STUDENTS: Share one example of conduction, convection, OR radiation. Make sure you don't repeat what your classmates say. Go back and read the comments before you post to get credit this week. I'll have your tickets ready Monday morning.
This week we learned about Habit 1: Be Proactive. We used www.popplet.com to brainstorm ideas and develop our class mission statement. I took pictures each day so you could see how we were able to work on and create our mission statement.
We started by listing the reasons we come to school. The following day we grouped those reasons (using color) and then added why it is important to do those things.
Finally, today we used our 3 color groups to create our mission statement.
Our class mission statement: In Mrs. White's class, we are working become better people, to have fun with friends while learning, and to get a good education so we can be successful in everything we do. I was so proud of them for writing such a wonderful mission statement!
We learned about proactive and reactive people. So we had a race (girls vs. boys) to list as many things we could think of that these people would say. The boys (proactive) won the race but both groups did a great job!
Daily Data is becoming a part of our daily routine. This week we voted for plain or peanut M&Ms. We then used this data to create a graph, determine who might be interested in this data, and determined another daily data question for later.
We used poppers to explore kinetic and potential energy. The kids measured the height of the popper when it started on different surfaces: tile, cardboard, and carpet.
Our reading story this week was Island of the Blue Dolphins. One of our vocabulary words was kelp so we tried some before the test.
As you can see, it was not a hit with most students. There were a few who liked it but not many.
We have also been using a math wall each day. I didn't think to take a picture of it before I erased it to prepare for next week. On the top right we create all he arrays we can for the target number of the day. We have also been adding cups to our gallon. We also learned the Big G to remember the number of cups, pints, and quarts in a gallon.
The Dinosaur Stomp was a popular brain break this week. I made this iMovie trailer to show the kids the video of them doing this. Everyone had a good laugh and I thought I'd share. If you want to try this at home or with your students I've added the video below.
STUDENTS: This week we worked on Habit 1: Be Proactive. Tell me something you learned and what you plan to do in order to become a proactive person.
This week I learned another math game at a math workshop so I taught the kids how to play today. This one is called Reverse Wild War. All you need to play is a deck of cards. The students each take 3 cards. With those cards he/she tries to get as close to zero as possible.
You use addition, subtraction, multiplication, & division. Face cards are worth 10 and A can be used as 1 or 11. Once you have a total use the absolute value to see which player is closest to zero. The winner takes all the cards from that round. Keep playing until you are out of cards. The kids decided if there is a tie the players play a tie breaker round.
Ex: 10, 7, 4 10-7 = 3/4 = .75
This week we also started our Daily Data notebooks. I posted the daily data sheet back before school started. This week the students voted for their favorite shaved ice flavor: grape or cherry. Then they created a graph with the data.
STUDENTS: This week we started a lot of new things in math. I want to know how you and your family use math. List a few ways you and your family have used math at home (and don't list math homework).
