Somehow we have completed the first semester of the 2014-2015 school year. Amazing how time flies when you are having fun! Speaking of fun, I got some great news this week that I had the opportunity to share: I filled out an application for a grant to attend educator's Space Camp in Huntsville, Alabama, at NASA's Space & Rocket Center and found out this week that they selected me!! I'll get to spend a week in June (all expenses paid even!) learning to be an astronaut and finding better ways to bring science and math learning to life for kids. Great early Christmas gift! On to news from the classroom...Math Olympiad number two is complete. Fourth and fifth graders seemed to find this month's problem solving questions more challenging than last month, but everyone persevered to get an answer down for as many questions as they could in the limited time. I am finding that even when they don't come up with the exact answer, the kids are using their strategies and looking for shortcuts. With practice, their precision will also improve. Because these tests are copyrighted material, you will not see copies of these come home, but if you are interested in what your child is challenged with each month, stop by and I'll give you a peak at the type of problems. As for other math news in each grade... 3rd grade has been exploring our base-ten number system through comparison activities. We have played games in a base-three system to see how challenging it is to subtract when you have to trade three and not ten. We have explored writing numbers in ancient Egyptian symbols (and how LONG that takes) and also looked at writing numbers in Chinese and how similar it is to our expanded form. While it has been a very short unit, I think the kids have enjoyed exploring the origins of our Hindu-Arabic number symbols. 4th grade students have completed a unit on multi-digit multiplication. After exploring different strategies, everyone picked their favorite and mastered it. We'll review this briefly after break and move on to long division. Lastly, 5th grade has been working knowledge of fractions. By working with math manipulatives and creating visual representations, the kids have been reinforcing their conceptual understanding of equivalent fractions and addition and subtraction of fractions. After making sure they have this background knowledge reviewed, we have then been practicing the procedures (the algorithms) needed to perform problems with + and - of fractions and mixed numbers. Not an easy concept for fifth graders. We'll continue after break with multiplication and division of fractions before moving to converting fractions to decimals. As for language arts/creativity groups, 5th grade language arts wrapped up our poetry writing/reading unit this week. Ask your student their thoughts on "Love that Dog" and "Hate that Cat" (two read-alouds we enjoyed over the last few weeks.) Here is an example of one of the poems that an "anonymous" student wrote that I thought beautifully captured the holiday season: I hear Christmas singing, the varied carols I hear, Third grade completed the second semester with me and will return to my classroom after Spring Break now. This week we completed creative projects based on The Green Book. Students got to choose, complete and share their projects. Some wrote an article for the newspaper about the events of the book, others created a map of what they visualized as we read, and still others imagined what would go on in the sequel. Here are a couple of examples of student work: Have a safe and joyous holiday break and see you all in the new year!!
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Wow! Only 6 school days left until break. I will be brief this week because I know we are busy at my house with holiday and school festivities, and I am sure you don't have a lot of time to read my rambling. Here goes... With only a few computer glitches, all of my math students completed our Hour of Code challenge this week. The kids seemed to love the chance to play while learning. At least one student said, "I never realized coding could be fun!" With comments like that, I consider that time well spent. Maybe we will have inspired the next Bill Gates or Steve Jobs (or hopefully the next female techno giant!) The Hour of Code links stay hot all year and the challenge continues through Sunday so if your child has earned some extra screen time, let them use these educational sites to experiment. http://traceybean.weebly.com/web-resources.html http://code.org/ The next Math Olympiad contest is on Tuesday, December 16. I had to change the date (it was suppose to be Wednesday) because of a choir field trip. Students in 4th and 5th grades will participate in this problem solving, nationwide contest. It entails five problems in 25 minutes covering algebra, geometry, divisibility, fractions, and more. The students did such a great job last month so I am looking forward to seeing how they fare this month! Sadly, next week is my last week with the third grade language arts/creativity group. Due to limits in my schedule, I see either third or fourth grade each quarter, and so I will transition to working with the fourth grade language arts/creativity group after Christmas break. Third grade will rejoin me after spring break. We have had a great quarter reading The Green Book and discussing how change is a major theme in this book. We have created time capsules showcasing the important things about life in 2014. We have written persuasive paragraphs about their favorite "luxury item" they would want to take on a journey in a spaceship to "Shine" (the fictional planet the characters go to live on.) We have discussed the use of imagery and key ideas and concepts within the book. So much work! Next week we will conclude our study of this book by completing a literature-based creativity project of their choice. I'll share more about what the kids create. Tune in next week! I hope you all had a fabulous Thanksgiving. My family enjoyed our time in New York City, and we made it to see the Macy's Day parade (although if you watched it on tv, you know that it was not the warmest day of the year!) Now we have the fast and furious weeks before the Christmas holiday. Here is a quick update on the world of Werner GT... I had the chance to check in this week with all of the gifted kids regarding their affective (social/emotional) goals for the year. With 5th grade, we talked about what it means to make "intelligent mistakes" by reading a silly story about failed science experiments and talking about what can be learned from failure. The kids also took their first semester reflection sheet so they can think about how their first risk-taking goal experience was. Those are due by December 19 (check with your child and make sure they turned in their blue reflection sheet in the coming weeks.) Fourth grade talked with me about how to manage paperwork which relates to their goal about study skills and organization habits. And by manage, I mean cleaning out their binders and backpacks and determining what to do with papers when they are completed or need to be completed. Take a moment to chat with your fourth grader and talk about a weekly time to clean out backpacks and binders. Also consider helping them find a place at home to file papers that they want to keep (if you don't already have a system in place for important papers and fourth grade memories.) Finally, third grade is working on peer relationships. We read a silly story with tips on making new friends called "Scaredy Squirrel Makes a Friend" and then we brainstormed what it looks like and sounds like to be a good friend. You would be surprised how challenging it is to truly define a good friend. The picture below is the chart of ideas we came up with: Fourth grade math students have begun learning different strategies for multi-digit multiplication. I know parents can feel a little frustrated with the methods that we use to teach kids mathematical algorithms these days. You probably think that the traditional method worked for you, why don't we just use that? I think it is important for kids to learn multiple methods, especially gifted students. Some kids "see" math differently and one method or another makes more sense for them. Math using Common Core standards is no longer about memorizing procedures like when I was in school. Math is now as much about understanding the concept thoroughly as it is about correct process. Some of the other methods (like partial products) help students understand the concept of multiplication through place value understanding. I was taught to put an "X" on the second line of a 2-digit times 2 digit equation. I never understood why until I became a teacher and realized that X is a place holder for the ones place. All of this is to say, please bear with me, fourth grade parents, as I teach your child different methods. Ultimately, I'll let them pick their favorite method, and I'll make sure they can compute with that method accurately. If you want to understand more about these methods, check out these links to videos that will explain to you just what that "crazy math" is that your child is learning. Partial Products http://everydaymath.uchicago.edu/teaching-topics/computation/mult-part-prod/ Lattice http://everydaymath.uchicago.edu/teaching-topics/computation/mult-lattice/ The Hour of Code is a national movement to have kids experience computer programming at all age levels for at least one hour of their school year. All of my math classes will be participating in the Hour of Code on Tuesday, December 9. Students will be using various websites to program a light robot, a tank, Anna & Elsa (of "Frozen" fame,) and many more options. These links to the programming games are on the website now if you would like to check them out or your child would like to experiment more with basic programming at home. Go to the Web Resources page on the website and scroll down to the Hour of Code links. I tried to provide a basic description for each of the links and guidelines for ages. You might even be interested in playing around with some of them yourself! http://traceybean.weebly.com/web-resources.html |
Tracey BeanWerner Elementary Archives
May 2018
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