With the shortened school week and our 2nd engineering challenges, we didn't have too much time for new instruction this week, but we did have fun. Here is a quick updates on day one of the challenges for each grade level... Fourth grade's mission this session is, "You have now figured out how to build a rocket to leave the surface of Earth. The next step is to land on the moon. Now NASA needs you to design and test a shock-absorbing system that can help a craft get to the moon and land on the moon and safely deliver two astronauts for exploration without injury to them or their craft." Check out some of the pictures of our planning and building beginning. (There was some major espionage going on today too!) Fifth grade formed their teams today and began their mission, "Once a rover lands on an alien surface, it must be able to perform science experiments for us remotely. We want this rover to be able to collect samples, take pictures, and monitor the environment. Your portion of the mission today is to design a robotic arm that can reach out and pick up an object and bring it safely back to you." The students must craft a robotic arm to pick up a cup holding 100 grams. Love listening to their problem solving and conflict resolution as they try to work with their teams! Check out a couple of shots from today... And the last group of the day were the third graders whose objective was, "Design & build the framework (6 X 6 X 6 inches) for a new capsule for astronauts that can hold up under the extreme pressure of space (math textbooks)." Interesting to see how cardboard can be used in so many different ways! I also love hearing the kid stress about a budget and begin to understand how important it is to make a plan before blowing said budget! There are even more pictures on the photos page of the website, but here are a couple of teasers... One last note, if your child is interested in learning more about the history of our space program and how our astronauts and aerospace engineers have problem solved in real life, I have been watching "Secret Space Escapes" on the Discovery Science channel. Their website also has many of the episodes online. Here is a link to the video 5th grade will watch tomorrow to understand how important robotic arms are to the space program and how they can be used to save lives:
http://www.sciencechannel.com/tv-shows/secret-space-escapes/secret-space-escapes-video/iss-solar-panel-rip-2/_
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Stay tuned for next week's update on our 2nd Space STEM Challenge. Math students will be participating on Thursday and Friday, February 18 & 19, in our next engineering build-off. Thanks to those of you who have already offered to volunteer. I could still use a couple of 4th grade parents if you have a little time to volunteer: http://www.signupgenius.com/go/20f0c4fa4ae2ea6fd0-stem_ Last week, the fifth grade students and I took advantage of our technology and participated in a Mystery Skype on Friday. With a Mystery Skype, the two classes don't know where each other are, and basically play a game of 20 questions using their geography skills to determine the other class' location. Turned out our partner class was from Charlotte, North Carolina - home of the Carolina Panthers! My friend Whitney Godfrey teaches 5th grade science at River Gate Elementary there. We organized the Skype in honor of our Super Bowl teams. Mrs. Godfrey and I had a couple of challenges then related to the big game: First, the winning state's class would receive handmade homework passes from the losing state's class (to be used for one assignment in the future.) Second, we did a coin drive just for this last week. We'll pool the money tomorrow and all the funds will go to the winning quarterback's foundation. Since that was the Broncos (YEAH!!) the winning Foundation is Manning's Peyback Foundation. Here are a couple of pictures from our end as we were Skyping... Fourth grade math students have begun a new unit this week on fractions. We'll be exploring equivalent fractions, comparing fractions, adding & subtracting fractions, and multiplying fractions by a whole number. This unit will lead into the next study which will be converting decimals, fractions, and percents. As part of our kick off today, we had some fun exploring fractions with pattern blocks and changing the whole to see how that changes the value of the shapes. Check out these engaged learners as they draw and learn... Not to be left out, third grade Knowledge Peak students all came down to meet with me on Tuesday for their affective goal review. Since their goals this year are all related to better peer relationships and learning how to work cooperatively, I gave them a challenge. Each group of three got 10 sheets of newspaper, five paperclips, a cup, and masking tape. There were fruit snacks taped on the wall and they had to figure out how to work as a group to devise a way to get the fruit snacks off the wall before they could eat them. It turned out to be a harder challenge than they thought (and we had such a limited time, unfortunately) but thanks to some great time reflecting on their group dynamics, everyone was a winner as they turned in their reflections this week. Again here are some pictures of your children having some fun! For more pictures from each of these, check out the photos page of the website:
http://traceybean.weebly.com/photos.html Couple of quick announcements for the next couple of weeks... Tuesday, February 9, is the 4th Math Olympiad for 4th and 5th grade math students. Thursday & Friday, February 18 & 19, are the next STEM Challenges. Sign-up Genius for parent volunteers was sent this week. Check your email inbox. Third grade language arts has begun again this week and will continue for the month of February. The students are leading and participating in literature circles based on Andrew Clements books that are about school. Your child is either reading The School Story, The Report Card, or Frindle. We had our first meetings today in small groups and the kids did a GREAT job participating in good discussions about our novels. Each week the kids will have 4-5 chapters to read and a job to complete. Their job will be either director when they write two "deep" questions for their team to discuss, summarizer when they write a 5-8 sentence summary of just what we read, word wizard where they define the two words given each week, or illustrator when students must graphically represent the chapters we read and write two sentences to explain. Mondays will be an in-class work day and Thursdays will be the official meeting day. In between, we will be doing some reader's theater and creativity tasks. Check with your child and see what their job is for next week's reading. The snow day changed our plans a little this week, as I was suppose to meet with all of the grade level gifted students to touch base on their affective goals from their ALP for the year. 5th graders' goals are based on healthy risk taking. We read stories of famous mistakes that turned out to be a success (ask them about the stories behind popsicles, hot dogs, or sticky notes.) 4th graders' goals are based on study skills and organization. We discussed test taking strategies. We also had some fun coming up with test taking tip posters that we can post during PARCC testing in April (they were super creative with slogans like "PARCC - the playground for your mind!") I will meet with 3rd graders next week to discuss their peer relationship goals and do a fun activity to work on team building. Stay tuned next week for pictures! What an amazing experience our first STEM Challenge was! The parent help was invaluable too! We had some great creativity going on in class to meet their objectives. The students worked very hard to communicate and cooperate with their teammates. There were challenges and frustrations and success and failures. Such is the life of an engineer! We also had 13 Fossil Ridge seniors come and help on Fridays with the building, testing, and reflecting. In your students' Friday Folder should be the copy of their reflection from the build. I played around with IMovie (forgive the cheesy music!) and created some videos for each grade level that are the pictures and test videos from our fun days. Check out the videos below and the pictures are uploaded by grade on the photos page. Enjoy! What an awesome day today was!! We began our first STEM Engineering Challenge. Actually, I should say what a great week it was! Monday was like Christmas morning as all of the supplies I ordered got delivered and organized. Here are a couple of shots from what my classroom looked like Monday afternoon... Thanks to amazing parent volunteers, excellent teamwork (seriously almost NO scrabbles between teams!) and some perseverance, all three math classes jumped right in to their work. Third grade worked on catapults for pom-poms with the goal of getting shooting your pom-pom as far as possible. Fourth grade built straw rockets with the goal of consistently hitting a target five feet away. Fifth grade is building airbag landers for their rover (EGG!) to land safely from a six foot drop. Keep in mind that they get no instructions on how to accomplish this. The students get the challenge, two teammates, a list of optional supplies (that they must "purchase" with their 200 points,) a poster to brainstorm on and they get to work. Tomorrow we'll finish the design/test/rebuild phase, complete our final tests for the offical points tally, and reflect on their task, as well as their group dynamics. All the pictures I took yesterday are on the photos page of the website so check them out. http://traceybean.weebly.com/photos.html That wasn't the only thing we did all week. Fourth grade math students have been learning about angles all week. We started the week reviewing how to name them (acute, obtuse, reflex...) and mid-week began measuring angles with different types of protractors. For a little bit of fun and exercise, we had a relay race for our review of angle descriptions. Here are a couple of photos from Monday. You can tell by the blurriness how competitive and speedy they were! One of the shifts mathematical learning with the Colorado Standards is that students understand how to use and manipulate number lines. As third grade has been exploring fractions, we have been also making sure to relate fractions to number lines. This last week our focus was on understanding how whole numbers, mixed numbers, and improper fractions (or as I like to call them "fractions greater than 1") all line up on number lines. We had some fun working with partners to create number lines, break them into fractional units, and label them while writing on the table. Something about writing on the table makes any topic more interesting! Next week will be our first STEM project (January 28 & 29 for those of you that volunteered to help!) so I have a feeling next week's blog will focus on my math groups experiences. This week I'll catch you up on what language arts/creativity groups are up to in Knowledge Peak. This week or next week depending on your child's homeroom teacher's schedule, you will find your child's mid-year report for their ALP (Advanced Learning Plan) in Friday Folders. Students completed a self-reflection on one side and a teacher (me for math and their homeroom teacher for reading) filled out the back with their thoughts at this point in the year. Please remember that this is just a check-in to see where your child might need to focus their energy in the second semester so that they can be considered completing their goal by the end of the year. Please let me know if you have any questions! 5th grade language arts/creativity kids have just begun a long-term project focused on learning to read nonfiction and do research. Your child has now brainstormed a topic and narrowed it to their top choice to complete an essay and a presentation project. Topics are ranging from the Borneo rainforests to Steven Hawking to requirements/qualifications to become president to necessary elements to colonize Mars. These projects are not due until Spring Break so we will spend many weeks first doing research and then working on how to synthesize that research into a coherent essay complete with citations and a bibliography. Take a minute to ask your child what their topic is and what their next due date it. One of the huge pieces of this project is learning to budget time and energy for a long-term project and meet deadlines along the way. Another element of this project is learning to use Google classroom and Google docs to complete work. Many of the middle school and high school teachers use Google Classroom for all student work so this will help them learn how to get assignments and submit work. Below is the outline of the project so you know what your child is expected to do (they have the due dates in Google Classroom where we are housing all of our work.) Fourth grade language arts/creativity is completing our last week together until March next week. They have been independently reading a biography on a Colorado history person. We have been learning and sharing about Mary Long Elitch and John Wesley Powell and Margaret Brown and more. Students had three tasks: read the book, write the ABC's of your person, complete a choice project. Most of them are in good shape. Please check with your child and see what they still need to complete. We will be working all week in class, but they may need to spend some time in the evenings this week finishing up since these are due on Thursday, January 28. Below is the requirements sheet that the students got: Updates this week on where each of the math classes are at in our studies... Third grade is continuing our study of fractions. This last week, we made sure they had secured the idea of unit fractions (fractions with a numerator of 1,) and then we worked on decomposing fractions into unit fractions. For example, seeing that 3/4 is 1/4 + 1/4 + 1/4 - the basics of adding and subtracting fractions. This next week we'll continue looking at fractions on number lines and real-world uses of fractions. The lessons I am using are from the Eureka curriculum which is one that the district is considering for adoption next year. Eureka is published by a nonprofit company called Great Minds. If you are interested in taking a deeper look at this curriculum, take a peak at http://greatminds.net/maps/math/home where you can see everything they provide for free. In February, third grade will be learning geometry from the other curriculum the district is considering which is called EnVision 2.0. Fourth grade began exploring long division and the strategies that students can use to first understand the concepts behind division and eventually learn the traditional method. I know parents sometimes get frustrated with the methods we use to teach students algorithms for the basic computation. Please trust that the goal of teachers now is not to simply teach students to memorize steps to solve a problem but to truly understand why the math works and why the standard (traditional) algorithms work. With that said, 4th grade spent the week exploring the concept of division as equal grouping, repeated subtraction, and the inverse of multiplication. Below you will see their best attempts based on basic understanding to divide 253 by 11. Rest assured, they will learn more efficient methods this week. Fifth grade math students began our unit on fractions this week. By the end of this unit, we will have mastered computations with fractions and mixed numbers including subtraction, addition, and multiplication. We'll cover division in a later unit this year too. This last week we had some fun exploring equivalent fractions with fraction tiles and fraction circles. The students reviewed greatest common factors, least common multiples, and converting mixed numbers to improper fractions and back again since all of those skills will be required in the coming weeks. We learned how to create fractions in their simplest form (the form that ALL answers must be in from here on out.) Below are some shots of our equivalent fraction explorations and math graffiti. Welcome back to the 2016 portion of our school year! One quick note, Math Olympiad 3 is on Tuesday next week for 4th and 5th graders so please try to make sure your child is in math that day since those contests cannot be made up. Here are a few things that went on our first week back... Third Grade math students are participating with me in piloting our new math curriculum choices so for the next two months we won't be using our normal Every Day Math (orange) books. I am on the adoption committee for the district, and we have narrowed it down to two. This month, we'll be learning fractions from Eureka Math. This week we completed some of the lessons. Today we created a "Fraction Museum" where students had to take a fractional unit and given paper, water, string, and playdough to demonstrate how to create equal pieces to demonstrate their fractions. It was fun, and there were some mistakes we had to fix in the end. Here is some picture evidence of the kids' work (more pictures on the photos page.) 5th Grade language arts/creativity is hard at work again to finish up our last poem for our poetry unit. The students used their math and technology skills to write a poem that reflected what they add up to. Below are a few of the students' examples of what they feel makes them "100% Me." Next week we will leave poetry behind and begin our Peak Projects - nonfiction reading, writing, researching, and creating projects that will take us the next couple of months to create and present. In Friday Folders this week, if your child is in my math class, you will find a letter for you that explains how your child can login and how you can keep tabs on their progress in http://www.XtraMath.org This program is something that we do in class weekly to practice basic math facts. What I love about this site is that it makes the students pass their addition facts then their subtraction and finally their multiplication. Many gifted students THINK they are beyond the need for addition facts. Many of them have found that is not the case. I have written on your child's letter what their % progress is in the topic they are on, and I have told the kids that at this point if they are still on addition (especially in 5th grade!) after 1/2 a year of practice, they need to be spending homework time doing more on this site so that they can pass. Please take a minute to chat with your child about their progress and determine what two nights of the week they would be willing to sit for less than 5 minutes each to do some extra sessions in XtraMath. The better they know their basic facts, the easier more complex math is in class. Fourth graders are finding this to be especially true now that they are in units covering long multiplication and long division problems. Thanks for your help with this necessary piece of math learning! First, I would like to wish you all a Happy Holidays. Enjoy time with family and find time to relax during this holiday break! What a surprise the snow day was on Tuesday! It did throw a bit of a wrench in my plans to bring closure to projects and units before break, but we are rolling with it. Here are quick notes related to language arts/creativity groups: The second round of third grade language arts time wrapped up today with a literature circle based on the book When Marian Sang based on the real life of Marian Anderson, a famous opera singer who fought against segregation to achieve her dream. This was a practice for third graders to understand the different jobs for literature circles so that in February we are ready to read a full novel and lead discussions in small groups. Fourth grade will pick back up with language arts time with me after the holiday break. Remind your fourth grader that they have projects based on Bud, Not Buddy that are due on January 4 when we are back together. Fifth graders literally did wrap up our latest unit on poetry today. I hope you will be pleased Christmas morning when you get your first glimpse of a little secret we have been working on for the last few weeks. There are some amazingly creative kids in that group. Below you can see some pictures of Santa's Workshop today during our "wrap up!" One thing I would request of you over Christmas break is to please work with your child - 3rd, 4th, and 5h graders - on their basic facts. We are using XtraMath.org this year to practice basic facts and many of the students are still trying to pass their addition facts. They must pass addition to get to subtraction and then multiplication. I would love for them to be done with addition and subtraction. If you could have them login to their account even 3-4 times during break, that would be awesome. Each time they login, it only takes about 5-10 minutes to run through a session. The kids know how to login from their computers (and they SHOULD know their four-digit login.) I have also sent them with a flyer reminding them. This flyer also has information for how you can sign up to get updates on their progress. Any help with this would be wonderful! Check out XtraMath at https://xtramath.org/#/home/index Please feel free to check out the Web Resources portion of the GT website too for other useful links for keeping math skills up during the two-week break. These are games that can be fun as well as educational if you don't mind your child having some extra screen time. The third grade page has some great games for working on basic multiplication fact mastery. http://traceybean.weebly.com/web-resources.html Lastly this week, I have a request. I mentioned that I have been approved for a grant for engineering projects for the spring semester. Some of these projects require some recycled materials that I would love some help collecting. If you have any of these materials in your recycle box, can you begin to gather them for me to add to my collection? We will be needing: * empty plastic water bottles * cardboard (cut into 2X8 strips, 2X4 strips, 8X8 squares, 4X5 rectangles) * paper towel tubes or wrapping paper tubes Quick note on Math Olympiad for next week, due to the choir field trip, I have moved the Math Olympiad contest to Wednesday for both 4th and 5th graders. We will participate in contest #2 during our math times on December 16. Please try to make sure your child is at school as they cannot make this contest up when they return to school. 5th grade will also check in on their Stock Market portfolios on that day. As many of you know, I had the opportunity to attend NASA Space Camp for Educator’s thanks to Honeywell last summer. I had so many great ideas for bringing back STEM learning to my classroom. But new ideas usually need a little “seed money” to get them rolling when you work with around 60 students. I applied for and have gotten word that I have received $400 from a grant from Toshiba, who was looking for STEM learning opportunities to invest in this school year. I am so excited that next semester each of my math classes will be doing monthly engineering projects (mostly space related) to learn about collaboration, designing, testing, and redesigning using their creative and mathematical skills. I can’t wait to kick this off. A group of Fossil High School students were also looking for a service project to share their passion for STEM fields so they will also be coming to help. If there are any of you that would want to volunteer time to help or you also have a passion for engineering and the design process, please let me know as I can always use more hands. We will use one Thursday/Friday each month during our regular scheduled math time to do these projects. More info to come… Probably the most fun the kids had all week in my math classes was to participate in the Hour of Code. This is a nationwide movement to get computer programming taught in public schools to all students at all levels for at minimum one hour each school year so that kids can see it isn't too hard and everyone is capable of coding. The kids were able to choose some basic block-programming games to play and learn from. These websites can be found on the Web Resources link on the GT website. They are open sites year round so that your child can get on and learn/play all year (consider this when they are bored over Christmas break!) I have put the links to a couple of the kids’ favorites here in case you too want to try your hand at coding! Also below is a quick video introducing the Hour of Code. Star Wars https://code.org/starwars Minecraft https://code.org/mc Frozen https://studio.code.org/s/frozen Hopefully you enjoyed a fabulous Thanksgiving feast at your house, and are now enjoying the December holiday season. Let me catch you up on the last couple of weeks in Knowledge Peak classes (since I was too sleepy after my turkey dinner last Thursday to blog!) Quick update on each class and what we are studying for the month of December: 5th grade math – Test over graphing and data collection this week and moving on to a brief unit on setting up and solving algebra equations 5th language arts/creativity – Working on a poetry unit (both writing and reading) 4th math – Finishing our decimal and measurement unit and beginning our long multiplication/division study 4th language arts/creativity – Break for the month of December, but don’t forget to be working on Bud, Not Buddy projects 3rd math – Completing a unit on basic multiplication and division and will be starting a unit on place value including decimals 3rd language arts/creativity – Shared The Green Book projects and learning about literature circles roles and modeling good discussion for literature circles As I mentioned 3rd grade language arts/creativity students spent this week presenting their book projects from our study of The Green Book. This story is a dystopian book about a father and his three kids that are a part of colonizing a new planet Shine after having to leave Earth. The students did an AMAZING on their projects. They were so creative! Some chose to continue the story of the people of Shine including elements like adding new alien characters, finding new creatures, facing new challenges, and even the death of a main character cliffhanger! Other students took time to put their visualization skills on paper or models. They created maps (complete with legends,) clay models, and structures to showcase what they saw in their minds for the layout of this new world. Still other students used their powers of invention to create something that the people of Shine could use to make their lives better like wheat harvesting machines. A couple of the girls used their artistic abilities to show us a picture of what life on Shine might look like a year after the book ends. Seriously amazing work! Here are some examples (and more are on the photos page.) Keeping on the 3rd grade theme, before we left for Thanksgiving break, the third grade teaching team and I organized a fun end to our measurement unit. The Second-Annual Measurement Olympics were held and medals were awarded for estimation and measuring skills. Students were put into groups with teachers, and our AWESOME group of parent volunteers manned the stations to help kids test their skills. Events included the cotton ball shotput, the straw-javelin throw, the paper plate discus throw, and many more. Again there are pictures below of my team competing (and more pictures from my team’s events on the photos page.) |
Tracey BeanWerner Elementary Archives
May 2018
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