Monday of a very strange week.

 

And we had a very strange day!

 

We spent the great majority of our morning talking about cells, microscopic organisms, and all sorts of neat stuff.  We learned that cells are the smallest structural parts of living things.  We also discussed the difference between living and non-living things.  We had quite a few misconceptions about what was living and non-living.  Many students believed that stars, the Earth, and other non-living things were alive.

We watched a lot of interesting videos, having to do with looking at plant and animal slides.  We also watched a video that totally disgusted the students and told them about all the bacteria and microscopic animals that live on their bodies!

Tonight students have two short passages to read and some questions to answer about cells:

WhatsInYourCells

TheCellsThatMakeUs

As always I expect some reasoning!

 

We then talked very briefly about subtraction and subtraction with decimals.  We discussed the difference between 3.4 – 21.57 and 21.57 – 3.4, and how the order matters in a subtraction problem.  We didn’t get nearly as far as I would have liked with this, so unfortunately we didn’t get to the homework part of this.  Monday schedules are so weird!

 

so, tl;dr

A lite day today

 

Simply read these two passages and answer the questions with reasoning:

WhatsInYourCells

TheCellsThatMakeUs

and read!

 

Have a good one,

 

-Mr. Potter

Today was a bit better!  We only ended up having to practice working quietly for 4 minutes, which was much better than yesterday’s 7.

This morning we watched two neat videos about the three little pigs.  We talked about how point of view can completely change the story, and if we should believe someone who was there, or someone who just wrote about it.  This extends to our discussions about history.  Who can we believe when we read letters, newspapers, and other primary sources?  Can we really trust everything as truth?  Do we have to understand that there are many ‘truths’ and we may have to sift through them to see the story?

 

Tonight students should compare and contrast the two stories of the three little pigs.  I expect to see at least 5 things in each box!

Compare and Contrast

Three Little Pigs

The True Story of the Three Little Pigs

 

Next we came up together with the steps that a red blood cell might go through and checked our work from last night.  I was very impressed with how well many students did on this.  Nowhere in the two passages did it give these steps.  The students needed to read both passages and synthesize the information themselves in order to come up with what happens to a red blood cell.

Tonight students should pretend that THEY are a red blood cell.  They should tell me about their day, in the first person.

A Day in the Life of a Red blood cell

RedBloodCellSteps

Lastly we talked about subtracting with decimal numbers.  This again is nothing too ground-breaking, and we used some play money and did some examples, showing how we break down larger numbers in order to perform subtraction.

Tonight students need to finish the worksheet from yesterday, doing the subtraction problems.

AddingSubtractingDecimals1

 

We also talked briefly at the end of the day about multiplication and division and what they truly MEAN.  Multiplying is all about repeated equal groups.  Something like 4 x 6 asks how much is 4 groups of 6, or how much is 6 groups of 4.

We then applied this understanding to multiplying and dividing by fractions.  Something like 6 x 1/2 asks how much is HALF of a group of 6?  Or how much is six groups of 1/2?

This was something brand new to pretty much everyone, and while some students caught on, others still need some more explanation.  We’ll continue working on this throughout the 2nd quarter.

 

 

so, tl;dr

Compare and contrast Three Little Pigs with the True Story of the Three Little Pigs.

Compare and Contrast

 

Write about your day as a blood cell

A Day in the Life of a Red blood cell

RedBloodCellSteps

Finish the subtraction problems from yesterday

AddingSubtractingDecimals1

 

And read!

 

Have a good one,

 

-Mr. Potter

 

Oh no! I jinxed it 🙁  So today we got a lot accomplished, but we had a pretty rough morning.  We had some real problems with calling out and talking, and we had to do some practice with regards to working quietly.  The afternoon was better, however!

 

This morning we talked a good bit about points of view again.  We introduced the idea that not all 3rd person points of view are the same.  There is 3rd person limited, 3rd person omniscient, and 3rd person objective points of view.  Sometimes the narrator knows everything, including all characters thoughts and feelings.  That’s 3rd person omniscient.  Sometimes the narrator only knows about one specific character’s feelings.  That’s 3rd person limited.  And sometimes, they only know what characters do, and not their thoughts and feelings.  That’s 3rd person objective.

Tonight students have a selection of passages from Roald Dahl books to read.  They should identify if each passage represents 1st, 2nd, or 3rd person point of view.  They should then explain how they knew what each was.

point-of-view-worksheet-5

 

Next we looked at the circulatory system, and particularly at how blood cells act within the system.  Tonight students have a short passage to read.  On the back, they need to look at last night’s homework concerning the heart, and tonight’s homework about circulation, and put them together to describe what would happen to a red blood cell moving through the circulatory system.  They should do this in terms of steps.  Six steps, in fact!

Circulation&Journey

 

Next we started talking about adding numbers in decimal form.  This should be nothing ground-breaking, as we have been adding numbers using the standard algorithm for literally years.  We discussed how we have always made sure that we are adding ones to ones, tens to tens, etc etc up until this point.  When adding decimals we must also ensure we are adding tenths to tenths, and so on.  Tonight students should answer ONLY the addition problems on this sheet:

AddingSubtractingDecimals1

 

Finally we took a trip to the computer lab and played around with a neat app that lets you make your own simple animations.  The students had a very good time exploring and making different GIfs.  We will be using this program in a project we will be doing later this quarter.  Ask your student about what they made!

 

 

so, tl;dr

Identify the pov used in each passage, and tell me how you knew:

point-of-view-worksheet-5

Answer some short questions and then tell me about the journey of a red blood cell through the circulatory system:

Circulation&Journey

Answer ONLY the addition problems:

AddingSubtractingDecimals1

 

And read!

 

Have a good one,

 

-Mr. Potter

Today we got a lot of things done!  I don’t want to jinx it, but this has been a very productive week, and I hope that things keep going this way.

 

We have been looking at different primary sources from the times of the early European colonists.  This means we have been exploring points of view.  Today we talked about how different points of view can tell different parts of a story.  Depending upon the point of view, the amount of information we have access to can change.  We are going to be exploring how the point of view chosen for a book can greatly affect the story.  We also talked about 1st, 3rd, and the little known 2nd person point of view.  I’m sure we all know 1st and 3rd person, but do you know what 2nd person point of view is?  What kind of writing would be written in the 2nd person?  Ask your student today and see if they remember!

 

Tonight students have a few short passages to identify as being written in the 1st or 3rd person.  Then they have a paragraph to read and re-write in the 1st person.

POV

 

Next we did a little experiment comparing the strength of cylinders to that of rectangular prisms.  We made paper cylinders and rectangular prisms and then put books on top of them until they collapsed under the weight.

The actual POINT of this was to explain why our bones are shaped like cylinders as opposed to rectangular prisms.  Unfortunately we ran out of time and didn’t actually get to that part of the lesson.  However, feel free to ask your student about how many books they managed to stack on their rectangular prism or their cylinder before it collapsed.  Many students were very surprised at just how much stronger the paper cylinders were compared to paper rectangular prisms.  Tomorrow we’ll wrap this up.

 

Finally we went crazy with more number lines.  As expected, the students did much better today.  We first made a number line that went from 0 to .5, then another that went from 0 to .3.  All the while students needed to figure out how to divide their sentence strips so that the pieces were evenly spaced.  For our last number line, we broke up our 0 to .3 number line into hundredths, which I am happy to say every single student accomplished.

Tonight students have another set of number line problems to do:

DecimalNumberLine2

 

 

so, tl;dr

Tell me 1st or 3rd person pov, and re-write the paragraph as if YOU were Buck:

POV

Tell me where some numbers lie on the number line:

DecimalNumberLine2

and as always, read!

 

A pretty lite load, honestly.

 

Have a good one,

 

-Mr. Potter

Great Monday!

I hope everyone had a great Halloween, and that everyone ate entirely too much candy.

We actually got a whole bunch of things accomplished today!  On a Monday even!

 

This morning we talked about powers of ten, and multiplying and dividing by tens, and all that jazz.  We went over our quiz from Friday, and I was happy to see that many students did very well.  We will keep touching on this stuff as we go through the year as understanding how our number system works is extremely important.  In case you are curious, here is the quiz they took on Friday:

Decimals&Base10Quiz

We then looked very quickly at all of the things we have learned about the age of exploration and colonization in North America, and colonist conflict with the Native Americans.

Tonight students need to write two paragraphs for me, giving me as much information as they have remembered about what we have been discussing in language arts and history in the past few weeks:

paragraph 1: What was the age of exploration?
Who (from what continent) was exploring? Why?

The paragraph should start like this:

The age of exploration was….

paragraph 2: What was going on between the colonists and the Native Americans? Did they get along? Why or why not?

And this paragraph should start like this:

The colonists and the Native Americans…

 

This should give me a pretty good idea of what students do and don’t ‘get’ so far.

 

In science we started talking about the cardiovascular (aka circulatory) system.  We learned how the heart pumps blood throughout our body.  The blood carries nutrients and oxygen to the cells of our body, and carries away the cell’s waste products.  Without our blood and our circulatory system, the cell’s of our bodies would waste away.

We also watched this quick little video (these things are very strange, but the students (and I as well) love them for some reason):

Circulatory System

 

Students also have a short selection to read and some questions to answer:

HumanHeart

 

We then took a long time and talked about decimals and fractions.  Students were tasked with making a number line that included divisions into tenths, as well as .25 (1/4th), and .75 (3/4ths).  In order to do this, students needed to measure the length of the paper they were provided, and then divide it into equal parts.  This COMPLETELY flummoxed some of our students, and it was very interesting to see them do a lot of trial and error to finally figure it out.  We took our time on this and eventually reached the conclusion that if our strip of paper is 60cm long, and we are splitting it into ten equal parts, each part should be 6 cm long.  Students eventually all finished their number lines, and they should use them tonight in order to help them on their math homework!

DecimalNumberLine1

This was also a good time to talk about productive struggle.  Even if we don’t know something immediately, it doesn’t mean we give up and stop.  We keep going, using everything we know and all of the resources available to us, in order to figure it out.

 

 

so, tl;dr

Write me two paragraphs –

1st paragraph answers – What was the age of exploration? Who (from what continent) was exploring? Why?

2nd paragraph answers – What was going on between the colonists and the Native Americans? Did they get along? Why or why not?

 

Fill me in on the human heart:

HumanHeart

 

Use the number line you created in class to help you answer these questions:

DecimalNumberLine1

 

And as always, read read read!

 

Have a good one,

 

-Mr. Potter

My apologies about not having an update yesterday.  I was feeling pretty awful, and we ended up having a substitute.  The substitute said that the students were fantastic, however, so that was good to come back to 🙂

 

This morning we looked again at some primary sources, and real things native americans and colonists living in the 1600’s said.  Specifically we looked at these quotes:

Colonies degenerate assuredly when the colonists imitate and embrace the habits, customs, and practices of the natives. There is no better way to remedy this evil than to do away with and destroy completely the habits and practices of the natives.

-Virginia Colony Promoter William Herbert, 1610

and this one..

Since that you are heere strangers and come into our Countrey, you should rather confine yourselves to the Customes of our Countrey, than impose yours upon us.

– A wicomesse Indian to the Governor of Maryland, 1633

We talked about these quotes and wrote them in our own words.  These quotes help explain that there was a definite culture clash going on between the European settlers, and the Native Americans.  Tonight students should look at these quotes (and their interpretation in their own words) and compare and contrast the attitudes of these two individuals.

PrimarySources

Compare and Contrast

 

Next we got to go outside and look at our plants!  We harvested a cucumber, another radish, and a teensy weensy carrot.  Tomorrow we’ll cut them up and have  a little snack.

 

Yesterday the students had some work to do regarding the musculoskeletal system, and today we finished up talking about it.  We learned that bones are actually hollow, and not solid as we might think.  Inside there is spongy bone, as well as marrow.   We also talked about how bones and muscles work together to move you, protect you, and to give you form.  Tonight students have a quick little worksheet to do regarding the jobs of muscles and the makeup of bones:

Muscles&Bones

 

Finally we talked a great deal about decimals and number line representations.  We looked at how we can break up numbers on a number line into smaller parts and that these parts would be fractions of a whole.  We can also describe these fractions in base 10, or decimal, notation.  Tonight students have some number lines to fill in.  As always, there are examples!

DecimalNumberLineExamples

DecimalNumberLines

 

so, tl;dr

Look at the first and third quote, then compare and contrast these two individual’s viewpoints:

PrimarySources

Compare and Contrast

 

Tell me about muscles and bones

Muscles&Bones

 

Fill in some number lines

DecimalNumberLineExamples

DecimalNumberLines

 

and as always, please please please read!

 

Have a good one,

 

-Mr. Potter

Today we were historians!

 

We talked this morning a good bit about how historians figure things out about history.  Historians look at books, newspapers, letters, and other artifacts from a time period, and use these PRIMARY SOURCES to piece together a story of what was happening during that time.

This quarter we will be doing some actual historian work.  Today we got a few pages of primary-like sources.  We talked about how we need to be detectives, and use the sources to help us figure out the story.

Tonight students should use a primary source to answer these questions:

Who: (who is this about?  Who is talking?  Who are they talking to?)

What: (What is going on?)

Where: (Where is this occurring?)

When: (When is this happening?)

Why: (Why is this happening?)

The specific passage they should look at within this paper is “Your mouth is of sugar but your heart is gall” on page 10.

indianscolonists

We also spent a LOT of time today talking about base 10, multiplying by 10, and dividing by 10.  We then looked a lot at decimals, and how decimals are simply another way to represent specific fractions.  We explored how we can represent something like 1/4 as a decimal – specifically, 0.25.  We thought a lot about money in order to explain this.  Tonight students have some decimals to represent as fractions and as pictorial representations.  There is a page of examples as always!

DecimalHwk2

Also ask your student about breaking up a dollar among 3 people.  What happens when you do that?  What happened when Mr. Potter tried to do that in class??  Did he go crazy?  Did he grab the sides of his head and keep exclaiming “I STILL HAVE ONE LEFT!!!!”?????

Tomorrow we have Lt. Guthrie coming into our room to talk about drugs and bullying.   Mrs. Carter, our class counselor has arranged this experience for us.  Last year Lt. Guthrie came and gave this talk to my students, and it went very well.  I’m sure it will be great again tomorrow.

 

so, tl;dr

summarize “Your mouth is of sugar but your heart is gall” on page 10.  Answer who, what, where, when, why.  Be sure you can actually explain this short selection to someone.  This will definitely require MULTIPLE readings and probably a few questions to mom/dad/uncle/grandma/someone. (My apologies to families!)

indianscolonists

Write the fractional representation for these decimal numbers, and also fill in the decimal square.

DecimalHwk2

 

And read!

 

Have a good one,

 

-Mr. Potter

 

What a great Monday!

Students got their report cards and information regarding the first field trip today – make sure you ask your student for all of it!

We spent a good deal of our morning talking about the math we have been doing up to this point.  We talked about how it is important to understand how operations work, so when we see something like:

A + B = 10

We also know that B + A = 10.

Or if we know that A x B = 16

We also know that A x B x 10 = 160

This is all very important because in the real world, we often don’t have all the information.  Sometimes we have to go on what we know, and in order to do that, we need to understand that addition is commutative, or that multiplication is associative.  The kids are slowly getting it I believe, and it is fantastic.

 

We also started talking about decimal notation today, and how really it’s just another way to represent fractions that have denominators that are powers of ten.  We went over how to name decimals, and how we can intuit the value of decimals based on the properties of the base 10 system.  Essentially we are increasing by a factor of ten as we move to the left of the decimal point, so it would make sense that we are decreasing in value by a factor of ten as we move to the right.

 

Tonight students have some simple decimal naming worksheets to do.  On the back, they should name the model both as a fraction, and as a decimal.

DecimalIdentification

 

Our day wasn’t all math though!  We also introduced a new vocab list, and did some dirty science review.

 

Tonight students should write one sentence per vocab word and ensure they are using it correctly by checking the part of speech.

JectWordList

They also have a quick Water Cycle review sheet to read and some questions to answer:

WaterCycleReview

Finally, we had a lot of fun today out at recess playing with our big red frisbees, and followed that up with our radishes that I picked over the weekend.  If I do say so myself, they were delicious!

 

so, tl;dr

READ!

Name some decimals (and fractions too!)

DecimalIdentification

Write a sentence for each vocab word

JectWordList

Review some water cycle

WaterCycleReview

And please remember to bring back your report card signed tomorrow, as well as your field trip forms!

 

Have a good one,

 

-Mr. Potter

WELCOME BACK!!!

Today was an absolutely fantastic first day back.  All of the children were bleary, disoriented, and had no idea what was going on.  I wish every day could be like this 😉

This morning we shared our track-out experiences in groups, and then each group put together their own experiences to write a fictional story about the best day of track out, and the worst day of track out.  We had some really awesome days, and some very depressing days as well!  Ask your student about their group’s story!

This week we will be doing a very quick review of the first quarter’s topics.  We spent a lot of the morning talking about explorers, and their interactions with native populations.  We did a See, Think, Wonder with the following picture:

The kids had some really great thoughts and questions about this picture.  Afterwards we talked about Cortez and Montezuma, and their not exactly mutually beneficial relationship.

 

We also talked a bit about the writing process, and how we will be using our process as we continue writing throughout the year.

 

Tonight students have a short passage to read about Jamestown, and some questions to answer.  They should ONLY answer questions 1-5, and they should of course have reasoning!

Jamestown

We then went outside and saw that our plants are growing vegetables all over the place.  We had some GIGANTIC radishes, as well as a tiny carrot we harvested, and also a cucumber.  We have some tomatoes to look forward to as long as it doesn’t get *too* cold in the upcoming week, and our corn was starting to stalk as well.  Keep your fingers crossed for us.

 

At the end of the day we talked a good deal about the different mathematical operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.  We took some notes on multiplication and division.  At this point our goal is to understand what kind of problems each operation is used to solve.  In order to do this we need to understand what each operation is used for:

Addition – combining

subtraction – finding difference

multiplication – repeated equal groups (repeated addition)

division – how many ___ are in ___ (repeated subtraction)

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but it is where we are starting.

 

Tonight students have a page of word problems to examine.  They should NOT solve these problems.  Instead, they should fill out some blanks about HOW to solve the problem and how they know this.  We did 3 examples together, and the students should do the next four problems, which means they are only doing the first 7 of the 10 word problems.   As always examples are attached:

DeterminingOperations

 

 

 

so, tl;dr

welcome back!

Answer 1-5 about Jamestown (WITH REASONING!)

Jamestown

Do problems 1-7 in the template given (1-3 we did together and are provided as examples)

DeterminingOperations

And as always, read!

 

Have a good one,

-Mr. Potter

 

 

 

 

P.S. Our first field trip of the year will be on December 15th to the Museum of Natural Sciences.  More information will go home next Monday, as will report cards.

Tomorrow is track out!

Please remember we are tracked out from October 1st through October 21st.  2nd quarter begins on Thursday, October 22nd.

Tomorrow is also pajama/pillow/blanket day.  Students may wear their pajamas, and bring a pillow or blanket tomorrow if they like!

 

We spent the majority of our morning finishing up our quick unit on the age of exploration.  We also took a quick quiz on the continents of the world.  If your student hasn’t sung the continents song for you yet, make sure you ask them about it 🙂

 

Tonight students have a final packet to do concerning exploiters (ahem) I mean explorers of the 15th/16th centuries.

AgeOfExploration

 

We then had some discussions dealing with whether we feel it was fair for the people from Europe to simply show up and take lands, resources, and riches from the native peoples of North and South America.  Most of us agreed this was not fair.  We then discussed whether at this point in time we can truly solve that injustice.  Can we just give everything back?  Where does that put us?  Who gets what?  Land?  Reparations?  Apologies?  It’s a good exercise in discovering that many things lack simple solutions, and even when we can see something as definitely wrong, righting the wrong can prove problematic.

 

We ended our day by taking our culminating animals and ecosystems test.  This was essentially the students’ last chance to prove to me that they understood some of the concepts we went over this quarter.

And before you knew it, it was time to go!  We’ll have to read about 30 pages tomorrow morning to finish up the Mysterious Benedict Society as we didn’t get a chance to finish it today.

 

so, tl;dr

Finish this packet about the Age of Exploration:

AgeOfExploration

 

And read!

 

Have a good one,

 

-Mr. Potter