November 11: Learning All Around!

Humanities: 

Early hominins, character identity charts, generating memories for personal narrative, the Neolithic Revolution… these are just a few of the things we’re learning about in Humanities.

We are almost done reading Wonder. We have tracked character development and created identity charts for each character, citing the text to support our ideas. We talked about each characters physical traits, emotional traits, motivations, problems, response to difficulties, and how the character acts in different situations. Once we finish Wonder, we will move into book clubs.

We have written poetry and an essay about the history and meaning of our names for our Memoir unit. Next we will write a personal narrative about an important moment from our lives. This week, students brainstormed initial ideas for their narratives. We will read many sample memoirs and identify the elements and themes that we notice before writing our own memoir.

We have finished our unit on early hominins. The students all loved learning about the evolution of humans from our oldest friend, Ardi (ask your students!) to Lucy, to homo Habilis, homo erectus, neanderthals, and Homo sapiens. We are now learning about the Neolithic Revolution (the invention of farming) which will lead us into the first civilization of Sumer.

Math: 

During the next few weeks, our math class will be learning about dividing three- and four-digit whole numbers. We will also learn how to interpret remainders. Students will be completing a project for this unit. Students will be in charge of a new movie theatre. They will keep track of the data as the theatre opens and begins showing movies. Students will then present what they learned to the class. You can expect to see a little more homework from math class as well. Students will get weekly homework assigned on Monday that will be due each Friday. Looking forward to an exciting few weeks. 

Hebrew Heritage:

להורים שלום,

במסגרת לימוד על חשיבותו וייחודו של מרכז ״נא לגעת״ שנמצא (בתל-אביב-יפו) שבמהלכו למדנו כיצד אנשים עם מוגבלויות כגון, עיוורים וחרשים  .תורמים לחברה

בשבועיים האחרונים אנחנו מתעסקים בנושא ״ילדים עם מוגבלויות״, כיצד הם מרגישים בחברה? כיצד אנחנו יכולים להושיט יד ולעזור להם? איזה ארגונים קיימים לצורך כך. לאחר קריאת טקסטים וצפייה בסרט בנושא כל תלמיד בחר ארגון שהוא מעוניין לחקור. במסגרת זו התלמידים לומדים כיצד להקליד בעברית במחשב ולהציג עבודה בנושא.

סוף שבוע נפלא,

אילנה

Judaics: 

5th graders have really stepped up their Chumash skills by studying hard for our weekly vocabulary challenges. It has been so fun to see their ease in translating with their growing knowledge of roots and grammar concepts. This access to the text is also helping them form much higher level kushiyot (text based questions). These questions have been leading to some heated class discussions around jealousy, how to respect your parents, dealing with anger in healthy ways and more. We are pausing our Chumash unit now as we learn about Hannah Senesh. We watched “Blessed is the Match” and spoke about her perseverance and what motivated her to keep going strong in all of the challenges she faced. We saw how her strong beliefs kept her focused on what she needed to do. We all reflected on our own beliefs and how they drive our actions in the world. Her life story will introduce our unit about Pre 1984 Zionism. We will be looking at why people leave their homes and what a Jewish Homeland is to us personally. I look forward to giving the students opportunities to share personal family stories of Aliyot! (More information on that to come!) 

Shabbat Shalom, 

Laura