October 7: The First Month of School

Humanities

In reading we have begun our first class novel, Wonder. During the beginning of the book we are focusing on tracking character development and using the text as evidence for our ideas. The students have written and revised paragraphs sharing their first impressions of the characters in the novel. We use ‘thought prompts’ such as “For example…,” “This happens when…,” “The author says…,” and “This makes me think…” to incorporate examples from the book into our writing.

In social studies, we just finished our unit on mapping skills with a quiz and are well on our way into learning about early humans. The class read an article about early humans and then played a Jeopardy game using that information. Ask your student one (or more!) of following questions: Did humans evolve from apes? What happened to human brains and jaws/teeth as we evolved? Who was a famous australopithecine? Did humans and Neanderthals live at the same time?

We started or first writing unit which focuses on individual identity by first collecting a group inventory. In groups, the students talked about what they have in common and what is unique about each person. They then created a poster to present to the class sharing all of their wonderful qualities.

Judaic Studies 

These past few week in Judaics, the 5th grade has been studying the ideas of Teshuvah, Tefilah and Tzedakah (repentance, prayer, and charity). Three important mitzvot which, if done, are said to bring a good new year. We looked at The Rambam’s (Maimonides) five steps of teshuvah(seeking forgiveness) and thought about how those steps can help us when we have wronged someone. We read the story of Jonah and made connections from the story to the 3 mitzvot we were studying. The students made posters, cartoons, and skits showing their understanding of the mitzvot and their connections to the texts we studied. Up next, we will shift our focus to sukkot and the 4 species (etrog, willow, myrtle, and palm) looking at how these very different plants are brought together  – each bringing their unique contributions to a greater whole.

Math

It has been a busy and engaging month! In Topic A, students learned to multiply and divide by 10, 100, and 1,000. They began by representing multiplication and division on the place value chart and recognizing patterns in products and quotients. They wrote repeated multiplication by using exponents and explored how powers of 10 relate to place value and metric units. Students also completed their first mini math project which was assigned to reinforce  solving problems by converting between metric measurements and describing the relationships between the units.

We just began Topic B, which focuses on learning to multiply whole numbers. Using models and methods from earlier grades such as area models, break apart and distribute, partial products, and the standard algorithm, students will become confident in multiplying together multiple digit numbers. 

If you are looking for a fun way to engage with your child about what they have been learning, you can try this game: Help your child practice converting metric units by asking “Would you rather” questions. For example, you could ask some of the following questions, replacing the pizza, chocolate milk, or scooter with your child’s favorite items. As they answer each question, have them explain why. • “Would you rather eat 100 grams of pizza or 10,000 centigrams of pizza?” • “Would you rather drink 1 liter of chocolate milk or 1,000 milliliters of chocolate milk?” • “Would you rather ride on a scooter for 5 kilometers or ride on a scooter for 500,000 centimeters?” 

Science

The 5th graders have begun their first unit, The Engineering Design Process: Physics of Flight. We began by reviewing the engineering design process itself, something the students worked through in 4th grade. One new focus of the process is identifying criteria and constraints. Criteria are anything your project needs to do/needs to contain. Constraints are anything holding you back from creating anything you could possibly want. For our first project, we are building catapults.

Criteria:

• You must build a catapult that can launch a cotton ball as far as possible

• You must use popsicle sticks, rubber bands, and a spoon

• The catapult must be free-standing 

Constraints

• Materials: you can only have a maximum of 15 popsicle sticks, 10 rubber bands, and 1 spoon

• You can not change the cotton ball in any way

• Time: you will have one class period to plan and one to build

Unfortunately, with the holidays, we have only had 4 classes so far and our next class will not be until October 24th. I look forward to REALLY getting to start science then!

Chag sameach!

Hebrew with Tamar

Over the past weeks in Hebrew we have been using our Back to School booklet to review and refresh our usage of previous vocabulary. We are using verbs in the past tense as well as verb names, to form grammatically correct sentences that describe things we did over our summer break. We are also practicing the impersonal way to describe things you can do or cannot do over vacation and during school time. For Rosh Hashanah students created short songs describing how they celebrate the holiday using verbs eat, dip, love/like. 

Hebrew with Ilana

Music

My name is Landon and I am the new music teacher at Senesh. In these first few weeks, we’ve been exploring different fundamentals of music rhythms. Through variations on games like Tic Tac Toe and 4 Corners, students have learned how to identify and perform the basics of musical rhythm notes. These include quarter notes, half notes, eighth notes, and their respective rests. We will soon apply this when we learn about chord structures and playing rhythms on instruments.