Hello parents,
It is time to update you. Our class has been extremely productive. Our days are spent reading, exercising, learning math, writing, studying cultural subjects and so on. Right now we are learning about the brain in physiology and river ecosystems in biology. We solve weekly problems in class meetings that the students run. We are focusing on how to build resilience right now in our behavior curriculum. The fifth graders just went on a field trip to JBiztown to learn how to interact in a financial community. The Utah Opera Company came to do an assembly and educate our students about the fine arts last week. We had a funeral for our class pet, a parakeet named Blue tube. As you can see, there is never a dull moment in our class.
We are going to begin a humanitarian project to send wash clothes to Africa. Each student is going to need to bring a pair of knitting needles (around size 6-7) by Friday of this week. They will also need to bring yarn. This will be a part of practical life curriculum that we highlight on Friday afternoons.
The home project for this month is an engineering project. Your student is well aware of it and has been working on it in class. Now it is time to involve you in the process. Your student has come up with an invention that he or she needs to create that meets a need in life. Your student should come home with the idea already formalized and a plan to create the invention. What we need from you is help to make your student’s invention a reality. Last year, we had inventions such as a mouse trap, a key retriever when it gets lost in the cracks of your seat in the car, an envelope opener and so forth. They also need to track in writing the process they took to make the invention, what mistakes were made and how they resolved them. This is an important part of this project. Below is the rubric for the project:
- Form 1: A Plan for the Invention (done in class)
- Form 2: Questionaire for the Invention (done in class)
- Create the invention. (Done at home)
- A written step by step process of the creation of the invention (done at home and at school)
- A display of invention to put in the school hallway on the Engineering Day (only for fifth graders) by March 29.
We will focus a lot on this at school just be there when they need your help.
One other thing I feel I finally need to point out is that there is quite a great profanity problem in our class. Certain students are dropping swear words quite regularly and it is becoming an uncomfortable situation for all of us. If you feel your student might have this problem can you please help me to work with him/her to find positive ways to clean up their language.
Thank you,
Ms. Shanan