Reading
In Lesson 12, students read a short story, The Long Bike Ride.  While reading, students worked on filling out a story map where they had to identify the characters, setting, conflict, plot events, and resolution of the story.  We also spent time identifying and interpreting examples of figurative language found in the text.  In our paired selection, students read and interpreted the meaning of two poems, and we discussed the various poetic devices found in each.

Math
In both classes, we started chapter 8, which focuses on multiplication and division of fractions.  Students learned how solve for a fraction of a number, as well as how to multiply fractions.  Students also learned to estimate the product of fractions.

Science
We continued the physics unit on gravity and motion.  Students learned about the three categories of motion: linear, circular, and vibrational.  We also discussed the terms used to describe the movement of objects (speed, velocity, acceleration, and displacement).  Lots of vocabulary terms to learn, many of then new to the students.  Students now have all the background information needed to understand Newton’s three laws of motion.  We will begin learning about these next week!

Social Studies
We shared our immigration projects and found out some interesting things about each other.  It was evident from the students’ presentations that they learned a lot of new information about their families or famous immigrant.  Students also learned about the life of Martin Luther King, Jr. which was an excellent introduction to our Civil Rights unit.

Writing/English
In Mrs. Mitchell’s class, students are working on the rough draft for their informational writing.  Students have complete the paragraphs containing their main ideas and will then move on to writing the introduction and conclusion for their piece.  In English, we are done learning about nouns and are now reviewing the information we have learned.  The end of the unit test will take place on Tuesday.

In Mrs. Johnson’s class, students finished their persuasive essays and submitted them for a grade.    In English, we started the unit on verbs.  We learned about action verbs and auxiliary/helping verbs. We also continue to work on Daily Language Review each day to practice grammar skills.