Native American Projects

Today we presented our Native American projects. This is our first attempt at using Google Docs to create our presentation. The videos are uploaded and you can click on the links to see your child's work. They all did a very nice job. Mr. S.

Announcing Performance Dates

The week after Thanksgiving, we are going to present our reader's theatre plays. We send an invitation to all the parents. We'll perform at 1:00 and again at 2:30, on Thursday, December 1. The plays are satirical looks at some of our best know folk tales. Our focus was on fluency and expressive voices and is one of the culminating activities of our study of traditional literature. The plays should last about 35 minutes. If you can join us, we would love to have you.

D.A.R.E. Visitors

 Today for D.A.R.E. we were visited by five high school students who came to share with us their wisdom of surviving middle and high school years. We had about 45 minutes to ask any questions and listen to the experiences of these outstanding role models. they tlaked about great clubs and activities offered and good strategies to get homework completed on time. They assured us that the schools are safe and a fun place to be as the teachers and principals are nice and helpful. We learned we will make a bunch of new friends and that the best friends we have here may not be our best friends in middle or high school. There was great advice about avoiding drinking parties or groups that chose to smoke or do drugs. We learned about the consequences for poor choices BUT we learned that it's easy to make good choices. Thanks to Officer Pilsner and these Wausau West juniors and seniors for taking time out of their busy day to chat with us.

Do you recognize Andrew Fischer on the right? He was a Rib Mountain 5th grader.

These role models seemed to have the answers to all our questions. They talked about how anxious they were the first few days in middle school but everyone was so nice and helpful, the nervousness went away quickly.

Emails Are Open

Today we opened up our new email accounts. We practiced creating a contact list for our classroom and learned how to send an email to our classmates. Then we sent an email to someone not on our contact list--Mr. S.--so students understtand how to type in an email not on our list. We talked about how emails are not things you just give out to anyone. Friends, family, etc. are usually safe places to send and recieve emails. Moms and dads, it might be good to reinforce Internet safety.

We only had a little time to look at Google Docs but everyone created a new document. Then they all worked on a "shared" document. I'll let you know when I'll have a mini-workshop on Google Docs for adults (parents) in the lab some December evening. Your child will be able to share their work with parents as well. They will probably make it so you can only see or maybe make comments but not edit their work. Everyone was so excited today and they can't wait to get back in work again.

Mr. S.

Verbs, Verbs, Vivacious Verbs!

We're looking at verbs this week and next to see how these flexible little parts of speech can make our sentences clearer to the reader. Topics include: action & states of being; past, present, future; regular, irregular. We'll practice using the thesaurus to help expand the verb vocabulary. If you hear of an interesting, colorful or downright vivacious verb, write it down, use it when you speak, add it to your scribblement.

Woodson Art Museum

Fifth graders will take 3 trips to the Woodson Art Museum this school year. Our first on is next week on Nov. 11th. If you have time, we could use some volunteers to help with the tour. The tour begins at 1:00 and ends at 2:00. You simple need to be another adult in a group of students. the tours are led by the trained museum docents. I like to roam and take pictures of our students groups so the images can be used in the e-portfolios. Send me a note if you are available.

Mr. S.

WKCE Testing

It's Wednesday and we are more than half way through our WKCE testing this year. We have only one more reading test to go and we'll be done tomorrow. How are you feeling about this kind of testing? Do you get nervous? Do you think this testing shows what you know? What are you thinking about WKCE?

Mr. S.