In Math we have been learning to create double bar graphs and derive insights from them.
In Science, we have had our first “Simple Machines Project” presented. Ansley shared her Lego world with a working pulley system and wheel and axels. Projects are due for presentation on June 10th.
In Social Studies, we have been exploring Indigenous stories. Today we read and analyzed message in the book “Flight of the Hummingbird” by Haida artist, Michael Nicoll Yagulanaas. Students made connections between this story and Catholic social justice themes.
In Social Studies, we have also continued with our “Time Traveller Report” presentations; keep scrolling to the bottom of this post to see some more incredible videos and photos from our travels to other times and places! You will be inspired!
Everyday Life in Ancient Greece Ancient GreeceThe Leaning Tower of Pisa Flying with the Wright BrothersFlying with the Wright Brothers Ancient EgyptAncient EgyptAncient EgyptWWIIWWIIPresenting in 5B in 2024Presenting in 5B in 2024
Take a moment to enjoy Sarah’s beautiful recital of the Brandon Lake song, “Gratitude”—this song has been a favourite of 5B students this year! Beautiful playing, Sarah! Continuing our unit on prayer in Religion class, students took time to select a sticker and quietly reflect upon its message and write about their insights and connections.
Coming up next in Math, students will learn about transformations (reflection and rotation) and prisms and pyramids through some hands on arts activities.
We have been enjoying a rich Social Studies unit on Canadian government. We’ve learned about levels of government (federal, provincial, and municipal), elections and voting (past and present day practices), and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
As well, we have explored topics specific to BC politics in preparation for our exciting field trip to the parliament buildings. While we were there, we watched and participated I. a fabulous travelling theatre presentation called, “My Place in Politics”. Students were encouraged to learn about their rights and seek ways to participate in democracy.
We enjoyed more time travellers’ presentations today—it’s been so much fun! There will be lots of fun photos in a future blog post.
In Religion and Health Education, we have been exploring strategies for self-regulation, reflective listening, and prayer. We enjoyed this beautiful book by Katie Warner, “Listening for God”. Students have been invited and supported to create their own peaceful moments in the day to recharge and refocus their minds, bodies, and hearts.
In Language Arts, we revisited expository writing to ensure we are retaining the skills taught earlier in the year. Fabulous news: we have wonderful writers capable of crafting cohesive, engaging, well-structured prose!
The students chose their own topics and showcased their learning of how to craft hooks and topic sentences, use transition words, develop ideas with supporting details, write meaningful conclusions, and self-edit. Enjoy!
Amelia and Michaela asked me to make a video of their dance, and they involved some classmates. We invite you to enjoy this charming video of 5B students enjoying our lovely school grounds. Music credit; “Wildfowers” by Brandon Lake
Hello, 5B families!
Congratulations to all of our hardworking TRACK PARTICIPANTS! We heard you represented our school so well, gave it your best efforts, and had fun!
For the next two weeks, we have lots of important projects, writing assignments, and year-end Math and LA assessments on the go, and so we are taking a pause this week from Spelling tests to focus our energy.
Here is a “Time Traveller” from 5B who shared his fabulous report of his journey to Ancient Rome, which includes an eye witness account of Julius Caesar’s last moments! He also brought back a special artifact: money from the era. We are lucky to learn from the young experts in our class!
Students are working to finish the following: “Time Traveller’s Reports” in Social Studies (due May 30), Simple Machines projects in Science (due June 10), two perspective stories (due now), group parables presentations in Religion/Drama (due by June 15), and personal interest projects (due by the last day of school, but I will do weekly progress check-ins starting now, and students will be expected to share their progress with classmates on June 11).
In Science, our simple machines projects are underway. This student is having fun analyzing the presence of simple machines in the Ugears STEM toy. See previous blog posts for project criteria.
In Math class, we have wrapped up our probability unit and are now learning about money! We have been reinforcing adding and subtracting with decimals by doing various money calculations. As well, for enrichment, some students have been keen to learn how to calculate sales tax. Using a fake money set, students have been practicing adding up coin and bills and making change. Great mental math! Today students were challenged to create their own toy stores, and then create a series of word money problems related to the stores. Students have also been doing one-to-one “money meetings” with me where they play the banker and perform calculations. Please keep practicing this real-life skill at home.
Please note that this Thursday is our grade 5 “Parliamentary Tour” field trip. We leave the school at lunch time and return by 2:55pm. There were no parent volunteers needed for this trip since we have 4 St. Patrick’s staff attending, and less than 40 people permitted on the tour as per the tour capacity rules. Please note the parliament’s posted behaviour expectations.
Behavioural Expectation Reminder BC’s Parliament Buildings are working buildings and visitors are expected to talk quietly, behave in a calm and courteous manner and follow public health policy during their visit.”
Poison Hemlock: Note the purple speckles on the stem. There are other poison hemlock “look alike” plants in the carrot family that have similar foliage shape. Large hemlock plants are easier to identify: if you see a something that looks like a huge carrot greens (4+ feet tall) and it has purple splotches on the stems, this is not a carrot plant! Use an app like the iNaturalist app to help you identify unknown plants. Also get good at recognizing this plant in its immature but equally poisonous young form. You can Google for more information on the effects of touching and ingesting the plant.
Civvies Day: Decades! Can you guess which decade each student is representing?
In Math class, we are learning about probability and also doing review of the major concepts explored this school year.
In Religion class, our inquiry has grown from this question: Why did Jesus use parables to teach, and what can we learn from these parables today? Students are working on reading, researching, retelling, and dramatizing Jesus’s parables and discussing their meanings.
In Science, we are now exploring a unit on simple machines. Students will demonstrate their understanding of this content through discussions, a unit quiz, and a creative project of their choosing. (Project criteria and ideas below!)
Princeton gave a great presentation teaching us about how his working model of an amusement park ride is constructed with the help of simple machines. We learned that gears are a type of simple machine under the category of “wheel and axle”.
In Language Arts, we have exploring perspective and point of view. Students are now working on writing two short stories, each about the same situation but from a different point of view. ***Reminder that we have our spelling test tomorrow. The word list is in the previous blog post.
On Monday we have another fun civvies day: decades! Students who would like to wear civvies should come dressed in clothing that represents a specific decade, such as the 1980s, 1950s, etc.
***Reminder that there is NO SCHOOL on Monday, May 20th and Tuesday, May 21st.
In Math, we have wrapped up our unit on perimeter and area. Students have now brought home their quizzes. I am offering a rewrite next Wednesday. It is important that students keep practicing their multi-digit multiplication skills. We will start our next unit on probability on Monday.
In Religion class, we have been exploring three topics: the parables (especially the prodigal son), the story of Daniel in the lions’ den, and strategies for navagatinf and reading the Bible.
Congratulations to our amazing three public speaking contestants for doing such an outstanding job!
Impromptu Story:
Our next Spelling test is on Thursday, May 16–it will cover part 2 of our list on literary themed words as seen below…
In Math we have been working on fractions and decimals, and students have now brought home their quizzes. I have offered a rewrite this Friday. We have now started a unit on how to calculate perimeter and area.
Reminder: this Wednesday is early dismissal at 2:00pm.
Please note that this Thursday, May 2nd is a special 3-hour Health Education presentation for grade 5s: the “Home Alone Program”. This short course is about safety and best practices when they are left alone at home.
Friday, May 3rd is our Spelling Test covering the 30 contractions we have been working with this week. We have done extensive in class review of these words.
On Friday afternoon we have the FAST (Friday Afternoon of Sports Training). Students have signed up for either the field trip to play squash or go skating. Squash students should prepare to wear appropriate St. Patrick’s gym strip for squash. Skating folks should also wear St. Patrick’s gym strip, but NO SHORTS (just the St. Patrick’s track pants or jogging pants.). Skating folks should also bring appropriate layers and items for a cold ice rink environment, such as gloves. Students skating are invited to bring their own ice skates and helmets if they prefer, but these will be available to all for free at the rink. Reminder: these FAST sessions will occur on the next few Fridays (May 3, May 10, and May 17).
In the assembly this Monday, we enjoyed a thought-provoking presentation by Ms. Murphy on honouring diversity and specifically how to support neurodiversity. Many students were also acknowledged with athletic achievements and “Fruit of the Spirit” awards. Well done!
In Art, we have been doing 3D nature sculptures—but the details of those will have to remain a surprise on account of a special day coming up! (Wink!)
In Language Arts, students have been further developing their skills when writing dialogue and using quotation marks. Students have been editing and practicing reading aloud their new stories. As well, we returned to core skills we developed this year when writing poetry for our “Earth Day Five Senses Poems”. Students explored the St. Patrick’s school yard and garden, making observations and capturing creative lines of text to paint word pictures about the wonders of nature we can appreciate every day at school.
The chickens are here!
*Students choosing to participate in our school’s public speaking competition should have a completed speech that is ready to share with our class on Monday, May 6th.
In Science, we completed our unit on rocks and the rock cycle (see the previous posts). Students who wish to improve their standing in this unit must request either a quiz rewrite or a chance to do a special presentation to the class on some topic related to rocks, the rock cycle, or fossils. We have now started a new unit on simple machines.
In Social Studies, we started a unit in government, and students continue to make progress on their “Time Traveller’s Projects”. These presentations are due May 30th but can be presented any time before that date. We have spent time in class with students to reviewing the project expectations on the criteria sheets, exploring questions that can guide their research, teaching where to find credible sources of information online and in our school library, learning to create simple bibliographies, and supporting one another with ideas. At this point, all students have had at least three Chromebook research blocks and should be well on their way. Please check in with your child to see how the project is coming along.
WHAT WOULD A GREAT TIME TRAVELLER PRESENTATION BE LIKE?
I have have modelled for students how they can apply their public speaking and drama skills and creatively use of props and/or costumes to “wow” their audience. As well, I provided students with two examples of successful time traveller scripts (see below), and we talked through actions that would dramatize these scripts in a meaningful way.
We had a wonderful morning at Swan Lake that started with listening to a barred owl hooting to welcome us! Then we enjoyed a one-hour geology lesson that included acting as “rock detectives” and handling some fascinating fossils. After that, we toured the Nature House galleries and observed the plants and birds while strolling near the lake. We hope you enjoy these photos that will tell the story of our learning today…
Here is an interesting discovery we enjoyed while walking the trails: evidence of beavers at work!
Evidence of beavers at work!
This is the charming rock cycle song we enjoyed today:
And here are some videos that review the new information we learned today about the different types of fossils…
In Language Arts, students have now brought home their spelling tests, homonym quizzes and their quotation marks quizzes. Please look at your child’s rewritten “dialogue between two characters”. For practice, I asked students to rewrite their dialogues to incorporate the specific feedback I gave them on their quizzes.
Next week, I am offering a rewrite of the “quotation marks and dialogue writing” quiz.
In Social Studies, students have been developing their research skills (note-taking, bibliography writing) during our Time Travellers’ Project work periods. They have been using both print and online resources. I recommend students also visit the public library to find books.
We have been reinforcing students’ skills when using Google Drive. By now, all students should be able to login to their accounts, locate Google Drive, create and rename a new document, and copy and paste content and web addresses using the CONTROL+C and CONTROL+V function. As well, all students should have created a document called “SS Bibliography” and entered at least one of their digital sources.
We are going with a very simple bibliography format. Please see the example below. A minimum of three different sources is expected for this project but 5 is preferred.
*A way you can help your children at home with Social Studies is to have them log into their Google accounts and show you that they know how to make a bibliography entry. As well, please help them to find new sources of valuable information on their time and place of study, either in print or digital form.
In Math, we are enjoying our fractions unit and the photos below show the kinds of questions we are doing. We did a check-in quiz today, and I asked students to bring them home to show you.
In Science, we have started learning about geology and the rock cycle.
In Health Education, we started our “Fully Alive” program. If you would like to see the exact textbook we are using, please send me an email, and I will arrange to loan a copy of the textbook to you. Or, you can come in and look at it in our class. Please let me know if you would like to stop by.
In Art, we just finished up a project that developed students’ techniques with pencil crayons. We focussed on blending, shading, and varying the colour value when making 8-square artworks celebrating the diverse beauty of various animals, birds, insects, reptiles and more.
Beautiful spring jewelry made on the St. Patrick’s field! Well done!
Tiffany Poirier 