September 25, 2020

 Welcome back!

Important Dates and Information:

We've completed a week of Hybrid Learning! Both Distance Learners and Brick & Mortar students have shown integrity and perseverance in their learning, and we appreciate you sticking with us as we've navigated this latest transitional period.

English Language Arts:

This past week we said goodbye to Mary, Dickon, and Colin as we finished The Secret Garden. Next week we will review The Secret Garden before beginning our next Literature text - The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. 

Math:

Hello 5th grade Spartans!

It was great to see some of your scholars in person, and to have an extended amount of time with them on zoom. This week we came to the end of our second unit in math, meaning next Tuesday we will have our second test. We will have a cumulative review on Monday of what we have learned so far. Then we venture in fractions and what they really mean or represent. Hope everyone has a great weekend, and we will see you all next week!

-Mr. Dorazio

History:

Next week, we will continue our multiple-part unit on the Renaissance with the Medici family and the merchant class of Florence, Italy. We will continue our discussion of the Renaissance by Identifying and explaining the significance of Leonardo da Vinci and Machiavelli.

Science:

This week we worked with color and energy. There were some musical instruments and flame! Next week we will start to build circuits and parallel circuits. Distance learners, you may want to have some pipe cleaners and look for paper lightbulbs and paper batteries that you may want to print out to play along. 

Grammar/Writing: 

This week in Grammar we started identifying and using adjectives. Scholars have come up with some creative descriptions of things! Next week we will continue working with analyzing and diagramming adjectives in sentences and composing our own descriptive sentences.

In Writing we will continue improving our summarizing and outlining skills. Our focus will be identifying and accounting for main events in chronological order. We will do this using a passage, then will write our own chronological narrative.

Specials link: https://ghwhspecials.blogspot.com/

5^th Grade Contact Info:

5A Lead – Mr. Craig Swanson; craig.swanson@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Ms. Kate Wall; katharine.wall@greatheartswesternhills.org

5B Lead – Mr. Vinny Dorazio; vincent.dorazio@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Ms. Kate Wall; katharine.wall@greatheartswesternhills.org

5C Lead – Ms. Hannah Harkness; hannah.harkness@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Mr. Daniel Coronel; daniel.coronel@greatheartswesternhills.org

5D Lead – Mr. Travis Chisholm; travis.chisholm@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Mr. Daniel Coronel; daniel.coronel@greatheartswesternhills.org

 

If you need us, we’re here! Please do not hesitate to reach out with questions, comments, or concerns.

September 18, 2020

 Welcome back!

Important Dates and Information:

Monday, 9/21, is our scholars' first day back on campus! Please consult the email from your scholar's teacher regarding what supplies to bring to campus. 

Also note that moving forward we will no longer offer homeroom or tutoring Zooms, but we will have new small groups Zooms for our distance learners as well as social Zooms twice a week; we will keep you posted with times and dates!

English Language Arts:

This past week we worked on analyzing character relationships in The Secret Garden, and next week we will finish the last chapters of our first novel of 5th grade! For Poetry, we had our Recitation on The Road Not Taken and next week we will begin Sonnet 29 by William Shakespeare. 

Math:

Hello Fifth Grade Spartans,
Next week we will wrap-up our Unit 2 and delve deeper into long division. There will be a brief review over the past few lessons and a cumulative review of everything we have done this year in math so far. These reviews are important for your scholars to gauge how they are doing with the material and where they need more practice. Have a great weekend, and we look forward to seeing some of you in person next week!
Sincerely,
Mr. Dorazio

History: 

Monday—

We will start our multiple-part unit on the Renaissance, beginning with the Origins of the Renaissance: the factors that brought about this rebirth of Europe and its people.

Wednesday—

We will continue our discussion of the Renaissance with an introduction to Humanism, the belief that people should be educated and that things like art, music, and science could make life better for everyone.

Science:

This week we wrapped up learning about chemistry and moved on to light energy. Next week we deal more with energy and what happens when light touches an object--why does an apple appear red? We will also introduce electrical energy and talk a little bit about circuits.

Grammar/Writing:

In Grammar, we will start working with adjectives. We'll learn what they do, how they're used, and how to analyze and diagram them in sentences. 

In Writing, we'll continue using different types of passages to practice key concepts of recognizing main topics and ideas and being able to summarize and outline. We'll also learn about the use of synonyms and thesauruses to make written work more interesting.

Specials link: https://ghwhspecials.blogspot.com/

5^th Grade Contact Info:

5A Lead – Mr. Craig Swanson; craig.swanson@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Ms. Kate Wall; katharine.wall@greatheartswesternhills.org

5B Lead – Mr. Vinny Dorazio; vincent.dorazio@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Ms. Kate Wall; katharine.wall@greatheartswesternhills.org

5C Lead – Ms. Hannah Harkness; hannah.harkness@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Mr. Daniel Coronel; daniel.coronel@greatheartswesternhills.org

5D Lead – Mr. Travis Chisholm; travis.chisholm@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Mr. Daniel Coronel; daniel.coronel@greatheartswesternhills.org

 

If you need us, we’re here! Please do not hesitate to reach out with questions, comments, or concerns.

September 11, 2020

 Welcome back!

Important Dates and Information:

Reminder: Each day starts at 8:00 a.m., when we look forward to seeing all students sitting scholarly and ready for our Homeroom Zoom meetings!

English Language Arts:

Literature: This week we practiced finding themes in The Secret Garden and next week we will find specific ideas in the story to back up our main ideas. 

Poetry: This last week and this next week we are practicing for our recitation on the 18th. 

Math:

Next week we will be taking a step further into working with word problems and learning how to navigate them. We will also see the fruition of the distributive property in the algorithms we use for multiplication and division. Have a great weekend!

History:

Monday of next week will consist of the Mesoamerican Review/ Test. The slide-video will take the students through the review and the Cornell notes will be provided as a reference to be used on the Google Classroom Test. The Test itself will have ten questions this time, as opposed to the usual five question quiz. Students can change their answers until they “Submit” those answers to GC. A grade should be given to them soon after in the top right-hand corner of the graded Test.

Wednesday will consist of a reflection project. One question will be asked about each of the Mesoamerican Civilizations: Maya, Aztec, Inca. Students will be asked to answer the question in 3-5 sentences and create a picture from their words to bring the words to life through art.   

Science:

We had some exciting developments with physical and chemical changes this week. We were able to see that after the baking soda reacted to the vinegar, the bag stayed relatively the same weight! Next week, we finish up our conversation about chemistry and start to turn our attention to energy and light. Here's a sneak peek!

Grammar/Writing:

Next week in Writing we will continue identifying topics and main ideas in paragraphs and putting them into outlines. In Grammar, we will continue practicing using and diagramming adverbs.

Specials link: https://ghwhspecials.blogspot.com/

5^th Grade Contact Info:

5A Lead – Mr. Craig Swanson; craig.swanson@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Ms. Kate Wall; katharine.wall@greatheartswesternhills.org

5B Lead – Mr. Vinny Dorazio; vincent.dorazio@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Ms. Kate Wall; katharine.wall@greatheartswesternhills.org

5C Lead – Ms. Hannah Harkness; hannah.harkness@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Mr. Daniel Coronel; daniel.coronel@greatheartswesternhills.org

5D Lead – Mr. Travis Chisholm; travis.chisholm@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Mr. Daniel Coronel; daniel.coronel@greatheartswesternhills.org

 

If you need us, we’re here! Please do not hesitate to reach out with questions, comments, or concerns.

September 4, 2020

 Welcome back!

Important Dates and Information:

Monday, 9/7: Labor Day; there will be no Zooms or Google Classroom lessons. Enjoy the long weekend!

Tuesday, 9/8: There will be NO Zoom meetings (Homeroom, Small Groups, or Tutoring) due to faculty training taking place throughout the school day.

Phased Reopening: Due to the latest reopening plan, 5th grade families who have opted to return to campus for Brick & Mortar learning will begin sending students to the building on Monday, September 21.

Reminder: Each day starts at 8:00 a.m., when we look forward to seeing all students sitting scholarly and ready for our Homeroom Zoom meetings!

English Language Arts: 

This past week in Literature we continued reading the Secret Garden and practiced identifying key ideas and concepts. Next week we are continuing our reading and will learn how to infer themes from the text. We will also continue practicing The Road Not Taken in preparation for our recorded Poetry recitations on the 18^th!

Grammar & Writing:

    We started off the year in Grammar reviewing the Four Types of Sentences and the Principal Elements. In the coming weeks, we will be focusing on Adverbs: what they do and how to use them. Each fifth grader should have a Well Ordered Language 2A workbook where they can complete a majority of their assignments and in which they may underline and/or take notes as they watch Grammar videos.

    In Writing, we are working on how to summarize passages about a variety of subjects. This week, we identified main ideas and wrote summaries in paragraphs. Next week, we will create summaries by using different kinds of outlines to organize central themes. Students should have a Writing notebook where they take notes as requested, but for now, they should be completing Writing assignments on loose-leaf lined paper.

Math:

Hello Fifth grade Spartans,

Next week for math we will be working with mental math. We will look at equations differently and try to manipulate them in ways that will be easier to solve in our heads. This will be a great help when we get to word problems. By the end of the week we will learn how to navigate a word problem and how to properly solve it. 

-Mr. Dorazio

History:

     We will continue our studies of Mesoamerica next Monday, discussing the Incan Empire and the influence it had in South America. The Incan people brought together many other groups along the Western coast of South America and created better roads, bridges, farming techniques, etc. that would advance their empire into greater dominance within the region.

    We will have a Mesoamerican Unit Review on Wednesday, followed by a 10-question test inside Google Classroom. This will be an “open note” test completed with the notes provided from the lessons provided through GC.

Be Well,

Mr. Swanson 

Science:

This week in Science we started to investigate chemical and physical changes. Next week, we dive deeper into what makes a chemical change different from a physical change. Be on the look out for our first Science test on Tuesday the 15^th!

- Mr. Chisholm

Specials link: https://ghwhspecials.blogspot.com/

5^th Grade Contact Info:

5A Lead – Mr. Craig Swanson; craig.swanson@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Ms. Kate Wall; katharine.wall@greatheartswesternhills.org

5B Lead – Mr. Vinny Dorazio; vincent.dorazio@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Ms. Kate Wall; katharine.wall@greatheartswesternhills.org

5C Lead – Ms. Hannah Harkness; hannah.harkness@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Mr. Daniel Coronel; daniel.coronel@greatheartswesternhills.org

5D Lead – Mr. Travis Chisholm; travis.chisholm@greatheartswesternhills.org

              AT – Mr. Daniel Coronel; daniel.coronel@greatheartswesternhills.org

 

If you need us, we’re here! Please do not hesitate to reach out with questions, comments, or concerns.