Welcome to fifth grade!  We enjoy this age group. It is a joy to watch children develop their confidence, leadership qualities, and sense of self.  This is an exciting time and year with many opportunities for growth.  This is a year when students take ownership of their learning and gain greater independence.  Here are some components of our day and the fifth grade curriculum. 

READER’S WORKSHOP

Your child is participating in Reader’s Workshop this year. The workshop approach aims to provide all students with instruction using materials that are appropriate to each student’s individual reading level.  Students will read and examine a variety of literary genres.

Structure
Reader’s Workshop happens every day for 60 minutes.  The period begins with a mini-lesson that is delivered to the whole group.  The mini-lesson provides the focus for the day's reading and responding. After the mini-lesson, students break off into groups. Guided reading groups and/or book clubs meet with the teacher.  During this time, the other students are working on…

• Independent Reading
• Book Talks
• Written Responses to Literature

Books and Booktalks-  The books students choose are from a variety of genres and can include nonfiction, biographies, poetry, myths, legends, and works of fiction. Students will complete written and oral assessments of specified genres.  

MATH WORKSHOP

Math TQE (Task, Questions & Evidence) is designed to enhance students’ problem-solving and mathematical reasoning ability by going deeper with math concepts through creating, evaluating, and analyzing math problems.

The curriculum focuses on number sense, shapes, geometry, measurement, algebra, probability and data handling. 

Students participate in many activities tailored to their needs, including.... 

• Flex Groups to Reinforce Skills
• Math Games Groups
• Math Enrichment

WRITING WORKSHOP

Writing is so important in our lives.  It allows us to communicate and compose our ideas and thoughts.  Writing helps us understand ourselves and the world around us.  Our writing program is based on balanced literacy methods that are presented through the use of the school district's adopted Writer's Workshop curriculum.  A main goal of the program is to help students make strong connections between literature and writing.  The six traits we learn about are:  ideas and content, organization, voice, word choice, sentence fluency and conventions.  Concrete lessons and writing activities spark students' imagination and interest in writing.

When students arrive in class they're eager to start writing! Our first introduction to living the Writerly Life is looking at the life of writers and what makes a piece of writing good.  Students work on collecting seed ideas or entries in their writer's notebook.  Future writing units include: Personal Narrative, Interpretive Essay, Research-based Argument, Biography, Literary Essay, Poetry and Memoir.