March Report Cards

As report cards are sent home again tomorrow, here is a timely post about the use of the March report card. 

Both November and March report cards are interim report cards which describe a student's progress related to year end goals for his/her grade level. Please take a look at the post in November regarding general information about interim report cards. 

The information in the following link clarifies some common misconceptions about report cards:

http://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/k12/assess/report_cards/docs/opinions_facts.pdf

Additional information about a few specific subject areas is included below:

Math:

Assessment of problem solving in math was addressed in the November post.

In the area of mental math, students are expected to meet specific goals by the end of the school year in the areas of fact fluency and use of mental math strategies including estimation.

For grade specific outcomes please copy and paste the link below into your browser and click on your child's grade for his/her year end goals. Students in both Grade 4 and 5 need to demonstrate fact fluency in addition and subtraction as well as a strong grasp of estimation and the mental math strategies taught in class. As we work on multiplication and division, Grade 4 students will need to be able to recall multiplication and related division facts up to 5 X 5 and demonstrate an understanding of division facts up to 9 X 9 using a variety of mental math strategies. Grade 5 students will be expected to recall multiplication and related division facts up to 9 X 9.

http://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/k12/cur/math/outcomes/index.html

English Language Arts and Social Studies:

Students are expected to think deeply and critically at higher levels in Grade 4 and 5. This includes deep comprehension strategies when reading, viewing, and listening, such as asking questions about format, purpose, and style when reading texts and responding to reading and research independently both orally, in writing, and by representing understanding through artwork, movement, etc.

Being able to "decode" by reading the words at higher levels does not ensure comprehension, thus students needs to show consistent and independent practice of strategies such as asking questions; making connections between themselves, texts, and the world; making predictions; and noticing and empathizing with characters. Assessment of reading includes evaluation of students' written responses to reading, observations of comprehension and critical thinking strategies, conversations with students about these strategies, and a small amount is based on a students' reading level or benchmark.

Students who actively question information and form arguments to support their opinions and preferences show very strong critical thinking and communication skills. Students in Grade 5 are expected to demonstrate these skills with greater independence and sophistication than in Grade 4 as they set goals for themselves as readers and researchers. 

As always, families are welcome to meet with teachers to discuss questions or concerns about their child's progress.

Literacy Stations and Word Work

Nearly every day after our last recess, our class has Literacy Stations. During this time we work on writing independently, catch up work, reading alone or with someone, listening to reading via Raz-Kids on the iPads, literacy work with an adult, and working on our spelling work called Word Work.

We have nine Word Work stations with each based on using a different intelligence. Howard Gardener, an American developmental psychologist, identified nine types of intelligence years ago, and educational practice has shown that learning using a variety of types of intelligence helps our brains make more connections between ideas and skills. Miss Cichosz created the stations after reading Dr. Jennifer Katz's book, Teaching to Diversity, and discussing ideas with our divisional literacy coach. Our nine Word Work stations include:

- Naturalist (Nature Smart): students find letter tiles in a sand bin using tools, like archaeologists, to spell their practice words

- Musical-Rhythmic (Music and Rhythm Smart): students use their spelling words to write a song or rap

- Logical-Mathematical (Number and Reasoning Smart): students make a word code using numbers to represent each letter and solve a message by adding or multiplying the numbers for each letter

- Existential (Big Question/Meaning and Life Smart): students find the meaning of the words by using a dictionary site on the iPads and writing the definition on the window and then on their dictionary pages

- Interpersonal (People Smart): students work together to guess their spelling words and to spell them by playing charades or hangman with a partner

- Intrapersonal (Self Smart): students create a story or comic about their own lives using their spelling words

- Bodily-Kinesthetic (Body and Movement Smart): students carve their spelling words into Play-Doh

- Visual-Spatial (Art and Picture Smart): students create word art using their spelling words, such as word graffiti or words including letter characters with arms and legs

- Verbal-Linguistic (Word Smart): students write a short story, poem, letter, etc. using their spelling words

We enjoy learning our spelling words in such diverse ways!

Throw Back to December Holiday Gifts

In December, our class made faux stained glass art to give to our families as gifts. We traced and added onto designs with sharpie on plastic overhead pages. We then painted the pages, waited for the acrylic paint to dry, and flipped the pages over onto aluminum foil in a frame. After you flip the plastic page the sharpie lines are revealed on the other side of the paint; when placed over the foil the art looks like stained glass! We loved making such festive art for our families.