What is Energy?

What an interesting essential question, and like all topics we cover in the fifth grade, we like to learn it through interactivity and fun.  Today in science, we defined energy and listened to a catchy song from the 1950s all about this physical science topic.  Here it is for those of you interested.


 

This was followed by some interesting examples of potential and kinetic energy.  Vielleux Crew Kids,  see if you can think of some examples of these other than the ones we came up with in class.  Wait until tomorrow when we take a look at this:




And as a special challenge, I would love for the fifth graders to create their own videos of potential and kinetic energy!  Anyone?  Anyone?

Sound is out first form of energy we will discuss.  On Thursday, we will have a guest teacher from VINS coming to lead us through some inquiry activities.  We've also assigned a 2 week project to create an instrument using household materials (please don't buy ANYTHING... just use what you can find around the house).  My junk drawer alone could furnish a junk instrument orchestra.
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The new session of reading groups is underway.  All fifth graders will remain in their homeroom classes until April vacation in order to focus on nonfiction reading and informational text.  This fits in nicely with our unit on Energy and our upcoming Screen Free Week (more info to come about that).

In writing, we are building our knowledge about persuasive writing through mini-lessons, read aloud and real world examples and will work our way up to writing a persuasive letter about television watching and screen time.

So You Think You Can Argue?

If you're a fifth grader, the answer to this question is simple.  Fifth graders will argue that the sky is blue or that there's snow on the ground.  They will argue that floating in the middle of an ocean you could tell the difference between high tide and low tide, and when you point out the there is no visual point of reference to tell the difference between tides, they will encounter a mysterious shipwreck or sand dune. Right in the middle of the ocean.  I like to tell that it might rain jello next Thursday.  At this point they are confused, and I remind them that in most instances they need to rein in their brains and think about common experiences and not the outliers.  This is a tough one.

However, we are doing just that with our journey into persuasion and persuasive writing.  We started by reading I Wanna Iguana, a book about a boy who writes letters to his mom to convince her to let him have a pet iguana.

I also asked the kids to think about the techniques advertisers use to convince us to buy or use their products.  In fifth grade, we focused on three persuasive techniques:

• Humor-- getting you to laugh
• Facts and Data-- 9 out of 10 dentists prefer...
• Emotions-- playing on your emotions; making you feel good or another strong emotion.

Kids nominated their favorite commercials and identified which techniques the advertisers were using to convince us to buy or use their product or service.  

Here were a couple of the students' favorites:

And then, following tips from www.writingfix.com, we read the book My Lucky Day, a book about a pig who convinces the fox not to eat him, and in the process gets a little spoiled.  We then created comic strips where a turkey would need to convince the fox not to eat!

Biography Fair Success

What a day!  After months of hard work, reading, research, note-taking, planning and designing, the first annual DBS Biography Fair was a phenomenal hit.  All of the students were prepared, knowledgeable and "on stage" from 9-10:45.

Teddy Roosevelt

Jackie Robinson

Harry Houdini

Henry Ford

Elvis Presley

Martin Luther King, Jr.

King Tut

Babe Ruth

Ronald Reagan

Dr. Seuss

Michael Jordan

Barack Obama

Eleanor Roosevelt

Queen Victoria 

Annie Oakley

I would like to congratulate all of the fifth graders and families for their hard work.  I was completely impressed by their knowledge and their ability to stay in character.  

Stop Motion

It's a dog eat dog world.  Oh, wait.  Dogs don't eat dogs.  Vielleux Crew kids know that.  We're learning about the interconnected webs that make up our world-- in our study of the food web.  Here are our stop motion animation  videos of food chains.  This was our first attempt at stop motion, and thanks to Miss Schneider, they were a huge hit!

Virtual Owl Pellets

Hey, Vielleux Crew Kids!  Check out this great site, where you get to "virtually" dissect owl pellets!  Try it online before we try it for real!

http://www.kidwings.com/owlpellets/flash/v4/index.htm

Happy Thanksgiving

What a great group of kids! Best holiday greetings to all of you and your families, and remember Vielleux crew kids: get on www.xtramath.org four out of the five days and earn a $10 classroom buck bonus.

Kids can also start reading their biographies. Our class choices range from Bill Gates to Annie Oakley!

Biography Fair Announced

It's time for the BIOGRAPHY FAIR!  Starting Monday, November 19th students will begin choosing their focus people.  Click on the Biography Fair Banner to bring you to the project information.

You will also find a slideshow of past presentations to help you with your showboard.

Biography Fair

5V Poetry

Ms. Schneider and the poets of 5V created some amazing, colorful poetry based on William Carlos Williams and William Blake.  Here they are-- click on the slideshow to make the pictures larger.

Our Presidential Blabbers

VOTE FOR SOMEBODY

The kids at democracy prep have a great song to remind us why it's important to vote.  Check it out here: