Sunday, November 29, 2015

Trimester One Reading Recap

I can't believe we are already at the end of the first trimester! The fourth and fifth grade students have been working very hard on achieving their goal of becoming skilled, critical, habitual, life-long readers! They have worked to meet individual page goals and as a matter of fact, many of them had to reset these page goals multiple times! They have also done a great job maintaining all of the important paperwork needed to create purposeful, intentional reading plans!




This trimester students also began the process of studying a variety of genres. By having a clearer knowledge of the qualities of these genres students open the door to many reading possibilities that they might not have thought they would enjoy! Knowing the specific traits of each genre also helps students approach each type of text successfully. They can now try new types of readings with confidence and excitement! As a final assessment students created a fiction and nonfiction genre comic strip for a specific sub genre. Students were challenged with making sure their comic strips contained the qualities specific to the chosen sub genre. Each student then viewed the comic strips  made by their classmates and determined their sub genres. This was a fun and engaging way for students to demonstrate their genre knowledge!

End of Trimester One Writing Recap


This trimester the fourth and fifth grade students have done a great job settling into the structures of writing workshop. Students have created expectations and rules for a successful writer's workshop and have worked very hard to maintain this necessary structure! This type of writing structure consists of a minilesson, ample writing time, and time for peer and teacher conferencing and editing.


For the first trimester students focused on the poetry genre. Students determined subject matters that had meaning for them, learned how to focus on the most important ideas, and how to use the most specific, powerful language to get their ideas across. We also discussed the use of figurative language, focusing specifically on similes and metaphors. We closely read and analyzed many pieces of poetry written by various authors and determined how their words and use of figurative language created mood, sensory reactions, and showed insight into the lives, thoughts, feelings and personality of the poet. Students also discussed how the poets words impacted them as readers. By the end of the trimester students produced many of their own poetic writing pieces!