Important Dates

• Friday, October 29th - Two Hour Early Release and Quarter 1 ends
• Monday, November 1st - Teacher Work Day
• Tuesday, November 2nd - Teacher Work Day

Language Arts

What are we learning?

• The students are learning that literary techniques in narrative nonfiction reveal images and evoke feelings to enhance a message for the reader to interpret. 
• The students are learning that the way the author crafts information communicates their stance or beliefs about a topic.
• The students are learning to understand that as the writer uncovers the focus of the piece, he or she makes decisions about how to organize the piece.

Home/School Connection

• Ask your student the following questions:
• How can you evaluate the reliability of a nonfiction text?
• What are other perspectives on this topic?
• How can my decisions as a writer impact the reader’s understanding?

Math

What are we learning?

• The student continues to multiply and divide fractions and mixed numbers.
• The student continues to Solve single-step & multistep practical problems involving addition, subtraction, multiplication, & division of fractions, mixed numbers, and decimals.

Home/School Connection

• Ask your student to help you figure out how to double or triple a recipe. What would they do if they needed to find ½ of the recipe? 
• Do you have a fractional amount of something that you need to divide into equal portions? Have them help you!

Social Studies

What are we learning?

• The student will describe the characteristics of West African Societies (Ghana, Mali, and Songhai) 
• The student will evaluate the West African Societies role in the European exploration of North America

Home/School Connection

• Ask your student the following questions:
• How do shared beliefs and values shape a culture?
• How do cultural universals differ among cultures? How might they be similar?
• How does trade impact the relationship between cultures?
• How might the role of wealth and power influence exploration and colonization?

AAP Content

Systems Are Influenced by Other Systems:  Human Migration and Settlement:

• In this unit, students demonstrate skills for historical thinking and geographical analysis to understand how early cultures developed in North America and the cultural and economic interactions between Europeans and American Indians that led to cooperation and conflict between systems. We will discuss how people explore, move, and migrate for social, political, and economic reasons. Students will explore how moving to new places can change many parts of a system (the people, land, and culture of the new place). We will also reflect on how Earth’s system are made up of parts of systems that are interdependent upon one another.
• Current PBL: How can you as an author/activist share a true story of cooperation and conflict between European Explorers and the Native Peoples they interacted with between 1400s-1600s to an audience of young readers?
• Our next unit: Patterns of Weather, Relationships, and Interdependence, Part 1

Advanced Math: Real Numbers and Exponents

• Students will develop an understanding of and flexibility with multiple representations of functions that model a multiplicative or additive relationship.
  • Topics covered include:
    • Square Roots and Perfect Squares
    • Absolute Value of Rational Numbers
    • Negative Exponents of Powers of Ten
    • Scientific Notation

Home/School Connection:

• What is a system?
• Why do we need systems?
• What are the causes and effects of conflicts that take place between groups within systems?
• How do systems change?

Click here to see what students are learning in Specials!