Livesay's Owl Post

8/25 - PICTURE DAY!

8/25 - Restaurant Night - Prost

8/28 - Deadline to sign up for Running Club, 3rd-6th graders

9/1 - No School

9/5 - Donuts with Dudes 7:45-8:30 am

Picture Day is coming up next Monday, August 25th! Order instructions went home in Thursday Folders yesterday. Please note that all orders will be done online only this year. Be sure to place your order before or on Picture Day so your child’s photo is included.

Beginning next week, students will start having homework assignments that require the use of a computer at home. Examples include vocabulary, math, Reflex, and other online programs. Please be sure your child has access to their Chromebook at home and can log in through Clever. This is an important skill for our fifth graders to have going into middle school, where most of their homework will be completed online.

• If your child still needs to check out a Chromebook for the year, you may do so here: Chromebook Checkout Link

• For step-by-step help, watch the videos on how to log in at home.

If you anticipate any issues with computer access, please reach out so we can make a plan together.

Fifth grade leadership shirts (light blue) will be coming home today. Thank you to our amazing PTO who purchased these for ALL of our 5th grade students! Please store them in a safe place, as there will be designated days throughout the school year when students will be asked to wear them to school. Students will also be coming home with flyers and information from the Band/Orchestra preview we attended today.

Over the past two weeks, we have been working on short constructed responses using the ThinkSRSD writing process. Students are learning how to answer reading questions in a complete way by:

• Citing text evidence – finding and using sentences directly from the passage to support their answer.

• Explaining their thinking – connecting the evidence back to their own ideas to show deeper understanding.

This practice is helping students build strong habits for responding to text, which will be a key skill for success this year and beyond.

In math, we have been focusing on place value with decimals, comparing numbers, and rounding. To practice these skills in a fun way, students completed an exciting activity where they helped Captain Penguin Pete find his missing treasure by using their place value knowledge. This hands-on practice helped students strengthen their understanding while keeping the learning engaging and interactive.

In writing, students have been working on a pre-assessment to see where they are as writers at the beginning of the year. For this task, they read two articles and watched a video about the 2000 South Africa oil spill that nearly harmed thousands of endangered African penguins. Their writing prompt was to explain the effects of the oil spill on the African penguin population and the rescue efforts that followed. This assignment gave students the opportunity to practice gathering information from multiple sources and organizing their ideas in writing. The pre-assessment also provides us with a clear starting point to guide writing instruction for the rest of the year.

In social studies, we have been learning about the regions of the United States. Students worked in groups to research a specific region and created a slideshow to demonstrate their learning. Next week, they will take what they discovered and create postcards highlighting the key features of their region. This project helps students learn research skills, collaboration, and how to present information in creative ways.