Before starting any individual work, we first worked through the research and writing process together as a class, doing research and writing a sample paper on hydration:

1.         Pick a topic.
2.         Find resources and take notes.
3.         Organize information.
4         Write paragraphs:
            introduction
            body (2-4 paragraphs)
            conclusion

Everyone has a topic. Everyone has found resources and has taken notes. Most are starting to organize and write.

The due date for the final draft of the paragraphs will be Friday, November 30.

I will continue to give computer lab time for students to work. However, parents are allowed—no, they are encouraged to support their children in their writing. But how much help can a parent legitimately give?

Here is what I am going to do. I will ask students to print their work at the end of each day. Children can take their work home to show their parents. Parents can offer suggestions for revisions first. How can students add ideas or improve their organization? Toward the end of the week, parents might help with editing for conventions. Going to my website (kragen.net) and reviewing the formatting guidelines would also be a great idea.

Please understand, I hope to have the student doing all the work at school, not at home. Parents will be looking at already printed papers and will give help that students will use the next day at school. I really do not want the students to be writing the papers at home.

I will put the rubric for research writing below. At this point, I am hoping for a lot of 3s.

Thank you, and I hope this helps!

The final draft of the worksheet for the first book is due Nov. 20. I encourage students to do the final draft on the computer. Everyone will pick their second book to read after they turn in their final draft of the first worksheet. 

The first activities will be due Nov. 27. We will share them in class that week.

The second worksheet will be due Dec. 4. Please turn in final draft quality work!

The second activities will be due Dec. 11. We will share them in class that week.

You can find the rubric for evaluating the book projects and the format guidelines for any written work done in Word under "Elementary Materials" on this site.

All 5th graders and all Pond Kids will go to IslandWood trip in April. The current plan is to ask parents to pay $80 for their child to attend. The balance of the cost will, we hope, be covered by fundraising. We NEED parent help with fundraising and organizing the details of the trip. If you can help, please contact Jan Jackson, the librarian at Suquamish Elementary.

jjackson@nkschools.org
360-394-6919

DUE DATES IN THIS POST!

There is a list of several fiction books for students to choose from for this fall. (The descriptions of the books are taken from amazon.com.) Students are going to read at least two of the books before winter break:

Shiloh 
When Marty Preston comes across a young beagle in the hills behind his home, it's love at first sight—and also big trouble. It turns out the dog, which Marty names Shiloh, belongs to Judd Travers, who drinks too much and has a gun—and abuses his dogs. So when Shiloh runs away from Judd to Marty, Marty just has to hide him and protect him from Judd. But Marty's secret becomes too big for him to keep to himself, and it exposes his entire family to Judd's anger. How far will Marty have to go to make Shiloh his?

Incredible Journey 
Instinct told them that the way home lay to the west. And so the doughty young Labrador retriever, the roguish bull terrier and the indomitable Siamese set out through the Canadian wilderness. Separately, they would soon have died. But, together, the three house pets faced starvation, exposure, and wild forest animals to make their way home to the family they love. 

 My Side of the Mountain 
Terribly unhappy in his family's crowded New York City apartment, Sam Gribley runs away to the solitude—and danger—of the mountains, where he finds a side of himself he never knew.

Call It Courage 
Mafatu has been afraid of the sea for as long as he can remember. Though his father is the Great Chief of Hikueru—an island whose seafaring people worship courage—Mafatu feels like an outsider. All his life he has been teased, taunted, and even blamed for storms on the sea. Then at age 15, no longer willing to put up with the ridicule and jibes, Mafatu decides to take his fate into his own hands. With his dog, Uri, as his companion, Mafatu paddles out to sea, ready to face his fears. What he learns on his lonesome adventure will change him forever and make him a hero in the eyes of his people.

Hatchet
Thirteen-year-old Brian Robeson is on his way to visit his father when the single-engine plane in which he is flying crashes. Suddenly, Brian finds himself alone in the Canadian wilderness with nothing but a tattered windbreaker and the hatchet his mother gave him as a present—and the dreadful secret that has been tearing him apart since his parent's divorce. But now Brian has no time for anger, self-pity, or despair—it will take all his know-how and determination, and more courage than he knew he possessed, to survive.

Island of the Blue Dolphins 
This book won the Newberry Medal. It tells the story of a 12-year old girl who lives alone on a Pacific island after she leaps from a rescue ship. Isolated on the island for eighteen years, Karana forages for food, builds weapons to fight predators, clothes herself in a cormorant feathered skirt, and finds strength and peace in her seclusion.

Julie of the Wolves 
To her small Eskimo village, she is known as Miyax; to her friend in San Francisco, she is Julie. When her life in the village becomes dangerous, Miyax runs away, only to find herself lost in the Alaskan wilderness. Without food and with time running out, Miyax tries to survive by copying the ways of a pack of wolves. Accepted by their leader and befriended by a feisty pup named Kapu, she soon grows to love her new wolf family. Life in the wilderness is a struggle, but when she finds her way back to civilization, Miyax is torn between her old and new lives. Is she Miyax of the Eskimos—or Julie of the wolves?


Everyone already picked their first book to read and formed groups. Groups figured out how much they needed to read each day to finish their book on time. They have had some class time to read, and they can also read at home. They have a worksheet to complete as they read--I told them to fold it into fourths and use it for a bookmark and then add answers as they found them.

The worksheet for the first book is due Nov. 13. (Most students are already done.)

We will look at the activities for the books next week. 

The first activities will be due Nov. 20.

Everyone will then pick their second book to read.

The second worksheet will be due Dec. 4.

The second activities will be due Dec. 11.

Colleen Fairchild and I decided not to do Words Their Way, at least not this year. So I am doing a vocabulary and spelling program I developed some years ago. The students have the 30 word lists for the year in their 3-ring binders. On Tuesdays we will do the list word spelling tests. During the tests I will give the meaning of the words; the students will have to remember the words and spell them correctly.

On Thursdays the students will continue to get their words missed spelling tests. Any word they misspell on any final draft written work can get added to their own personal words missed list.

In addition, also in their 3-ring binders, they now have a list of over 1000 core words--the most commonly used words in the English language. (I also included all 50 prepositions in the list.) The core words list is a challenge--the students can move through the list at their own pace, 20 words at a time. Those tests would also be done on Thursdays.

Add that to the daily work in CCD (Cognitive Content Dictionary) where we are learning Greek and Latin roots, and periodic DOLs (Daily Oral Language) where we apply rules of grammar and spelling to real-life writing, and you can see that spelling and vocabulary development are a critical component of our curriculum!