Reading and Math

For the past few weeks we have been working on how to do research.  Children have been learning how to take notes from biography books and from the internet, including how to properly make citations, parphrase, and hwo to write a bibliography page for where they obtained their information.  Next week they expand this to using an encyclopedia.  Eventually, in two weeks, students will use all of their notecards from all three sources to write a mini report on the American hero they chose to research.

In math, students have been working with negative numbers.  This week was especially challenging, as they learned how to add AND subtract positive and negative numbers (example:  5-(-2)=).  Knowing this is one of the most challenging concepts to wrap a 5th grade brain around, Miss. Fanning taught several strategies to help the class solve such problems, including walking on a number line, "add the opposite", and using special counters.