Happy Fall!

Happy Fall!

What a busy week we have coming up!
Take a peek below to see what's going on and to find a few reminders.

Water Bottles: With drinking fountains shut down, please makes sure students come to class each day with a full water bottle. Students are also welcome to keep water bottles at school and bring them home to wash on the weekend. I have a limited number of water bottles each day that students may borrow if they forget their own.

Spelling Homework this week!

Tuesday Trip to the Pond: We will be walking to the pond Tuesday afternoon 9/21 to continue our study of Earth's different spheres and to seek inspiration for some poetry writing.

Traveling Folders: Red Traveling Folders will be coming home on Tuesday 9/21 with a writing assignment, a math exit ticket, a spelling quiz, and a practice vocabulary test. Please look through and keep the work. Sign and return the folders by Friday 9/24. Thanks!

Picture Day this Thursday 9/23!

Conferences Coming up! 
Keep an eye out for Zoom conference sign ups in the next week or so. Conferences are scheduled October 11, 12, and 13 (half days of school for students) followed by fall break October 14 and 15 (no school). 

Students of the Week: 9/6 and 9/13
Congratulations, Andres and Kiomi!
Thanks for being such great partners to students in our class.

September Has Arrived!

Dear Families,

I'm so excited to finally be getting the blog set up for the year! Your fourth graders have already been learning so much both academically and about each other. We've been practicing daily connection circles, reading James and the Giant Peach, and working on place value.

Traveling Folders Coming Home This Week

This week, students will be coming home with their red "Traveling Folder." Inside of it you will find several exit tickets (end of lesson checks) and concept "quests" (quizzes). Take a look at and discuss your child's work with them. Once you are finished, keep their work, sign the folder, and send the folder back to school for me!

Spelling and Vocabulary Homework Starting Soon

Starting next week, students will be working on spelling and vocabulary "home"work. Besides building their spelling skills and vocabulary, they will be working on time management skills in a daily study hall.  During this study hall, students will have the chance to collaborate and get much, if not all, of their "home"work completed at school. Many students struggle with this freedom at the beginning of the year, so we will be focusing a lot on responsible study habits during this time. Students will showcase their learning on a weekly spelling and vocabulary test.

August's Students of the Week
Congratulations, Addy, Joey, Paige, and Carlos for THINKing like a Mustang!

Upcoming Events

• Monday, September 20: No School for Students
• Thursday, September 23: Picture Day
• October 6: Walk to School Day
• October 11-13: Conferences (1/2 days for students)
• October 14-15: Fall Break (No School)

September Check In 2020

What's Up in Fifth Grade

What a beginning to school! I think we've finally settled into a "school" routine with our expectations, learning, and technology issues. In the spirit of routine, I'm hoping to get into a more regular routine of class updates through the class blog. Please email me (efisher@fusd1.org) with any questions, concerns, or needs that may arise for your family during our flexible remote learning time.

Technology, Assignments, and Grades

The fifth graders (and me!) are becoming more fluent with our Canvas learning platform. At this point, students should easily be able to navigate our homepage and daily agenda where they can find their schedule and assignments for the day. We are working on completing and submitting assignments on time through Canvas. Students and families can see what work is missing by clicking on the "Assignment" button in their app. Student grades in Canvas are marked as complete or incomplete, while their "formal" report card grades (1, 2, 3, or 4) are available through ParentVue in the synergy system.

Canvas Parent Accounts

Have your fifth grader give you a Canvas tour if you haven't checked it out yet! Also, don't forget to get a parent account to observe your student's work on Canvas. Go to the FUSD website to create a family account. You must also have a pairing code to connect your account with your student's. Follow the steps in this link to get a pairing code. Once you are logged in, you are able to be an observer on your child's Canvas account.

Academics

MATH: In Math, we've been working hard on the names of place value spots as well as the value of numbers from the billions all the way down to thousandths. We've also been practicing how to convert between metric units of measurement and multiply whole and decimal numbers by exponents with a base of ten. Next week we will be working on rewriting numbers into expanded form and exponential form followed by comparing numbers.

ELA: In ELA, we've been reading Night of the Spadefoot Toads and practicing our comprehension skills. Expect your student to finish this book in the next several weeks. Much of our focus outside of comprehension has been on figurative language, specifically idioms, similes, metaphors, and personification. Students will be using this knowledge in a poetry project in the coming weeks. We will also be using our knowledge of nouns, verbs, and prepositions to write summary sentences of longer pieces of nonfiction writing.

SCIENCE: We've added science Friday to our week! This means that on top of students accessing their science curriculum through self paced work during their independent study time in the afternoons, we are also taking more time together as a whole class to emphasize science each Friday. Currently, we are working on genetics and will be transitioning to how humans impact the natural world.

DON'T FORGET!Spirit Week 9/14-9/18

Welcome to the 2020-2021 School Year!

     

Hello Fifth Graders and Families,

Welcome to the class blog where you can find weekly(ish) updates on what's happening with learning, important news, and who our student of the week is. Feel free to add your email in the space to the right to be notified when a new post has been made to the blog so you never miss a thing!

I know many families are figuring out how remote learning will look in their homes. Know that this experience will not only be full of great learning experiences but also one of flexibility. The schedule for our class is one that I will be following on a daily basis, but there is certainly flexibility with how you and your family interact with that schedule. Please don't hesitate to communicate with me if something isn't quite working out for your family. I'm here to help and to make sure that all families are able to access the learning that their fifth graders need.

Please take the time to look over and become familiar with the schedule for our class. As things get started and we figure out what is working or isn't working for our team, there may be adjustments made. If that happens, I will communicate with all students and families about those changes. A paper copy of the current schedule will be included in the beginning of the year papers that go home during the August 12th pickup. 

As we get started, I'm asking each family to fill out an information sheet. This will be coming home in the beginning of the year folder with iPad pickups, but a link to the digital copy can be found here: A Little Bit About Me. This form is very helpful for me and it's a chance for you to share unique information about your child and family that helps me get to know you a little bit better right from the beginning. Thank you so much for completing this brief but very important form.

More information will be coming your way from FUSD, Mrs. Reasor, and me as we get closer to "the first day." For now, know that I'm so excited to get started on this unique journey with you and your child!

Sincerely,
Ms. Fisher
(efisher@fusd1.org)

First Day Scavenger Hunt Clue

Your seventh clue is the letter: S

Dear Families,

What a year! What a quarter! What a last week of feelings this final "school" week of the year has been. I loved seeing so many of your faces at the "parade" today! I wanted to say thank you for sharing your kids with me this past year. Every single student grew in so many ways and I am proud of each and every one of them. In the hopes of recognizing these amazing kids, I've uploaded two very special slideshows below.

First is the promotion slide of just our class, second is something of a memory video that highlights many of the amazing things your kids did this year. Though this year was cut a quarter short, boy does it show a lot of learning! Feel free to share the link to this blog, the slideshow, or the video with your friends and families but please do not share on your personal social media platforms. While all students in the video have media releases, we want to be respectful of each family's rights on how their children's images are shared outside of the FUSD "family." 

Cry. Hug each other. Laugh at some pretty silly pictures. Enjoy!
Thanks for a great year!

Love to you all,

Ms. Fisher

2019-2020 Promotion Slide Show-Ms. Fisher's Class: 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1myqEtFIGXlCEOjvVKpD31xiwVTinGEv2/view

2019-2020 Memory Video: 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bCWOW8hR7MExL7gH1frcgfhj3NuFyam7/view?usp=sharing

Dear Families, 

Can you believe it's the last Monday of the school year? How did that happen? Mrs. Reasor has given us permission to give an in person drive by farewell to interested kindergarten and fifth grade families. For interested families, teachers will be out front of Marshall school on Thursday morning May 21 to give our kinder and fifth grade families a chance to drive by and wave their farewells. Teachers will be wearing masks, spaced apart, and will not be allowed to approach cars. Families will not be allowed to stop but may drive really really slowly. Please start from the Flag High/FJA side of Marshall and drive towards the "tree park." See the schedule below for our class's time slot:.

9:00-9:30 Kindergarten

9:00-9:10 Bianco

9:10-9:20 Housholder

9:20-9:30 Ryan

5th grade

9:40-9:50 Arnold

9:50-10:00 Grimmett

10:00-10:10 Krause

10:10-10:20 Fisher

Please email me if you haven't yet and are interested in a pick-up time for school work on Friday, May 22. Available slots are from 9-11am or from 1-3pm. Art projects from Mrs. Hobson will not be available until the beginning of next school year. Families must stay in their cars and wait for help in the bus lane. This will also be a chance for families to drop off library books.

Be on the lookout on Thursday for two very special end of year videos for our class. I'll send a text when I post them on the blog!

Have a great week,

Ms. Fisher (efisher@fusd1.org) 

Dear Families,

Can you believe it's the second to last week of school? I know I can't. What I wild journey these last months have been. Below are a few updated notices and requests from FUSD. I'll be reaching out to individual families this week through email, so keep an eye out on your inboxes.

Fifth Grade End of Year Slide: Be sure to have your fifth grader log into Google Classroom to complete their 5th grade slide. A few students have turned them in and they look great!

Google Classroom Reminder from 3/30:  "Students should be familiar with logging in from past school work: once they've navigated to Google Classroom, they log in with their FUSD email (their 600#@fusd1.org) and their full birthday as their password (ex: 03/23/2020). Please email me if you need help logging in."

Whole Class Zoom: Don't forget to contact Eleni's Mom, Kim Owens, at okhensley@gmail.com if you are interested in getting together for a virtual visit!

Surveys from FUSD: Please take a look at the information below from FUSD and complete the two surveys.

FUSD Update: New Parent Survey 

The Flagstaff Unified School District understands parents and families are balancing the unexpected challenges of your children’s remote learning, while caring for others and dealing with the many ways COVID-19 has impacted how you live and work.  We are interested in knowing how you feel your children’s remote learning is going- for them and for you. Your input will help our district understand where we might need to provide your children and your family additional support and how FUSD can better prepare should we have to shift again to remote learning in the future.  Please take a few minutes to share your perceptions by completing this survey.  Thank you for your input.

Take the Parent Survey Today

    Elementary Student Survey (grades 3-5)

Dear Parents/Families,

Now that students have been involved in remote learning for several weeks, the Flagstaff Unified School District and our school is interested in finding out how your students in grades 3-5 are feeling about the experience.  We are administering a survey to gather input from students about the difficulty or ease of completing their learning assignments, whether they have everything they need, and how we might be able to help them more.  

Please help us gather this information by encouraging your student to complete the survey.  You can explain the questions or help them think through their answers if they need help.  Your child’s answers will be confidential.  Thank you for your input.

Estimados padres / familias,

Ahora que los estudiantes han estado involucrados en el aprendizaje remoto durante varias semanas, el Distrito Escolar Unificado de Flagstaff y nuestra escuela están interesados ​​en descubrir cómo se sienten sus estudiantes en los grados 3-5. Estamos administrando una encuesta para recopilar información de los estudiantes sobre la dificultad o la facilidad de completar sus tareas de aprendizaje, si tienen todo lo que necesitan y cómo podríamos ayudarlos más.

Ayúdenos a recopilar esta información alentando a su estudiante a completar la encuesta. Puede explicar las preguntas o ayudarles a pensar sus respuestas si necesitan ayuda. Las respuestas de su hijo serán confidenciales. Gracias por su aporte.

Link to Elementary Student (grades 3-5) survey:

https://eprovesurveys.advanc-ed.org/surveys/#/action/134502/p1502

FUSD Learning HUB Link: www.fusd1.org/digitalhub