Grade 5 Class Blog

What a great week we had last week!

What with investigating what an exhibition is and writing persuasive texts as well as introducing our work on Fractions. The students did a wonderful job staying engaged and it was lovely to see their smiling faces each morning in the google meets.

Firstly, Happy New Year!

As you are well aware, the beginning of this term  is not what we had hoped for, however we are flexible and ready for this type of situation.  A big thank you for all of the parent support we have received and the patience you are showing with a difficult situation. So just a few housekeeping notes for you to consider now.

1) Daily Morning Routines

Students start at 7:50 to watch a short video recording of instructions for the day. Then, at 8am, students have a live video conference/help desk for 40 minutes, except for Friday when it is later in the day, where we deliver the tasks, answer questions and catch-up together. Please help your children to ensure their headsets and microphones work on their computers. We are using Google Meets exclusively as it is the best means through which to do our live sessions. Please test this with your children.

2) Schedules

All three classes have virtually the same weekly schedule as semester 1.

You can find your G5 Weekly Remote Learning Schedule here

G5 Remote Learning Schedule (1)

3) Planners

You will be receiving a weekly planner on Fridays which describes the learning engagements throughout the week. Please see attachment below.

Planner January 11th -15th.docx

Your child will receive a daily planner on the google classroom to help them manage their learning each day.

4) What you need for next week

A short one page document entailing what is needed for the following week is also included in our Friday emails to you. Please see attachment below.

G5 Friday 8th Jan What I Need For Next Week

5) Library

Please ensure to visit the library webpage here for more activities of all sorts available for you and your child.

https://sites.google.com/edu.kis.ac.th/library/

6) Counselling with Ms. Alex

Here is a blog post link with resources for parents on how to support your child at home during remote learning, and how to manage parenting stress during a lockdown. 

https://klearning.ict.kis.ac.th/kblog/counselor/

All  G5 students are using Google Classroom as the main learning platform.

Here is a short tutorial to teach how to  Navigate through Multiple Google Classrooms.

Please keep checking the Grade 5 blog as all information will appear there. There will also be a parent meeting on Wednesdays at 10.30. We will send you the link on the day.

If you should have any questions please email your child’s class teacher. They will get back to you as soon as they can but please bear in mind that they will be undertaking face to face teaching at different times during the day.

Thank you for your continued support. We hope you stay safe and healthy.

 The Grade 5 Team

Mrs Carole carole.pa@edu.kis.ac.th

Mrs Rachel rachello@edu.kis.ac.th

Mr Nic nicholasm@edu.kis.ac.th

Dear parents and students

What a lovely way to start the last week of term 1.

The singing as a whole, socially distanced primary school of White Christmas was a great addition to the week. Ey1 were amazing ringing their bells for jingle bells and all Grade 5 looked awesome in their Christmas hats.

A thank you from Ms June

Please see the attached letter

Grade 6 Play

Grade 5 were lucky enough to be invited to the Grade 6 play on Wednesday. A greek play brought up to date with some very funny lines and some great performances. We Thank grade 6 and Mr Bastian for inviting us. In the students words the play was  entertaining, fantastic, great, interesting and gorgeous.

Winter Party

The students chose  which room they wanted to spend time in on Wednesday afternoon. Games was in one, watching films and Christmas crafts in the others. All students seemed to have a good time and the food was very tasty. Thanks to the class parents reps for organising this.

End of term 1 Assembly

What a variety of talent was on show at the end of term assembly on Friday. Students sang, played instruments, rapped, amazed us with their insightfull predictions and even had debates with each other. We hope you enjoyed the assembly. Please follow the link if you would like to watch again.

The sad part of the last day was having to say goodbye to Ms Nitcharee who has been an awesome EAL and we are very sad to see her go off to America. However we have wished her well, asked her to keep in touch and told her that we would love to see her when she comes back for a holiday.

Finally we, as teachers, would like to thank you all, for your support this term and for our lovely gifts. We would like to wish you a lovely seasonal time with your families. We look forward to welcoming all the students back on the 6th January.

Have a great holiday everyone!

Mrs Carole carole.pa@edu.kis.ac.th

Mrs Rachel rachello@edu.kis.ac.th

Mr Nic nicholasm@edu.kis.ac.th

It is hard to believe that we are on the final week of Term one. It has been a long term with many events and a great deal of learning taken place in grade 5. Can you remember which photos connect to which events?

A thank you from Ms June

Please see the attached letter

End of term assembly

The grade 5 assembly will take place at 11am on Friday 18th December in the auditorium. The students have been practising hard so we are looking foward to seeing you all there, as our final farewell to the term.

Sports Day

UOI

The students spent last week, designing, preparing and undertaking their science experiments to show changes in state and that they could follow the scientific process. The results were pretty explosive but lots was learnt about how to undertake an experiment and how not to.

Three units have been investigated and reflected on this term. How we learn, migration and energy all of which have allowed the students to hone their skills in readiness for our first unit next term which will lead to the grade 5 exhibition, which this year will be held over several days in the second week of March.

Literacy

The students have been encouraged to be persuasive in many different areas this week. Persuading others to value the energy sources they favoured,that pets should be kept and convincing us that their choices for the christmas party were valid. We will continue with this after the break.

Reading

It is really important the students keep up their reading over the holiday. Try to encourage them by modelling reading yourselves and by asking them some of the questions on our list.  To help with this we have included a list of sample questions here please feel free to choose different questions each week and to ask extra questions too.

Numeracy

Averages such as mean, mode, median and range have been our focus for the last few weeks with the students using the skills they have learnt with these and their graphing investigations to persuade with statistics.

Grade 5 party

This will take place on Wednesday 16th , the students will be allowed to bring party clothes to change into after lunch, lots of sparkle please!

Mrs Carole carole.pa@edu.kis.ac.th

Mrs Rachel rachello@edu.kis.ac.th

Mr Nic nicholasm@edu.kis.ac.th

UOI 3

Last week the students researched the lines of inquiry in reference to their chosen two sources of energy. They then prepared a presentation which they will share with their peers on Wednesday of this week. We are looking forward to hearing what they have found out.

Literacy

The focus is persuasive writing as such the students have been investigating the devices which are used in order to persuade people to a point of view. These include rhetorical questions, powerful verbs and the use of expert opinion. All devices which we hope to see in the student’s own argument for a particular energy source when they present on Wednesday.

Reading

Many of the students decode words very well and can read aloud fairly fluently, the challenge is for the students to really comprehend what they are reading and to practise this they must answer questions about what they have read both orally and in writing.

Therefore we would really like to ask parents  to continually talk to your children about what they are reading. To help with this we have included a list of sample questions here please feel free to choose different questions each week and to ask extra questions too.

Numeracy

What is a line graph and how do I make one? Should I use a pie chart or a bar graph to show my results? Do I need a title? Which one is the Y axis? All of these questions were asked and answered last week so hopefully with a better understanding of how to sort, interpret and present data, the graphs,on energy usage, the students will present this week will be clear, informative and interesting to look at.

Sports day

Please see Mr Ben’s blog for up to date information

This will take place on Friday of this week. the students will need to be in P. E clothes for this day wearing their house t-shirts.

G5 A News

Attacking Orca’s was the theme of Pim Pim’s news article this week. The discussion ranged from were the Orca’s playing  or fighting? If fighting, were they upset about global warming or pollution or simply wanted the yachts to move out of their way?

Kenny’s article was about a vaccine for Covid 19 being ready to be given to Americans. This caused lots of discussions focused on. Who the vaccine should be given to first? Why should the Americans only have this? Should the companies who made the vaccine get paid for it? and how if we had the vaccine we would share it?

Ms Carole then shared an article about the relaxing of lockdown in the Uk over the Christmas period? Why this was happening? Why did it not happen for Diwali or Hannukah? Would this be safe? Was it fair? These were all questions covered in the discussion which arose from this news item.

Mrs Carole carole.pa@edu.kis.ac.th

Mrs Rachel rachello@edu.kis.ac.th

Mr Nic nicholasm@edu.kis.ac.th

Devices in school

No personal devices are allowed in school. This is a school rule. These include phones, laptops and smart watches. If any student is  found with any of these devices they will be confiscated and will need to be collected  from the school office with an adult. Please see Ms June’s letter for more explanation.

Diwali

Thank you to the parents who provided the students with some interesting activities to do  this week to celebrate Diwali. As you can see they had fun.

UOI

Last week the students really began to gain an understanding of the new unit on energy with a critical and indepth look at the central idea and lines of inquiry connecting these to the key concepts. They generated many questions which they will continue to research during this week ready for their mini presentation the following week.

Energy

Central Idea: Human interaction with natural resources provides society with energy choices.

An Inquiry into

Sources of energy and their usage

Impact of energy resources on our environment

The impacts of technological advancement

Concepts: Function, Connection, Causation

Literacy 

Persuasive writing is the focus for literacy for the moment so the students have been investigating the key features of this sytyle of writing, ahead of creating their own persuasive arguments based upon a sustainable or non sustainbale energy source.

Reading

Many of the students decode words very well and can read aloud fairly fluently, the challenge is for the students to really comprehend what they are reading and to practise this they must answer questions about what they have read both orally and in writing.

Therefore we would really like to ask parents  to continually talk to your children about what they are reading. To help with this we have included a list of sample questions here please feel free to choose different questions each week and to ask extra questions too.

Numeracy

The unit on Angles was completed last week and the new subject focus is data handling which will be closely linked to our UOI work, with the students needing to create two different types of graphs to use within their presentations on energy. This will involve them collecting, sorting, interpreting and then presenting the statistics they find.

Sports

As you can see from the pictures the students have been very busy in their P. E. sessions. Please see Mr Ben’s blog for more photos.

Well done to those students who took part in the tournament on Saturday- the first of the year. A third place for the A team a good start!

G5 A News

All the students in G5A have now presented the news at least once so Austin and Elizabeth bravely volunteered for their second go. Elizabeth’s article was about 100 sarcophagi being unearthed in Egypt. The discussion for this involved the rights of the dead to lie in peace as opposed to human’s need for knowledge. In the end it was a pretty even split for those who believed in one way or another.

This week Austin introduced us to the intriguing story of an off duty policewoman in America who killed a black man in his own home. Her defense was that she had thought it was her home and that he was a burglar. This created a heated discussion with lots of questions.

Under the tree gift giving

Please support the charities by buying a gift using the tags on the tree to give a child a present.

Mrs Carole carole.pa@edu.kis.ac.th

Mrs Rachel rachello@edu.kis.ac.th

Mr Nic nicholasm@edu.kis.ac.th

Devices in school

No personal devices are allowed in school. This is a school rule. These include phones, laptops and smart watches. If any student is  found with any of these devices they will be confiscated and will need to be collected  from the school office with an adult. Please see Ms June’s letter for more explanation.

Workshops and Forums for Parents: 

November PYP for grade school parents Friday 20th 8:00 in the auditorium

Maths week

G5A

G5B

G5C

As you can see from the photographs above we had a very busy maths week in which the students needed to use many skills and demonstrated the learner profile attributes of inquirer, communicator, well balanced and risk- taker.

For Maths week in P.E follow this link

UOI

Last week we finished the migration unit with reflections, presentations and even a kahoot quiz.

Our Third unit of the year was then started with a deep dive into statistical analysis of energy consumption by different countries. The students learnt a great deal about the difficulties of too much and contrasting data and how to persevere through a task which is challenging. The details of this unit are below.

Energy

Central Idea: Human interaction with natural resources provides society with energy choices.

An Inquiry into

Sources of energy and their usage

Impact of energy resources on our environment

The impacts of technological advancement 

Concepts: Function, Connection, Causation

Literacy 

Our new area of study is all about procedural writing and persuasive arguments both influenced by our energy unit. The students are beginning to think about how to create a persuasive argument both verbally and in a written context. Looking into including evidence in their arguments and persuasive techniques including rhetorical questions.

Reading

Many of the students decode words very well and can read aloud fairly fluently, the challenge is for the students to really comprehend what they are reading and to practise this they must answer questions about what they have read both orally and in writing.

herefore we would really like to ask parents  to continually talk to your children about what they are reading. To help with this we have included a list of sample questions here please feel free to choose different questions each week and to ask extra questions too.

G5 A News

It was the turn of Bea and Arkaad this week With Bea explaining her article using an informative slideshow all about the killing of Mink to stop the Covid 19 virus spreading further. This provoked an interesting argument on the rights of animals.

Arkaad’s article was a fascinating story of a man in India who dives for the Police to retrieve bodies from a lake and who now saves people in the lake before he he has to retrieve them as bodies. Questions about this were flowing, ranging from Why the man would do this job? to How clean is the water?

Mrs Carole carole.pa@edu.kis.ac.th

Mrs Rachel rachello@edu.kis.ac.th

Mr Nic nicholasm@edu.kis.ac.th

UOI

After the excitement of Halloween last week the students have settled back into their normal routine, mainly concentrating on producing their infographics to sum up the knowledge they have learned from their second unit of inquiry about Migration. They presented these to their peers and were very informative and knowledgeable.

We will be starting our 3rd Unit of inquiry this week focused on energy sources, how the energy is created in both sustainable and non- sustainable ways and how this creation can affect the world we live in.

It is Maths week!

This week we will be celebrating all things mathematical with lots of inquiry maths tasks. Each day will have a different mathematical focus and many of the activities this week will require collaboration, inventiveness and lots of communication skills. Look out for the pictures in the Primary foyer and of course on our blog.

On Friday 13th the children are going to be encouraged to dress mathematically: that is in patterns, particular colours or in different shapes. We will be looking for creativity in their clothes on this day.

Literacy 

The focus on narratives is now coming to an end, the new area of study will be procedural writing influenced by our energy unit.

Reading

Many of the students decode words very well and can read aloud fairly fluently, the challenge is for the students to really comprehend what they are reading and to practise this they must answer questions about what they have read both orally and in writing.

herefore we would really like to ask parents  to continually talk to your children about what they are reading. To help with this we have included a list of sample questions here please feel free to choose different questions each week and to ask extra questions too.

Devices in school

No personal devices are allowed in school. This is a school rule. These include phones, laptops and smart watches. If any student is  found with any of these devices after Wednesday they will be confiscated and will need to be collected  from the school office with an adult.

News 

G5 A

It was Jack and Max’s opportunity to share their news items with the rest of the class this week. Jack showed us a very thoughtful article about how we should also be mindfull that pets may catch Covid 19 just like humans can.

Max’s story involved the inquiry into the Australian bush fires of last year. There was much discussion into what caused these fires and how they might happen again in the future along with floods and storms.

Of course the big news story of the week has been the American election. All the students were very interested in this, watching the counter whilst learning and creating their infographics, waiting for a result, just to go home without a result announced. We are all so glad that a decision has at last been made.

G5C

Patryk was especially interested in the election and he created a very good powerpoint of his thoughts which you can see below.

Mrs Carole carole.pa@edu.kis.ac.th

Mrs Rachel rachello@edu.kis.ac.th

Mr Nic nicholasm@edu.kis.ac.th