It has been a busy October at HCA! This month, the fifth grade has enjoyed visitors, exciting announcements, and school celebrations. See below for some snapshots looking back on the month.
Last Thursday, fifth grade visited with Lt. Lanni as part of our partnership with the Upper Darby Police Department.
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HCA students enjoyed a picnic lunch outside on Monday sponsored by Student Council.
Making the most of beautiful fall weather!
Enjoying the sun while it lasted this week.
Chris and Sam enjoy dining al fresco in the shade.
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Fifth and sixth graders visited the Book Fair on Tuesday.
Izzy and Gabby searching for the perfect book!
A successful visit!
A HUGE THANK YOU to the Danifo and Swain families for their donations to our classroom. The students will enjoy new nonfiction and fiction books in our library.
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Sixth graders have finished composing their original myths. On Wednesday, they printed them out and used a dying process with tea bags to turn them into ancient scrolls. They will be displayed in our hallway to showcase our mythology unit. To read a digital copy of their myths, please visit the slides below!
Grant uses a tea bag to dye his myth.
Garrett and Sean use tea bags to "age" their myths.
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A few snapshots of collaborative learning in our classroom:
Fifth graders participate in a Vocabulary Word Talk in reading.
Busy at work with their partners discussing and answering vocabulary in context questions.
Partner work and frequent movement in Stand-Up, Hand-Up, Pair-Up allows our students to socialize while constructively discussing learned concepts with all of their classmates.
Izzy and Joslyn looking for text evidence to support their discussion question.
Patrick, Aidan, and Arrington collaborate on another discussion question.
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Moments before this year's musical was announced: Frozen, Jr.!
This Tuesday, our HCA students met their new family members and spent the morning getting to know each other and creating "About Me" banners to display in our cafeteria. They look forward to a year full of memories together!
On Tuesday, we celebrated a new tradition, Las Posadas. A holiday custom in parts of Latin America, Las Posadas represents the journey of Joseph and Mary on their way to Bethlehem before the birth of Jesus. Mrs. Kathol, Señora Vintimilla, and our fifth graders worked together to bring this exciting custom to our school. They began with a traditional Spanish carol, "My Burrito Sabanero," (video below) which they performed for their families, followed by churros that they made with Ms. Kathol that morning. As we wrapped up our morning, all students were surprised with piñatas in the gym. Our older students really stepped up to make this a memorable occasion for our younger students, with our fifth graders taking on a special role.
Happy New Year! I hope all of our families enjoyed a restful, but joyful holiday season. I am so happy to be back at HCA. The fifth grade and I have spent the past few days getting to know each other. On Thursday, the students shared what they are most looking forward to in 2019! They also stated their goals as readers and writers in the new year. We will keep these up for the next few weeks to refer back to as we continue to "dust off" and polish our language arts skills. In Social Studies, we discussed the importance of being aware of current events on a local, national and global level. Fifth grade watched today's student video for CNN 10 and reviewed the 5W's ("& an 'H!") that make up a strong news story. They will spend the next week choosing an appropriate, newsworthy article -- on a topic of their choice -- to write and present a summary and reflection on for their first Current Events report. I'm proud of both the fifth and six...
