Our NEW Growth Mindset

Over the past 2 weeks our class has learned the difference between having a fixed mindset (thinking I can't do it, I don't want to do it, this is too hard, I give up, etc.) to having a growth mindset (I can't do it YET, I can learn from my mistakes, I WILL be able to do this, etc).  We have been reading books, having great conversations, looking at inspirational posters, and we even had some 5th graders come talk to us about growth mindset.  Our recent project was to write a promise to ourselves on how we could have a growth mindset this year in order to learn to our highest potential and not give up when things get hard.  Each student wrote a promise in a speech bubble and we added it to their picture on our growth mindset board.  I wanted to share pictures of our posters and of the students' promises because they came up with some amazing things!  Feel free to use this language at home, during homework or extra curricular activities. Enjoy! 

Map of a Special Place

We have started our personal narrative unit in writing.  In this unit the students will write a story about a true event in their life.  In order to brainstorm times in our life we could write about, we thought a special place where we spend a lot of time.  They picked their neighborhoods, houses, soccer field, tennis court, Nana's house and the list goes on.  The students then sketched a map of their special place labeling memories they have from there.  Below you will see some of the sketches created this week.  Next week we will pick a memory and begin writing a personal narrative! 

A neighborhood

Another neighborhood

Tennis Court

Bedroom

States of Matter

We have started our first science unit, States of Matter.  The students are very excited.  Our first two experiments were using solids and liquids to make and observe changes.  We observed a tablet dissolve in a liquid.  Then we tried different techniques to melt an ice cube.    

Scholastic Book Orders

Don't forget to order books from Scholastic by September 15th if you're  interested. 

Click here to order 

Our class code is: H84LQ

Editing and Revising

We have been learning how to make our stories better by editing and revising our work.  Today we got with a partner and helped each other edit for punctuation.  They found a lot of places to add periods and had fun while doing it!