Jefferson 1/9-1/10

3rd Grade ELA

Students in Ms. Karides's class have been engaged in sustained inquiry during their Literary Entrepreneurs PBL unit. Students selected a character from the fiction book they were reading. They noted character traits, motivation, and perspective. They brainstormed and came up with a business that their character would be successful in based on who they are. Students have learned about business plans and what they include, they've explored logo creation and elements, and are now moving on to website design. Last week students looked at a variety of websites (Peanut Butter and Jelly Deli, Apple, WI State Fair, etc) and noted features the different sites included. Students recorded features they liked and that would make sense for their business. We discussed our observations as a whole class.

Students will be using Google Sites to create a website to represent their business. Today students had the chance to test out Sites and get to know the tools that are available. They enjoyed figuring out how to add text, images, additional pages, and more. We concluded our session by sharing out helpful tools and tips, highlights from our work, and challenges. Students were extremely engaged and are looking forward to building their sites in the coming weeks.

5th Grade Math

Students in my 5th Grade Math group launched their new PBL Unit today, "Magnificent menus. The Driving Question is, Can a $30.00 budget feed ten people a healthy and enjoyable meal? Students will be in pairs and are challenged to create a meal menu with $30.00 or less. They will be establishing as a group what constitutes healthy. From there they will select and adjust recipes, conduct cost comparison, create a grocery budget and list, find total meal cost, and meal cost per person. Groups will then be pitching their meal to the group. We'll vote on one meal and I will be preparing that meal for the group (of 10) to enjoy for lunch one day.

Students are developing skills in decimal operations, collaboration, communication, and money sense.

To launch we played "Price is Right-Grocery Edition". Pairs were presented with a grocery item (I brought in several items such as cereal, soup, a mandarin orange) and had to come up with an estimated price in dollars and cents. The closest group was awarded the correct price in points. This got them thinking about real world pricing, unit price, and communicating effectively with their partners. The winning group won a prize (popcorn).

Examples of Items/Prices in Google Slideshow used for the game

Chess Club

Jefferson's Chess Club is well under way! We have a range of experience levels so students are working on everything from learning the game to developing opening and check-mating strategies. We've been working on sportsmanship and focused strategic game play. Students are already excited about the district tournament which takes place in May! Chess clubs meet every Thursday and Friday, students were invited to join for one or both days.

Today Willa and Abby decided to multi-task, before each chess move they read each other a word from the Spelling Bee Study list. Way to go girls!

Have a great weekend everyone! Stay safe and warm!