Dear Fifth Grade parents,
Welcome back to our school and to your new class.
I hope everyone had a
rewarding and interesting summer. I had a fascinating summer myself
riding my bicycle the entire length of the West Coast. from outside
Seattle to San Diego.
Enough of that though! Now it’s time for us all to face the
challenges and rewards of a new school year.
I am, as always, excited, idealistic, and confident that this will be a very
special year for all of us.
Of course, there will be a transition period for the class at the start of
the year as we all get to know one another better. I will do everything
I can to make this transition as smooth as possible for us all.
I am concentrating for the opening weeks on what I think of as a series of ‘getting to know you’ mini-projects. The classroom atmosphere I am aiming for during this period will be relaxed, comfortable, and secure.
I have very high expectations for my fifth grade classes. In my classes there
is a focus on teamwork throughout the year. There is also an equal focus
on independent learning. The deeper background skills that I aim for are
the ones that lead to students who are self-motivated, skilled in all
aspects of information search, retrieval, critical analysis,
reformulation, and production, and who are skilled team members, in any
context.
The educational philosophy at the heart of my
teaching style is Howard Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences approach. The
basic idea is that people are smart in lots of ways; not only in logical
and linguistic ways (reading, writing, math/science), but also in
musical, spatial (art and, architecture, as well as building and making
things), and physical (sports, dance, acting, public speaking) ways,
too! Gardner describes an underlying interpersonal intelligence that is
revealed in our abilities to coexist with other people and, alongside
that, an intra-personal intelligence that governs our ‘self
understanding’, and the personal strengths that make it possible for us
to achieve our goals in life.
The program I have developed attempts to provide multi-level opportunities
for children to explore, discover, assess, develop, and improve their
skills in each of Gardner’s main intelligence areas.
This is all work
done within the context of the fifth grade curriculum, determined by the
Medford Public Schools, and the Massachusetts Frameworks.
I attempt to run a completely integrated curriculum, as far as possible. I
use the Social Studies and Science Curriculum requirements as the
framework for the integration through a series of ‘Projects’. I try to
fuse the core topics into a single year long “story” that attempts a
grand and idealistic goal – to give a basic grounding in all the key
issues of contemporary science and American history!
Each topic is used to address the many language curriculum goals as part of
the social studies or science research and presentation. A typical
project includes multiple opportunities for reading, writing, and
research training. In addition, there are multiple opportunities for
building and design work, artwork, music creation and performance. There
are creative opportunities for dance and drama. Topics are exploratory
in nature, and are centered in genuine questions. Observations and
experiments, as well as research and collaboration are at the heart of
most of the projects. Students work in multiple team and solo formats.
Most projects conclude in either group or solo presentations to various
size audiences – from each other, to all the parents; from ‘buddy’
classes, to the whole school – and beyond!
This year, the required Everyday Math program will be taught by Ms. Moll. This is a new approach to teaching Math and science being piloted
again this year in Medford (I will be teaching Science to
Ms. Moll's class).
Any questions you have about this policy need to be addressed to the
administration of the School and the City.
Here is the overall plan for the year. Please note this plan is subject to
radical and major changes especially regarding dates!
September:
Future World? - a project to build community.
October:
Trends in history – a topic based on “Guns germs and steel” by Jared Diamond,
that provides a background to American and World history.
November:
Space, the solar system, stars, and gravity.
Two or three day multimedia project with Fourth grade at the end of October.
The ‘Explorers.’
Simple machines and start the related ‘Invention Challenges’.
December:
Rocks and fossils.
Two week multi-media project culminating in a performance for parents.
January:
Light and Sound.
The Native Americans.
February:
The recording project – our class CD!
Language MCAS tests - two or three tests - kiss goodbye to a week!
March:
Colonies and the American Revolution.
April:
Populations and ecosystems – an exploration of living
things.
May:
MCAS; Third week of May – MCAS tests in Social Studies, Science and
Math - two tests for each subject. Total: six tests.
June:
“The End of the Year Show – Two week Multimedia culminating event.
Now onto the thorny subject of homework!
Medford expects Fifth grade students to be spending one hour per day on
homework. That means a rough weekly expectation of five to seven hours
work per week. Please work with your child to ensure that they are
within range of these expectations - not too many weeks above eight
hours, that’s what I say!
There is a homework requirement of twenty minutes reading every evening in
addition to the weekly assignments.
Typically, if a project requires specific reading then the twenty
minutes is subsumed into the general homework time.
Principle issues for parental involvement regarding homework are:
- planning
- organization
- time management - completing work on time and handing it in
- maintaining high standards
Sixth grade homework can feel intense to students. It is vital that your child has a comfortable, efficient and self-reliant way to deal with those demands by the time they get to Grade six.
I have a separate note for you about the homework with more information.
I believe the font of learning is joy. When a person enjoys their work and
their life then learning is natural and automatic. My first job is to
help generate and sustain passion and enthusiasm in the class.
Enthusiasm is the fuel. Hard work is the vehicle. You will be seeing
plenty of each from the students and me this year!
The Fifth grade is a special year for children. It is a time of transition
for many of them. My ambition for the children is that they each will be
fully prepared intellectually, personally, emotionally, socially,
artistically, musically and physically for the demands of the Sixth
grade and, beyond, into the rest of their lives.
The teacher is one part of the three part system that is the learning environment of your child. Most of my time is spent getting to understand and extend your child’s world. It is very difficult for me to get to understand the parent’s world in the brief and often hurried meetings at the beginning or end of a school day. With that in mind, I’d like to ask you to help me by writing to me about your child. It would be helpful for me to read your ideas about:
- Your child’s strengths, weaknesses, enthusiasms, etc - anything you could offer would be valuable to me as I begin the process of learning about each child.
- Your goals and aims for your child’s learning this year.
If you have the time to get involved in the class by sharing your skills, enthusiasms or resources please let me know about that, too.
In closing, and having written all of this, I would especially also ask for
your patience this year as we all enter into the demands of the new year
at the Brooks School. I can’t honestly know how many of my plans and
great schemes for the year will survive the transition period! All I
can really say with certainty is, that I hope that this class is going
to be one of the really great ones.I hope
you enjoy the year as much as I hope I am going to!
Sincerely yours,
Michael Allen