Sunday, May 26, 2019

5B Classroom News: Week of May 20th

A note from Mrs. Burke:  
It has been a busy week! The 5th grade went on a field trip to the Norwich Bookstore with the librarian, Mrs. Whitney, to pick out books for a diversity project they have been working on with her. Also, the students put on a terrific spring concert on Thursday night. The singing was beautiful and the band played loud and proud! On Friday we went on a field trip to the middle school. The students were given a tour and then asked questions to a panel of 6th graders who were OQS 5th graders last year. They seem very excited to transition to the middle school. Please keep reading to see what our student reporters wrote about this week.

Norwich Bookstore Field Trip:
may porch  
Why did you go on a field trip to the Norwich Bookstore with our librarian, Mrs. Whitney? What kinds of books did you help pick out for our library?

We went on a field trip to the Norwich Bookstore with our librarian, Mrs. Whitney, because we have to pick out books we don’t have.
-Jayden

We went to the Norwich Bookstore because there was not a lot of diversity in our library. Some kinds of books we helped pick out are graphic novels like “The New Kid”  or other types of books with diversity in it.
-Maximus

We went to the Norwich Bookstore with Mrs.Whitney because we needed to find more diverse books for our school library. Books that I helped pick out were LGBTQ picture books and I did pretty well finding them in the Norwich Bookstore, but not so great in our school library. I noticed there was not so much LGBTQ picture books in our school. Also my book was called Felix’s New Skirt, it is about this boy who wears his sisters skirts and he loves them but, he and his sister switch off clothes.  
-Madylyn

The reason we went on a field trip to the Norwich Bookstore with Mrs. Whitney was so we could buy books for our library audit. The two books I helped pick out for our library were Power To The Princess, which I gave to another group to buy, and a book about diverse stories from around the world. I wish we could read them!!
-Flynn

I absolutely loved that book store! I begged my mom to go again. All OQS 5th graders went to the Norwich Bookstore to search for books about our diversity group projects! Aubree, Zachary, and I were studying LGBTQ. We searched through every book in our Realistic Fiction section of the OQS Library. We found 9 out of 320+ books about LGBTQ in that single section. It was an amazing experience at the Norwich Bookstore, they had books for all ages. Our book was about a husband and wife that started their own family, but they went separate ways and ended up with the same gender spouse. The grandfather of (I think) the family's dad was upset with the way of life they chose to follow. It was a beautiful chapter book with a few illustrated pages along the way!
-Braelyn

We went to the Norwich bookstore field trip because we wanted to make our library more diverse. We picked out LGBTQ graphic novels.
-Zachary

We went on the field trip to the Norwich bookstore to help our school library be more diverse. We got books with LGBTQ characters, Native American characters, autistic characters, disabled characters, and tons more.
-Aubree




OQS Spring Concert:
Image result for band and chorus concert  
What did you enjoy most about the OQS spring concert?
What I enjoyed most was singing to fun songs and giving flowers to Mrs. Wadleigh.
-Madison

Playing in the band but I also enjoyed singing high hopes and other songs in the concert.
-Lyndsey

I enjoyed playing in band and doing the song with the fourth graders!
-Abby

What I enjoyed most about the OQS spring concert was that mostly every one was there and it was fun to play my trumpet and sing.
-Jayden

The concert was exciting but also I was really nervous. At the concert I felt like I came out of a hot tub but at the end I was excited that it was over. My favorite song was high hopes.
-Jack

What I enjoyed most in the OQS concert was that we all had a good time and we all did a good job
-Madylyn

What I enjoyed most about our Spring Concert was Hidden Path. I liked hitting the Medium Drum with Sophia!
-Flynn

The concert was so exciting. My most favorite part of the concert were the solos from Aubree (My class) and Sophia (5R). I understand why they were chosen for the solos, they both had beautiful voices that set the chorus into character! I loved all the parents faces when their perfect vocals lit them up! They were so amazed. The band was also great. As 10 and 11 year olds, we sounded pretty fantastic. We sounded like musicians. It was so beautiful. I want everyone to know that their outfits were fabulous.
-Braelyn

I liked the spring concert because when we sang high hopes all the kids started to jump and dance all over the place it was so funny. Some of the songs we sang were high hopes,I believe, step by step, and a lot more songs.
-Taylor

I really enjoyed everything; Band, 5th grade special (percussion), our songs, and the whole school songs. What I loved most though is my solo that I got to do with Sophia. When we did our last song I felt very sad and happy, we have a new adventure at our new school.
-Aubree





















Field trip to the Hartford Memorial Middle School:
Image result for hartford memorial middle school vt
What did you enjoy most about the field trip to the middle school?  
What is something you learned on this field trip about the middle school?

What I enjoyed most about the field trip to the middle school was that we got to do a sheet that had questions that we had to ask and answer. Something I learned on this field trip about the middle school was that most of my friends are there and we learned that the nurse came from Florida and what teachers we pass in stuff to.
-Jayden

I enjoyed when we went and saw all the teachers and  learned about the teams and when we me the teachers they were nice. I learned that each team has different amounts of homework and some teams don't have homework.
-Nevaeh

We get a better choices for lunch and the gym is so big and the teachers are nice.
-Randy

What I enjoyed most about the field trip to the Middle School was seeing the people I knew, and getting to know even more about HMMS! Something I learned on our HMMS field trip is that you can check out 3 books at a time from the HMMS library!
-Flynn

To be honest, I learned that it was pretty awkward being taller than some of the 7th graders and in 5th grade. But I guess that goes for a lot of us. Seriously, though, I learned how big the school was (we didn't even explore the whole thing) and that it's not too hard to learn your surroundings. One of the 6th graders told us that it took them around a day or two to understand where they were going. I´m not too worried for middle school, in fact, I´m ready!
-Braelyn

I really enjoyed the chorus and the band room, I love music. I learned that I don't need to be too scared, and that everything will be okay.
-Aubree




Saturday, May 18, 2019

5B Classroom News: Week of May 13th

A note from Mrs Burke:
We are finally coming to the end of our state standardized testing for the year. The students took the first part of the science test this week and will take the second part of the test on Monday. This week the students have posted their thoughts about the Skype interview they had with the author of the Wings of Fire book series. Keep reading to see what they wrote about.

Skyping with the author of Wings of Fire book series: Tui T. Sutherland 

Image result for wings of fire series

What did enjoy the most when talking with the author, Tui T. Sutherland, of the Wings of Fire book series?  What did you learn from talking with her?

What I enjoyed the most was when people asked Tui T. Sutherland questions about her books. I learned that there will be new characters in the Wings of fire book series.
-Madison

I enjoyed learning about her inspiration for her books and the way she thought of the dragons when she wrote them in her stories.
-Lyndsey

I loved the author chat!!! It was so so so cool to actually meet my favorite author! My favorite part was just getting to meet her in general! She also gave us a sneak peek of her new graphic novel that will come out this summer! She is super inspiring to me. One thing I learned about her was that she uses her kids as inspiration.
-Abigail

What I did enjoy the most when talking with the author, Tui T. Sutherland, of the Wings of Fire book series was all of the questions and awesome answers. What I did learn from talking with her was that I did not know she had kids and a dog.
-Jayden

Wings of Fire author was very very interesting to talk to.
-Cash

What I enjoyed most when talking with the author of the Wings of Fire book
series is when she showed us part of the third Wings of Fire graphic novel book.
What I learned from talking with her is that some of the dragons in Wings of fire
are based off of her sons.
-Maximus

I enjoyed the part where i found out that she is making a new Wings Of Fire book.
-Nevaeh

It was cool to see a famous person she was really nice. She let us see a peak of the new book for the wings of fire I hope she sends us copies.
-Jack

There are 12 books in the whole series and it was fun talking to an author.
-Randy

What I enjoyed most while talking to Tui T. Sutherland, is how she wasn’t rude or stuck-up or anything. I also liked how I got to see and hear her and her words, and she got to see me and hear me. What I learned was that she wants to make another Menagerie book, but she needs to make sure it’s OK with the WIngs Of Fire publishers first. I also learned that the Wings Of Fire series is VERY good!
-Flynn

Some things that I liked about the talk with the author is that there is going to be a new graphic novel, I can't wait.
-Owen  

The Wings of Fire series by Tui T. Sutherland, is a 14 book series (I think). A book I heard of was a book about a scavenger (Human) and a dragon named Rose. Since the scavenger and the dragon couldn’t understand each other, Rose pointed out different flowers to try and show the scavenger what her name was, he ended up calling her Flower. I’d say close enough. I’ve read probably a tenth of the first Wings of Fire about a year ago, and to me, it was confusing. Still, I’d suggest it, it kind of reminded me of How to Train your Dragon.
-Braelyn

I enjoyed when she said their was going to be more books. I learned that she
wrote more than one series.
-Zachary

I liked skyping Tui T. Sutherland because she is nice and I love her books wings of fire is my favorite one is the 2nd one. Because I just could not stop reading it it was just too good.
-Taylor

What I enjoyed most when talking to Tui T. Sutherland is just hearing her voice
for the first time. I also loved how she answered the questions we asked her. She
explained her answer very well. Something I learned from her is she will be making
a 3rd graphic novel. We also got to see the cover of her new book and learn what
the next WIngs of Fire will be about. I can’t wait for the new books!
-Aubree