For the week of Dec. 8-12

Social Studies

Monday: Students learned about West African Kente cloth today; homework tonight is to finish up coloring their own sample so we can create little “Kente men” tomorrow.

Current event #2 was assigned today. This is completely a homework assignment (no class time will be given to work on it) and is due on Friday. Students have directions in their binders.

Tuesday: We’ll assemble our Kente men in class.

After that, students will begin a project on Africa, using information from the Culturegram website. (The school district pays for access to this site and you may use it from home: www.culturegrams.com, username: w304mfredn, password: culture) They’ll be completing a research “overview” sheet about five separate countries. I will select the first county and we will complete it together in class. They will select the other four and will work on them during class on Wednesday and Thursday.

Wednesday: Students have this day to work on their culturegram assignment. They should complete 2 countries to stay on track.

Thursday: Students have this day to work on their culturegram assignment. They should complete 2 more countries to finish up.

Friday: Culturegram packets are due. Current events are also due. We’ll spend class time discussing some of their topics.

Language Arts

Monday: Our second vocabulary unit was assigned. Just like last week, students need to do the following for unit 2: write each word three times to practice spelling, use each word correctly in a sentence, and the “completing the sentence” and “choosing the right word” exercises. This work is due on Thursday.

Tuesday: We’ll continue notes on essentials of persuasive writing. We need to finish up our “audience awareness” activity form last week and will complete a worksheet on persuasive language (that we didn’t get to last week).

Wednesday: Students will draft a persuasive letter in class today, keeping in mind the elements of persuasive writing that we have covered so far. They will be allowed to finish up at home if they need more time.

Thursday: Continue notes on essentials of persuasive writing. Students will be taught the strategy of “concession/rebuttal” in persuasive writing. For homework, students need to go back and add one concession/rebuttal argument to their persuasive letter.

Friday: Vocabulary test: unit 2. Students need to know how to spell each word, as well as its definition.

.