Valentine's Day

Here are some photos from our very fun Valentine's Day party.

Math Masters

Our 5th grade Math Masters team is called Pi Power. We have been practicing every Thursday after school and have participated in two local meets in Grand Rapids so far. At our first meet in January, we came in first place and got to take home the traveling trophy. At our meet today, we came in second place. This is a smart, hard-working team and I am having so much fun working with them!

Meal Worms

My science students have been busy studying meal worms for our animal adaptation unit. Each student received a worm and after some initial observations, they designed some experiments to watch worm behavior. We had groups of 5th graders testing which food and color meal worms prefer, how they react to cold and warm temperatures and how each worm's speed could be changed. The groups had to record and graph their data to show what they learned. This is called scientific inquiry and is the basis for a lot of the science we do in fifth grade.

History Fair

The 5th graders presented their fabulous Native American projects at our History Fair. Each student had an area set up to show off their wonderful display and report. We had visitors from kindergartners to grandparents. The kids worked hard as they learned how to research and write an informational report. The projects showed some creative skill and some nice collaboration between family members and the students. Thanks to everyone who attended!

Winterfest Week

It is Winterfest week at Hill City School! The high school students led a pepfest for the elementary kids today. We played some fun games, sang the school song and was entertained by the Hill City Hornet!

Squid Dissection

We are continuing our study of animal adaptations and today we explored a very special animal in the mollusk family. Small frozen squid are available at the grocery store, so each year I buy a package for my kiddos to dissect.

Here's what the squid look like before we start.

Here is what they look like when we are done. You can see a small fish at the top of this plate. We found it in the stomach of one of the squid we dissected.

The squids have an ink sac and a body part called the pen that is used to give the animal shape. The students pierced the ink sac and wrote their names with the pen.

When we were finished, the 5th graders cut off the tentacles and cut the mantle (body) into rings. Then we fried them up as calamari! Yum!

Merry Christmas!

We ended 2014 with a fun holiday party planned by our committee. There was lots of food, a gift exchange game and a heated game of dodge ball against Mr. Tulla's class. Merry Christmas, everyone!

Wiggly Worms and Loopy Leeches

We are well into our animal study in science. We are talking about each group of invertebrates and learning about their special adaptations that help them survive. Today we looked at some annelids, or segmented worms. The kids made some careful structural and behavioral observations of earthworms and leeches, including looking at them very carefully under dissecting microscopes.

Fractions and Decimals on a Number Line

We have been studying fractions and decimals in math. The kids are finally understanding how fractions and decimals are related. Today we practiced placing fractions on a giant number line on the floor.

Coins for Vets

The fifth graders worked hard and raised over $350 for our area veterans. Each student adopted a classroom and decorated a milk jug to collect the money. They made announcements and created a flyer to send home.  Every day they collected and counted the money from their room. We kept track of donations on a big poster. We were very impressed that our calculations were less than $10 off from what the bank told us!  This money will be used to help out three area veterans in the Hill City/Jacobson area.

Veterans Day Program

The Hill City High School band starts the program with some patriotic music.

Major David Nyback, US Army Reserve gave the Veterans Day Address.

The high school choir sang "America he Beautiful."

Tess read an essay she wrote about Veterans.

The fifth graders announced the kickoff to our fundraiser, "Coins for Vets."

Noah plays "Taps" to end the program.