Blog Shift

After a long hiatus, I  have returned to this blog.  While Project Postcard is still active, I have shifted my focus to other aspects of my classroom.

Small group reading:
This is perhaps my favorite part of the day.  My fifth grade groups are steadily working their way through various novels.  One group is in the middle of the Arena in Hunger Games, another just found out Sirius Black and Peter Pettigrew's secret in the third Harry Potter, the third group is rebelling against the Capitol in Mockingjay and my fourth group just entered the Vile Village and are quickly unraveling the secrets of the VFD (Series of Unfortunate Events).

However, larger class sizes next year will need additional novels to accommodate extra students.  Please consider donating to my class on donorschoose here.  All donations are tax deductible and you'll get a snazzy thank you from some wonderful ten year-olds!

February Updates

US Map

World Map

New England Region

Southern Region (and extra Washington DC)

Midwest

Midwest

Northwest Region

West Coast

Southwest 

Map Update 3

Our map as of late January!  (February updates coming soon!)

Can you find your postcard?

Bringing it All Together

This week my young scholars are finishing their mock government bills, which are part of our government resource box (Lakeshore Kit).  We are taking the post cards we have from Washington DC and visiting these locations using Google Earth.  Lucky for us, we are going on a virtual field trip which can be viewed here.

New Post Cards, New Adventures

We recently received postcards from friends, family and strangers from around the world.

Next week we are looking forward to visiting the Midwest Region and placing our new Nebraska postcard on the map!  We also received a postcard from the Dominican Republic, so that will be added to our world map and provide us with an opportunity to review land forms and science definitions. (We will be clarifying the difference between islands and peninsulas).

Keep the post cards coming!

Education and Project Postcard

In fifth grade, many of our social studies standards relate to geography (learning the fifty states) and government. In order to make our classroom exciting, we have written many different government branches requesting postcards and educational information.

Last week, we received a box of brochures from the U.S. Capitol Building describing the history of the building. We were able to view pictures over many years and create a picture time line describing the creation of the building. We then related our picture timeline to how we could use a time line in other subject areas (reading, writing, science and social studies).  From there, we reviewed the three branches of government and brainstormed why checks and balances are a good idea.

We received a postcard from the White House and took a virtual tour of the Oval Office and first floors of the White House (Visit Here).  My students are so engaged and love learning about our system of government.

We start each morning with a post card (either a review or "state of the week") and work on our listening and speaking skills by describing what is depicted on the front.  My students then verbally compare and contrast those images to what we know about our own state (Nevada).

Please continue to send postcards to help my students learn all about the world around them!

Southern states needed!

This week we are learning about the southern states in geography. Unfortunately, we lack postcards from Georgia, Mississippi and Alabama. Help us out by sending a postcard to my 5th graders!