With all the hype of the next US President in the news recently, have you ever wondered how the US president gets into office? This video offers a simplified explanation of how it all happens. I encourage you to watch it as our next unit study in Social Studies focuses on governments. Check it out and post a comment about what you think of the video. Being a Kiwi, the process certainly makes more sense…I think. So who do you think will be the next US President? Obama or McCain?

Mr. T

It was a very successful 5th Grade Open House last night. The night was filled with very important information regarding your child’s learning and the 5th grade curriculum. Thank you to all the parents who came out.

We look forward to working closer with you throughout the year.

If you didn’t make it to the Open House, please email me jacob.toa@saschina.org as I would like to get your email address for future contact, and so I can email you information that you may have missed out on.

Have a safe and relaxing October break.

Mr. T

Congratulations to Nathan, Caleb, Lisa, Mobin and Dylan. The correct answer for last week’s problem is 595 hand shakes. Nathan did a very good job in explaining his answer.

“First I looked at the comments to try and find a clue to the answer. I thought that Grace’s strategy was pretty good. So I added my listed numbers 1 through 34 together, and got 605. I wanted to be absolutely right, so I looked over the comments again. I saw Anita’s comment, and tried dividing it by 2, to see if the answer was close to 605. The answer was 595, so I thought the true answer was probably between 595 and 605. Then my mom reminded me of the story about Gauss. It was about how Gauss developed a method to solve problems like these at a very young age. The method is this: First you put the numbers from smallest to largest. Next you add together the smallest and largest numbers. Then you add together the next smallest and the next largest number, and so on. I was about to do this with all the numbers, but then I noticed that they all added up to 35. So then I divided 34 by 2, which is 17, and multiplied 35 by 17, got 595, which is my answer.”

The algorithm to solve the question of 35 people is: The number of hand shakes, squared, minus the number of people, divided by 2.

n²-n/2.

The Question

If there are 150 people born in the world every minute; how many are born every Hour? Day? Year? 4 Years?

Mr. T

The Boys Varsity Rugby Team played a friendly match against BISS Pudong yesterday afternoon at home. The SAS boys scored a try early in the first half to get the upper hand. They scored another two tries before half-time to lead 15- 0 at the break. The whole team worked well to keep them scoreless in the first half by moving the defensive line up together and putting pressure on the ball carriers. The SAS boys were also very good at getting to the breakdowns quickly and supporting the ball carriers well. The second half saw the SAS boys score another two tries through some slick handling from the outside backs. It was a very good overall performance from them and an improvement from their performances last weekend.

Player of note in the forwards was Koumei, Brandon and Patrick played well in the backs.

From HS Boys Rugby Pic Sept. 2008

Well done boys!

Coach Toa

Watch out…5JT students all have  blogs! The students are very excited to be proud owners of their very own blogs! Mr. Power came in yesterday afternoon and again this morning to set up each student with a gmail account and their new blog. Students are excited to have this new learning tool to push learning to new boundaries.

Keep your eye on each students blog…and watch them come to life.

Mr.T

I know that many of you are asking ‘What is a Blog’? An article on wordpress.org explains what a blog is, what they are used for and terminology used in the blogging world. You can read the article by clicking here. It would be a good idea to read the article before you get your blogs this week so that you have some background information on what you’re getting yourself into.

Read through it and then post a comment about 3 things that you learned from reading the article.

Also, check out this video that explains ‘Blogs in Plain English’.

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Have Fun

Mr. T

What’s up in 5JT

Language Arts – We are steadily working through Writer’s Workshop unit 1 and almost every student has completed at least two draft stories. As this unit focuses on personal narratives student have chosen seed ideas to build upon and have really worked on creating strong leads and endings and also concentrating on putting specific details in their writing. We are excited to share our stories with you when they are completed. We are currently working on focusing on character traits and providing evidence from the book. We will also focus on setting and writing summaries.

Math – We are nearing the end of unit 2 in math and should be ready do the assessment soon after returning from October holiday. Students have been working hard on completing homework and I’m proud to say that we have so far had every student complete their homework during unit 2 so far. Please help your child to continue to practice their basic facts when they have spare time. There are also some great math games to reinforce basic facts, the links can be found on my blog under Educational Sites.

Science – We are currently finishing up investigations on Saturation and will start a Social Studies unit on Government when we return after the October break. Click on the photos to see the class in action during our latest investigation.

Student Blogs – This week, Mr Power our amazing Tech guru, will be coming in to set each student up with their own personal blogs. These blogs will be a forum for each student to share their work and also to comment on each others work. Blogs are a fantastic tool to enhance learning and the students are excited to be getting them. We will also cover blogging etiquette to ensure that students are using them in positive ways.

A Great presentation!

A big thank you to Manal who gave the class a very informative presentation on Ramadhan last Friday. She shared her experiences with us and the meaning behind it. She also brought in treats that the class really enjoyed. Check out the photos of her presentation on my Picasa web album.

Art field trip

The Art field trip is this Thursday. Thank you to our Room Mom, Mrs. Hussain who has offered to help Mr. Davis with supervision on the trip.

Open House

I’m looking forward to meeting many of you at the Open House this Thursday starting at 7pm.

After School Activities

After School Activities have started. Students were given details of the activities they are in last week. It is a good idea to pack an extra snack in your child’s bag as they will be at school for an extra hour.

Mr. T

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The New Zealand Warriors are through to the semi-finals of the NRL Rugby League competition against all the odds. They beat the Sydney City Roosters 30 – 13 on Friday night and are 80 minutes away from a grand final appearance. Check out the action…Go the Warriors!

The SAS Pudong Boys Rugby team also had a great day on Saturday competing in a tournament at SAS Puxi with teams from BISS Pudong, BISS Puxi, Rego and SAS Puxi. The boys improved on their performances from last week and really worked together as a team on defence. We played well to win against BISS Pudong and Rego however, lost to the SAS Puxi Varsity team. We had just begun the game against the SAS Puxi Junior Varsity team when the heavens opened and the game was called off due to thunder and lightning. We are building up to some very important tournaments later in the season and look to improve again this week against BISS Pudong at home on Tuesday afternoon. Keep up the good work boys.

Coach Toa

Welcome to Problem of the Week!

I will endeavor to test your problem solving, reasoning and decision making skills every week by posting a problem right here. Feel free to comment on the problem and share your answers and thoughts! Remember to explain your answers in detail.

Lets get started.

The Question:

You are in a roomful of 35 people. Everyone is asked to shake hands with everyone. How many handshakes will there be? How can you figure this out? What strategies will you use?

Mr. T

Reading – Complete your draft character study on either Molly or Howard. You should have completed two draft Character studies.

Writing – Complete your second draft personal narrative in your Drafting Booklet

Unit Study – Complete the Science investigation handout

Math – Learn Basic facts

Check out the ‘Problem of the Week’. I look forward to reading your comments.

Have a good weekend

Mr. T