General Goals: Students will read grade level material fluently with expression, taking punctuation into account. Students will demonstrate informative, narrative, descriptive, persuasive, and a multi-page research paper utilizing the writing process of prewriting, drafting, revising, editing and publishing. Students will identify the subject and predicate of simple, complex and compound sentences, and will learn the function of all 8 parts of speech, and the proper use of end punctuation, commas and the semicolon. Given oral presentation of subject matter, students will identify and share main points, and copy from visually presented material. Students will participate in classroom and small group discussion with relevance. Students will be taught spelling based on phonetic families and spelling rules. Students will give oral reports of 4-5 minutes.

Goals By Term

Term 1 –

• READING: Witch of Blackbird Pond – read the whole book and use the Progeny Press Study Guide. Also introduce writing a book report using Maniac Magee as a demonstration. Students will write a book report on a work of historical fiction from early American history (colonial period – Civil War), and will give a 2-4 minute oral presentation. Read Aloud: Journey to the New World by Kathryn Lasky.
• SPELLING: Units 1-9 (Skip Unit 6)
• GRAMMAR: Writing sentences, Punctuation, Capitalization.
• WRITING: Introduce Key-word Outlines, Dress-ups: Writing Focus: Narrative writing cuminating in an original, illustrated story.
• HANDWRITING: 3 pages per week.

Term 2 –

• READING: Johnny Tremain – read the whole book and use the Progeny Press Study Guide. Students will write a book report on a work of historical fiction from early American history (colonial period – Civil War), and will give a 2-4 minute oral presentation. Read Aloud: Standing in the Light by Mary Pope Osborne
• SPELLING: Units 10-18
• GRAMMAR: Prepositions, Verbs.
• WRITING: Continue Key-word Outlines, Dress-ups: Writing Focus: Informational writing, culminating in a “Mini-Book” research paper.
• HANDWRITING: 3 pages per week.

Term 3 –

• READING: Amos Fortune Freeman – read the whole book and use the Progeny Press Study Guide. Students will write a book report on a work of BIOGRAPHY from early American history (colonial period – Civil War), and will give a 2-4 minute oral presentation. Read Aloud: Lydie by Katherine Paterson.
• SPELLING: Units 19-27
• GRAMMAR: Interjections & Conjunctions, Nouns, Adjectives, Adverbs.
• WRITING: Writing Focus: Informative writing – State Report.
• HANDWRITING: 3 pages per week.

Term 4 –

• READING: Number the Stars – read the whole book and use the Progeny Press Study Guide. Read Aloud: The Ballad of Lucy Whipple by Karen Cushman.
• SPELLING: Units 28-35
• GRAMMAR: Important Words, Pronouns.
• WRITING: Writing Focus: Informative writing – Research Paper.
• HANDWRITING: 3 pages per week.