Homework

One of the most popular questions that students ask at the beginning of the school year is, "How much homework will we have?"  For some of you it may be more homework than you are used to.  For others it might be about the same as you had in fourth grade.  I figured I'd take this opportunity to explain to you what you can expect for homework in fifth grade.

• You can expect to have homework every night from Monday through Thursday.
• You will not have homework over the weekends.
• Every night you will be expected to read for at least 30 minutes and then complete an assignment option from a Reading Homework Menu that you will receive.  (the assignment should take you 10-15 minutes, assuming you are working and not distracted)
• Every night you will have a math assignment, sometimes it'll be a one sided page, other times two sided.  (10-20 minutes)
• Every night you will have an assignment with the five vocabulary words that you will have that week.  (10 minutes)
• Most nights you will have one additional assignment.  It could come from any subject area.  Sometimes it will be to study for a test.  Other times it might be to read and respond to an article in Time For Kids.  Or it could be something totally different.  (10-15 minutes)
• Throughout the year you will have different projects that we will work on both in school and at home.  You typically will have at least a month to work on them.

Overall homework should take you no longer than one hour plus your thirty minutes of reading.  At the end of the year I will be hosting a Tropical Smoothie Cafe luncheon for any students who never miss a homework assignment.

Commenting Tutorial

Click here to watch a video tutorial teaching you how to leave a comment on this blog.

Advice From the Class of 2012

Last June I asked my class to reflect on our year together and think about what they would tell the incoming fifth grade class.  Watch below to hear what you can expect from being a fifth grader in my class.

Who is Mr. St. Pierre Anyway?

Some of you probably know me pretty well already, whether it be from Terryville Student council, seeing me around the hallways, or from the world famous movie my class made last year.  However I know many of you, particularly those of you coming from Clinton Avenue, have never met me before.  So allow me to tell you a little bit about myself...

I am in my eleventh year of teaching.  I started my career teaching fourth grade at Clinton Avenue.  The following year I was transferred to third grade at Norwood Elementary School.  I worked there for six years where I taught third, fourth, and fifth grades.  In 2009 I was transferred to Terryville.  I am entering my fourth year of teaching fifth grade at Terryville this year.  Fifth grade is my favorite grade to teach and Terryville is an amazing place to work.  The building is filled with wonderful students and teachers!

I am very involved in the Comsewogue School District as you can often find me at school board meetings, homecoming parades, the Warrior 5K, and a variety of other events throughout the school year.  I am a vice-president of the Port Jefferson Station Teachers Association and my wife and I currently live in Comsewogue as well.

Mrs. St. Pierre and I at the Terryville Carnival this summer.

My wife Dana, who is a fourth grade teacher in Port Jefferson, grew up in Comsewogue and attended Norwood Elementary and JFK Middle School.  We live with our two (very crazy) dogs, Samantha and Asha.  Sammy is a five year old goldendoodle and Asha is a shepherd mix who we adopted about a year and a half ago.  You will probably hear me talk about them a LOT, as they are constantly driving me crazy and keeping me entertained!

Asha

Sammy

Well, that's a little bit about me.  I would love to hear from you so feel free to use the commenting feature of the blog.  Just remember, no last names!  If you are having difficulty figuring out how to comment I will try to post a "how to" video later this week.

Welcome to 5th Grade!

Welcome to fifth grade!  You have reached our class' online home for the upcoming school year.  You will definitely want to bookmark this website so that you can easily access it.  This blog will be one that you will want check on a daily basis throughout the school year.  I also recommend that you check back several times this summer, as it will be updated with posts that should be useful to you as you prepare for your fifth grade school year.

You may have noticed that it is possible for you to comment on the blog posts here.  Not only are you allowed to, but I encourage you to!  The beauty of a class blog like this is that it allows us to interact outside of the classroom.  In this case it will give us an opportunity to get to know each other a bit before we even meet on the first day of school!  However I do have a few very important rules for commenting on the blog:

1. Do not use your last name.  Your first name will do just fine.  If you want you can use your first name and last initial.  For example, if Derek Jeter was in our class, he would use "Derek" or "Derek J."
2. Do not post any personal information such as your address, your phone number, etc.
3. Do not say anything that you wouldn't say in a whole class setting.  Anyone will be able to read what is typed here.
4. Be kind and respectful here.

One final note on comments: All comments are filtered.  That means they must be approved by me before they are posted.  So if you leave a comment and it doesn't immediately appear on this site, it doesn't mean it is not working or that your computer is broken.  It just means that I haven't read and approved it yet.  Any comments that do not follow the rules above will never be approved.

Thanks for reading today.  Feel free to leave a comment about this post or anything else you wish to share with our class.  Check back soon to see the new things being put up!