Grade Five Curriculum Picks
Note: These Grade Five Picks can be purchased from Homeschool Canada (order using the HCOS Curriculum Order Form). Some options may also be available to borrow from the Learning Commons Search Portal and/or via the OverDrive virtual eBook library.
Vendor websites are pick-and-choose and some optional or alternate suggestions may be listed, so select your items with care.
Overview Of Grade 5 Curriculum Picks
Here is an overview of the curriculum picks that we suggest for Grade 5. Please note that some subjects provide more than one option. For more information about the curriculum, please refer to the information under Detailed Information for Grade 5 Curriculum Picks.
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English Language Arts
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Mathematics |
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Science
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Biology
Chemistry
Physics
Earth/Space
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Social Studies
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Bible/Christian Studies |
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Optional Resources (not detailed below)
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English Language Arts
Language Lessons for a Living Education 5 with 101 Favorite Stories from the Bible
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Type of Resource: Workbook
Description: students will build on and reinforce essential communication skills as they achieve proficiency in grammar, vocabulary, reading comprehension, spelling, and written communication. Independent reading and mastery of effective sentences and paragraphs are at the heart of this course. Students will enjoy poem, hymn, and picture studies as well as faith-growing stories to inspire detailed and descriptive paragraphs while making real-world connections that enhance this fun and engaging story-based approach. Written with a Charlotte Mason influence but designed for modern homeschoolers, activities include book reports, Scripture, creating a dictionary, narration, and critical thinking games to hone and apply their writing and reading skills creatively. This course is a story-based approach, using Charlotte Mason's ideas for the modern homeschool student with character-building themes. Each quarter has five stories, two picture studies (one of which is biblically-based), and two poems (one of which is a proverb). Using the spelling words and the Dictionary Worksheets, the student will create their very own dictionary as they move week by week through the material. This course incorporates picture study, memorization, grammar and punctuation, spelling and vocabulary, observation, and application through creating their own stories through pictures, sentences, paragraphs, poems, proverbs, and letters. This course also develops reading and narration skills. Writing stamina is built up gradually. By the end of the course, students should be able to comfortably write various types of paragraphs. Scope and sequence, daily course calendar, assessment charts, recommended reading list, spelling practice ideas, and grammar sheets also included.
Other Optional or Supplementary Resources Table of Contents (under "Descriptions")
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From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E Frankweiler with Literature Kit by Classroom Complete Press (or alternate)
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Type of Resource: fiction novel and workbook
Description: enhance instruction and allow for much deeper conversations to keep students engaged. Imagine who the character of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler will be and what role she will play in the story. Put the Kincaid children's actions in the correct order they occurred as they ran away. Find a simile used to describe how hungry the children are in the book. Invent a character and write a letter similar to what Mrs. Frankweiler does at the beginning of the novel. Draw a map of the children's journey in the style of a plot pyramid. Aligned to your State Standards, additional crossword, word search, comprehension quiz and answer key are also included.
About the Novel: From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler is a Newbery Medal-winning story about two young children who run away from home. Twelve-year-old Claudia and nine-year-old Jamie run away to New York using an old unused adult ticket for the train. The pair find themselves living in the famous Metropolitan Museum of Art by hiding in the bathrooms when the Museum closes. While there, they become interested in Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler and her recent purchase of the marble statue of an angel on display at the Museum. They use the rest of their money to visit the woman in Connecticut. Their trip leads to them discovering the secret behind the angel statue.
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Dear Canada: An Ocean Apart: The Gold Mountain Diary of Chin Mei-Ling, Vancouver, British Columbia, 1922
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Type of Resource: Historical Fiction
Description: each fictional diary in the "Dear Canada" series invites readers into the world of a girl living through a particular period in Canada's past. Gillian Chan's latest addition illustrates the effect the Chinese Head Tax has on one young girl and her family. Mei-ling and her father are struggling to pay the head tax that will allow her mother and brother, who are still living in China, to come to Canada. They must have that money before the impending Exclusion Act bars any more Chinese from immigrating. What will happen if they can't come up with enough money in time to reunite their family?
Other Optional or Supplementary Resources
Table of Contents and Preview (available on Amazon) |
No Time to Say Goodbye: Children's Stories of Kupe Island Residential School
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Type of Resource: Historical Fiction
Description: a fictional account of five children sent to aboriginal boarding school, based on the recollections of a number of Tsartlip First Nations people. These unforgettable children are taken by government agents from Tsartlip Day School to live at Kuper Island Residential School. The five are isolated on the small island and life becomes regimented by the strict school routine. They experience the pain of homesickness and confusion while trying to adjust to a world completely different from their own. Their lives are no longer organized by fishing, hunting and family, but by bells, line-ups and chores. In spite of the harsh realities of the residential school, the children find adventure in escape, challenge in competition, and camaraderie with their fellow students. Sometimes sad, sometimes funny, always engrossing, No Time to Say Goodbye is a story that readers of all ages won’t soon forget.
Other Optional or Supplementary Resources: |
Mathematics
Singapore Math Standards Edition edition is not mentioned here because as the grades progress, it is more difficult to "jump in" to this method of learning. It is still a strong option and can be considered for students looking for an academically rigorous curriculum. A placement test is strongly recommended before selecting a level.
Option 1: Math Lessons for a Living Education 5
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Type of Resource: workbook
Description: students learn best and retain more when they are engaged in the material and actively applying concepts to everyday life—Math Lessons for a Living Education Level 5 engages your student through exciting stories and teaches them how to apply mathematical concepts through everyday life situations—allowing your student to learn smarter instead of harder! Math Lessons for a Living Education teaches through short, story-based lessons; real-life application; Hands-on activities; and engaging, full-colour worksheets.
This engaging, story-based approach puts math into context for your student as they student build connections between mathematical concepts and their own lives—learning both how to do math, and how to apply it to life outside the textbook. A blend of stories, copy-work, oral narration, and hands-on experience brings the concepts to life, invites the student to explore the world around them, and gives this course a Charlotte Mason flavour. In Math Lessons for a Living Education Level 5 your student will learn:
Table of Contents (under "Descriptions") |
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Type of Resource: workbooks
Description: in conjunction with
NOTE:
On pages where there are multiple grade options, choose the correct grade from the dropdown menu. Teacher Resource/Lesson Plans(free when you register online) Other Optional or Supplementary Resources
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*First 8 lessons of 12; lessons 9 and 10 address Grade 6 content standards
Note: This resource will make up half to two-thirds of the student work for Grade 5 science. The other branches of science addressing the other big ideas and content competencies are purposefully not addressed to the same level of depth. Type of Resource: home education student textbook and student notebooking journal (like a workbook)
Description: From the brain in your head to the nails on your toes, you and your students will encounter fascinating facts, engaging activities, intriguing experiments, and loads of fun as you learn about the human body and how to keep it working well. Beginning with a brief history of medicine and a peek into cells and DNA, your students will voyage through fourteen lessons covering many subjects, such as the body systems: skeletal, muscular, respiratory, digestive, cardiovascular, nervous and more! They’ll study nutrition and health, how God designed their immune system to protect them, along with embryology and what makes them a unique creation of God. As they work their way through the course, your students will enjoy adding the organs about which they learn to their own personalized human figure to be placed in their course notebook. In addition to all this exploration, your students will enjoy scientific experiments and projects, such as testing the bacteria content around the house, finding their blood type, creating a cell model from Jello and candy, and even building a stethoscope! In keeping with the other books in the Apologia elementary science Young Explorer Series, the Charlotte Mason methodology is employed with engaging narratives, narration prompts and notebooking projects, all of which reinforce their learning using proven techniques that strengthen retention.
Other Optional or Supplementary Resources
Table of Contents and PDF Samples: Additional Support: |
Chemistry
Mixtures and Solutions by Molly Aloian
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Type of Resource: Nonfiction Book
Description: most of the materials around us contain blends of more than one substance. These are mixtures and solutions. Seawater, for example, is a solution of salt and water. The engaging text and vivid illustrations in this book will help readers understand how mixtures and solutions form and how they apply to everyday life. Topics include: • the difference between mixtures and solutions
Other Optional or Supplementary Resources
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Physics
Simple Machines! With 25 Science Activities for Kids by Anita Yasuda
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Type of Resource: Nonfiction Book
Description: You might not think you’re using a simple machine when you zip up your coat, but it’s true! Simple Machines! With 25 Science Projects for Kids introduces readers to the six simple machines recognized as crucial to human civilization: planes, pulleys, screws, wedges, and wheels and axles. Hands-on science projects, essential questions, links to primary sources, and more get kids excited about STEM learning. This resource dedicates a chapter to each of the six simple machines that were identified centuries ago: levers, inclined planes, pulleys, screws, wedges, and wheels and axles. Kids develop analytical skills as they figure out where force is applied and what kind of work it generates. Essential questions, fascinating facts, and links to online primary sources make student-led learning fun and productive! Through science-minded STEM projects and investigative engineering experiments, kids develop critical and creative thinking skills about the roles simple machines play in our world and their importance to human civilization. Try these hands-on engineering projects!
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Earth/Space
Option 1: ScienceWiz Rocks and Geology Book & Kit
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Type of Resource: Science Kit with Book
Description: This is the WEIGHTIEST ScienceWiz book sold, as it has lots of good-sized rock samples! Eruptive experiments are used to explore the active geology of planet Earth. Relate rocks to the history of the planet and connect the earth’s crust to real rocks through exciting eruptive experiments to foster comprehension. 20 activities which include:
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Option 2: The Geology Book (Wonders of Creation)
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Note: only the first 4 of 8 chapters need to be completed to address content standards. This is not a very costly book.
Type of Resource: Nonfiction
Description: rocks firmly anchored to the ground and rocks floating through space fascinate us. Jewellery, houses and roads are just some of the ways we use what has been made from geologic processes to advance civilization. Whether scrambling over a rocky beach or gazing at spectacular meteor showers, we can’t get enough of geology! The Geology Book will teach you: what really carved the Grand Canyon; how thick the earth’s crust is; why the earth is unique for life; the varied features of the earth’s surface—from plains to peaks; how sedimentary deposition occurs through water, wind and ice; effects of erosion; ways in which sediments become sedimentary rock; fossilization and the age of the dinosaurs; the powerful effects of volcanic activity; continental drift theory; radioisotopes and carbon dating; and geological processes of the past.
Other Optional or Supplementary Resources |
Science/Social Studies
Option 1: The Elementary Teacher's Big Book of Graphic Organizers, K-5
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Type of Resource: workbook Description: graphic organizers are a powerful metacognitive teaching and learning tool. These graphic organizers can be used before learning, during learning, or after learning activities. This resource provides tools to help students understand relationships between facts, terms, and ideas.
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Option 2: 3-D Graphic Organizers: 20 Easy-to-Make Learning Tools That Reinforce Key Concepts
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Type of Resource: Workbook
Description: bring a new dimension to graphic organizers-and increase students' ability to learn and remember important content-area information-with these 20 engaging learning tools. Each organizer comes with a ready-to-go template, easy step-by-step directions, and ideas for using it across the curriculum. The finished three-dimensional products serve as powerful reference tools-and make a great classroom display to show off what students have learned. Great for individual, small-group, and whole-class learning!
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Social Studies
Internment Camps (Crabtree Publishing's Series, Uncovering the Past: Analyzing Primary Sources)
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Use of The Elementary Teacher's Big Book of Graphic Organizers or 3-D Graphic Organizers with the resources in the section below is recommended, as the books below provide only a few ways to interact with the content.
Type of Resource: Nonfiction Book
Description: an important addition to any multicultural collection, this title examines the internment of “enemy aliens” in the United States and Canada during the Second World War. With particular emphasis on “yellow peril” and the plight of Japanese-American and Canadian citizens, the book reveals the events, mindsets, and policies leading up to and following the forced removal of thousands of citizens from their homes into internment camps. Using primary sources including real accounts of survivors, the title encourages readers to examine differing perspectives on the events and think critically about the complex relationship between citizenship and diversity in North America. A final chapter considers the lasting effects of internment—and how harmful stereotypes in today’s global climate run the risk of repeating past mistakes.
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BC Land and People by Apple Press
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Type of Resource: Consumable Workbook
Description: This reproducible activity book is about Canada's Pacific province. Topics include a cross-section of British Columbia, the Cordillera, climate, the Fraser River system, preserving a temperate rainforest, and natural resources, Aboriginal place-names, a traditional winter lodge, the gold rush, fruit growing, copper mining, Pacific Rim National Park, the capital, Victoria and emblems of British Columbia.
This series of reproducible resource books are filled with factual and up-to-date information. The imaginative and self-directing activities in each book focus on a particular province or territory of Canada and are designed to help students acquire a knowledge of the basic geography and social history of Canada. Numerous map activities are a part of each book and develop map skills such as plotting a route, interpreting symbols and using a scale to calculate distance. Pictures and charts are used to clarify and enhance the content. Activities such as crossword puzzles and quizzes are used for review. The answers to the activities as well as outline maps for the teacher or student use are included at the end of each book. |
Coming to Canada by Robert Livesy
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Type of Resource: student textbook Description: This textbook of 160 pages contains personal stories of 42 young people aged 8 to 25, who left their native countries to come to Canada. It describes their reasons for leaving, why they, (or their parents) chose Canada, the problems that they encountered on the way here, the immediate culture shock when they arrived, their adjustment to their new environment, the problems and advantages that they discovered and their opinions of Canada today.
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Canadian Government by Classroom Complete Press
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Type of Resource: Workbook
Description: travel back to Confederation to see how Canada became a new nation. This resource breaks down the responsibilities and parts of the federal government. Recognize that Canada is a democracy and a constitutional monarchy, with the head of state being the King or Queen. Read the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, before writing your own Constitution for a new country. Create a presentation on one of the departments the federal government is responsible for, such as national defense or the post office. Understand that Canada is made up of provinces and territories and that each has its own government under the federal system. Jump into the political process to elect the next Prime Minister, and see how a majority of minority government affects his or her leadership. Written to Bloom's Taxonomy. Additional writing tasks, crossword, word search, comprehension quiz and answer key are also included. Gr. 5-8; reading level Gr. 3-4.
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Bible/Christian Studies
Who Is God? And Can I Really Know Him?
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Type of Resource: Student Textbook
Description: introduces the concept of worldview while laying the foundational truths upon which a biblical Christian worldview is built. Our children are bombarded on a daily basis with competing messages. Every song, movie, book, TV show, blog, and game is full of ideas about truth, morality, beauty, identity, faith, and more. Not all of these ideas are true. Some are wrong, some are deceptive, and some are outright destructive. Young children must be equipped to discern among competing ideas and stand firm in the truth. Concepts covered include:
Other Optional or Supplementary Resources |