Weekly Work Update

Homework

  1. Homework packets were handed out on Friday and are due back on Thursday.
  2. Spelling sorts came home on Friday last week and will be tested on Friday.
  3. We need empty Pringles cans for a solar cooking experiment in a couple weeks.  All empty (large) Pringles cans welcome!
  4. BE SURE TO TURN IN YOUR PERMISSION SLIPS FOR NEXT Thursday’S FIELD TRIP.  We still need drivers for this trip…..let me know ASAP.

Week of 5-9-16

  • We are at Springmill Learning Center and the Library on Monday.
  • In Math we will be looking at graphing and all that it entails.  Looking at median, range and mode are some of the vocabulary that we will enjoy.
  • In our Inquiry Unit we will be looking at conservation of energy-Renewable and sustainable energy, nuclear energy. With Alternative Energy source – We will be using a graph of energy sources in order to apply our current knowledge to this growing graph.  
  • As many of you know, if we can be outside, I’ll take it outside.  So please pack items that do not need warmed up as much as possible for the rest of the year.  This way I can enjoy my students in a picnic lunch whenever it is nice.  Thanks!

Week of 5-2-16

  • Math for the rest of Unit 8 will be covering items from the year’s work and working them into projects.  We will also be covering a few things I feel that our 4th graders could benefit from that have not been covered yet.
  • In writing we are still working on writing about literature.  The students will be completing an essay about their recent group study book: The Talking Earth.
  • Our Unit work this week will focus around comprehending where natural resources are sourced around our state and where the upcoming alternatives are being used best.  We will also be looking at the current drought situation in California, which we know is not a really new struggle.
  • Spelling words have gone home with the homework last Friday and the test will be on Friday.

This Week of 4-18-16

  • Keep an eye on our blog to see what we are getting up to this week.  We have an engineer, Mr. Francl, coming in to run an experiment with us again this week.  You might be talked into changing your lighting in your house!
  • Math – We will be working on fraction and decimal word problems.  This tends to be quite a difficult one with the children as all word problems this time in the year are multi-step.  Nothing is just one answer anymore.
  • Literacy – We are reading about the life of Thomas Edison in Guided Reading and looking at cause and effect of his life.  We will also be comparing his life to ours in our reading journals.
  • Our group reading and writing is based on the book: The Talking Earth.  We will be completing this book this week and the students will be writing a character essay on any character they choose in the book.  The students use our essay format to develop their essays and the Lucy Calkins development charts, along with our lessons, to guide them in their thoughts about characters.
  • Science – If you can, please send in Pringles cans with your children.  We will be using them for an experiment in a few weeks.  We will need one can per child, and a few extra for mistakes.  :o)  Thank you!

WEEK of 4/4/16

Well, we had an amazing week back after spring break last week.  It was so nice to see my students again and hear about their time away.  I was also very impressed by the posters and movie trailers for their past book review.  Well done everyone!

  • We hit the ground running with a new Unit in Math.  Unit 7 offers quite a lot of learning in fractions (adding, subtracting, multiplying)  We are also concentrating on those dreaded multi-step word problems that throw everyone off.  In last week’s homework, I have included a family letter for this unit.  This should help many of us who have not multiplied mixed numbers since High School!  Psssst – the homework answers are in the back of the family letter, be sure to keep it for safe keeping and your own, “Look what I know!” moment!
  • Spelling – These words went out last Friday.  All children took them home with their homework packets.
  • Writing – We have been working on writing about writing.  Sounds confusing, eh?  Not really!  If you have ever developed an opinion or idea about a book or a character in a book this is exactly what this style of writing is about.  We encourage children to develop their own ideas about literature; it increases fluency and comprehension.  Using the essay format, we will develop ideas about the text and back it up with evidence.  So far so good!  We have been using several fun books on-line as well as our group book: The Talking Earth.  The children are loving this book, and especially that ornery Petang!
  • Inquiry – We are wrapping up our Unit “Where we are in place and time” this week.  Many of you will see your child working on (I hope) their summative assessment at home.  They will be bringing it home Tuesday and it is due on Friday.  Many of these children are working in pairs so I hope they make plans on how they plan to get this done together: Skype, Face time, E-mail, Google Docs, phone, ‘work-date’ all work well.  Next week we have a new Inquiry…..stay tuned for details!
  • Reading – As I mentioned, we are reading The Talking Earth.  We have also begun a book about Thomas Edison….a link to our next Unit.  Any guesses yet?
  • I hope to see you all at the Discovery School auction night this Saturday the 9th from 5-9 p.m. at the Mansfield Art Center.  Whatever parent comes with the best 70’s costume I will give you a homework pass for your child to use anytime for the rest of the year!  Think about it, a week without fraction homework!!!
  • Have a great week families.

WEEK of 3-14-16

Hello 4th grade families.  It is the last week before Spring Break so we will be bringing a few things to a close this week.

  • MATH – We will be completing our unit on angles, measurement and division.  Assessment will be given for this unit on Friday.  The assessment practice sheet will be handed out on Wednesday as well as next week’s homework.  The reason we will be handing out homework early is because most of it is very crucial to what will be on the test.
  • Spelling – Usual individual spelling lists have been handed out and copied for home study.  Assessment will be on Friday.
  • Writing – We have completed our Informational Books on the Great Depression.  We would like to celebrate and share our wonderful works of literature with you!  Please join us Friday the 18th from 2:30 – 3:00 for a ‘book share’ celebration.  We will be sharing our books with family who come.  We will also have drinks, coffee and snacks during this time to celebrate.  If anyone can donate cookies, oranges, apples, crackers or cheese trays during this time please let me know.  The more the merrier!
  • Unit – We will continue to go through our lines of Inquiry:
      • How natural phenomena continue to change the earth
      • Humankind’s response to the changing earth.
  • Have a wonderful Spring Break!

Week of 3-7-16

Hello 4th grade families.  We have a full week ahead of us here in our classroom.

  • Math = We will continue to work on division and measuring angles.  Our OSU student will be teaching the students a lesson on measuring angles on Wednesday.  I know she has a great lesson planned using our new angle manipulatives that many of you saw during conferences.
  • Spelling – all words have been copied and sent home on Friday with the homework package.  If you did not see this list to study at home please ask your child where it is located.
  • Writing – We have been working endlessly on our informative books on the Great Depression.  Students have been given a self-assessment and a checklist of all the things they should be looking for in their writing.  This covers all previous lessons.  The great thing about how this book is working is that the children get the chance to cover the layout process for chapters and information in each chapter that they do.  Organizing information to relay to an audience is not an easy process.  Many of the students struggle with the concept of getting the facts out there and adding their personal knowledge to it as well.  Many students may be required to work on this writing on google docs at home.  If you do not have access to this please let me know so I can make alternative arrangements.  Another OSU student will be teaching a lesson on adding facts and details to informative stories in order to make them come to life.  This lesson will occur on Wednesday.
  • Inquiry Unit – We will be exploring each natural phenomenon on our earth and relating it to the three lines of Inquiry:
    • Geological structure of the earth
    • How natural phenomena continue to change the earth
    • Humankind’s response to the changing earth.

    So far we have looked at hurricanes and tornadoes.  Do you have any personal experiences in any natural disasters?  Do you have experience in what happens when a disaster is man-made? (deforestation, etc?)  Our class would love to hear from you!

  • Reading – We are still working on Lemonade Wars as it was put on hold for a small while to work extra hard on our informative writing books.  We are also starting a new read aloud this week:
    • ‘The Talking Earth’ by: Jean Craighead George
  • Our class will be selling popcorn this week to make money for seeds and gardening.  If your child is on the fundraising committee we would like for them to stay after school to make and bag the popcorn on Tuesday until 4:30.  Thanks a bunch!
  • As usual, if there are any questions please feel free to get a hold of me.
  • I hope to see you all at the Literacy Night on Friday.  It is going to be a fun-filled evening!

Week of 2-17 and 2-22-16

Hello!  I hope you all enjoyed your snow day this week.  We have managed to get caught up in pretty much everything.

  • Math = Our Unit 5 with fractions, angles and multi-step word problems is going very smoothly in class and I plan on testing on this Unit next week on Tuesday and Wednesday.  There will be a review paper sent home for all students to practice with for the assessment.  Our biggest struggle is learning to check our work as if we were doing it all over again.  Look for ‘sense’ and ‘reason’.
  • Writing = Many of our students are doing well with their books on The Great Depression.  This has been a challenge for all of them.  It is quite a lot of information to learn, process and compartmentalize.  However, with the use of skeleton outlines, graphic organizers and learning to extend our thoughts, we are doing well.  I am looking forward to a writing celebration involving these books by the middle of March right before we break for Spring Break.
  • Spelling = We are all back to our individual word sorts.  You should be receiving these words at home, written and sorted by your child.  The test for these words will be February 26th due to the lack of days this week.
  • Book Reports = All children checked out a book from the library on Wednesday for our March book report.  They have brought the directions/options for this book report home with their book.  It will be due on March 28th.
  • Reading – We are are completing the book “Out of the Dust” this week and we are all working in various stages of “Lemonade Wars”.
  • Unit = We are wrapping up our Inquiry Unit, Sharing the Planet, this week.  As many of you may have heard, we are working on a business plan and grant writing procedure for a greenhouse at our school.  The students will contiue to work on this venture for the rest of the year.  The grants are due in one month’s time and their input in the decision making process is crucial to the design and outcome of the idea.  :o)  Our Summative Assessment will be given on Friday afternoon.  Next week we will begin our new Unit of Inquiry.
    Where We Are In Place and Time

    An inquiry into the natural world and its laws; the interaction between the natural world (physical and biological) and human societies; how humans use their understanding of scientific principles;the impact of scientific and technological advances on society and on the environment.
    Central Idea: Human survival is connected to understanding the continual changing nature of the Earth.

A few ideas and business notes:

  1. We are all out of pencils in the classroom.  The children brought in quite a lot at the beginning of the year but needs must and we are running extremely low.  Ask your child if they need more pencils at school for their personal collection.  They might!
  2. The Fund Raiser at Chuck E Cheese’s is tonight.  I hope to see you there supporting our school and having a fun time!
  3. Homework – The return of homework has been rather slack lately and my recess time has been full of students who did not turn in in the past few weeks.  Homework is always due on Thursday, unless I have written otherwise on their paper.  Please ensure your child does their homework AND turns it in on time.  It saves hassle for all involved.

Week of 1-25-16

Welcome back!  This week we will be working on the following activities:

  • Math – We will be reviewing our Math assessment from Unit 4 and beginning Unit 5 this week.  The students will be taking a pre-assessment to base their growth of knowledge between the beginning and the end of the unit.  Unit 5 will begin with more development into fractions, including addition of fractions.
  • Spelling – the spelling words from last week have been carried over to this week.  The children have 8 Unit words added to their individual lists:
  • finite
    infinite
    income
    deposit
    loan
    grant
    trade
    barter
  • Reading – We are continuing to read the following books in class, depending on which group is reading, The Lemonade War,  Frindle and Out of the Dust.
  • Book Reports – Cereal Box Book reports are Due February 8th.  All students should have their book read by now and working on the product.
  • Writing – We have begun our books on the Great Depression.  The students will be outlining and roughing the first chapters out this week.
  • Inquiry – This week we will be reflecting on the local businesses that we have visited this far.  We will be using our learned knowledge of finite and infinite resources, as well as inquiring into what would be best for our community in the area of business for 4th grade.
  • REMEMBER- NO SCHOOL ON FRIDAY!

Week of 1-4-16

Happy New Year 4th grade families!  Here’s to a wonderful open year full of possibilities and opportunities.  This week:

  • Math – We will be looking at partial products of multiplication as well as the metric units of measurement.  Remember to keep practicing those multiplication problems at home!
  • Reading – We will will looking at a variety of non-fiction books this week that are focused around our unit.  From the story of Benjamin Franklin to the remote control and the traffic light, we will delve into these inventors minds and lives to see what they were thinking when they ‘invented’.
  • Inquiry – well-connected with our reading this week, we will complete the idea behind inventing and ‘filling a need’ by completing our Invention Convention folders.  By the end of the week, your student will have completed and come up with a protocol for an idea that could be the ‘next famous invention!”
  • Writing – We will be delving into our next writing unit of informational writing.  As the students have been doing so much with informational books this past unit, they should be very well versed on the layout and structure of informational writing.  If you have any informational books at home, be sure to share them with your 4th grader.  It will be such a great link.
  • Spelling:  Homophones again.  Here are this week’s words:

    mane

    pale

    made

    pain

    plain

    their

    hair

    main

    pane

    male

    great

    mail

    pail

    maid

    grate

    plane

    sale

    waste

    there

    waist

    sail

    maze

    hare

    they’re

    maize

Things to remember this week:

  1. Early release on Wednesday the 6th at 1:00.
  2. I will be doing mid-year testing for our reading levels this week for ALL students.
  3. Spelling tests are every Friday morning.
  4. We will be getting another book from the library for another fun book report for the month of January.  Details will be sent home with the book.
  5. Math homework this week is lessons 4.4 and 4.5.

Week of 12-14-15

  • Monday, during recess, we will have the Spelling Bee for all who are interested in participating in the Spelling Bee test!
  • Math – We will be working on converting liquid measurements and converting rectangles.
  • Reading – We will be reading _The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, The Story of Jeans and Tesla’s Invention.
  • Inquiry – We will be embarking on the Art Unit of Invention Convention and looking into ways we can make this our own!
  • Spelling – More HOMOPHONES!!!!

    days

    ate

    way

    wade

    bear

    wait

    slay

    vain

    brake

    eight

    daze

    weighed

    vein

    weigh

    reign

    pair

    sleigh

    weight

    stake

    rain

    steak

    break

    vane

    bare

    pare

    rein

    pear
  • Dates to Remember this Week:
    • Monday Spelling Bee classroom test during recess
    • Thursday – Hygiene Inventions and how they are good for you!
    • Thursday 2:00 K-2 Concert of the students
    • Friday – Pizza Friday – lunch and Winter Party in the classroom from 1:00 – 2:00
    • Friday 2:00 – Drama Play in the gym for students.