This Week in Fourth Grade...

Reader's Workshop

This week we continued to think about character's traits and and strategies for determining them.  Next week we will learn that characters are complicated and have more than one trait and sometimes these traits can be opposites.

Students have also been learning that they can stop and jot in their notebooks and then categorize their notes later to help them infer and grow new ideas.

Writer's Workshop

Last week we had some secret agents in the classroom trying to solve some tricky cases!  These secret agents were in charge of looking for evidence and clues in a short story to help them figure out the solution!  The kids got a lot of practice finding evidence and making inferences based on the evidence.  

This week we will continue to learn about how to collect specific evidence that will help us back up our thinking.

Math Workshop

We have wrapped up our first math unit.  On Friday the kids took the Module 1 Assessment.  Many of the students really made sure that they took their time and used strategies that they had learned while taking this assessment.  Below are some pictures of kids using the resources that are available to them. 

Your child's assessment will be sent home this week.  Please take a few minutes to look at it with your child.  There will be a sheet for you to sign to show that you were able to take a look at it.  It will also give you the chance to ask questions (email works too) and a box to check off if you would like me to send some review pages home for your child to practice. 

This week we will start our next module on Metric Measurement.  

      

Zones

During morning meeting, students learned that there are 4 different zones of emotion that kids often experience.  If you click on the link below, you will see that the "green zone" is the zone that we want to be in: happy, feeling good, ready to learn.  You will also see that the "blue zone" is when students may be feeling sad or tired, the "yellow zone" is when students may be feeling silly, frustrated or worried and that the "red zone" is when students are feeling angry or out of control.  We taught students that it is normal to not always be in the "green zone." and that we can help ourselves get back into the green zone by employing different strategies.  

Later in the week students brainstormed additional strategies that they could use when they are not in the green zone.  Next week, students will be given scenarios and be asked to decide which strategies they may use in those situations.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1H6uObsc6yWgNscB87JFnmgBCakwC_ckJHxYa10mcEXg/edit?usp=sharing  


Rock, Paper, Scissors!

Our quest for more physical activity continued this week during morning meeting when students played rock, paper, scissors in the gym.  This wasn't your typical game however!  In this variation, students hopped from hula-hoop to hula-hoop and faced off (rock, paper, scissors style) in an attempt to beat everyone in his/her path.  We have included some pictures of the activity below.

This Week in Fourth Grade...

It was great to meet with so many parents last week during conferences!  Thank you for letting us be a partner in your child's education.

Writing Workshop

We continued to practice answering questions using key words in our answer.  The kids were able to "interview" a character in one of the picture books that they have been reading for the Battle of the Books during Reader's Workshop.  This allowed them to practice using the key words in the question and putting them into the answer.  

This week we will be focusing in on evidence.  Evidence is something in a text (or picture) that you can touch.  Finding specific evidence will help the kids as they begin to write answers to open response questions and need to back up their answers with evidence.  

Math Workshop

Last week each team was introduced to a problem solving template that we will use throughout the school year.  Becoming familiar with this template will help students become more effective problem solvers.  

One of the parts of the template that we are really focusing on is what they are envisioning, or the picture that they are seeing in their mind as they read the problem.  Although they have been practicing this strategy since the start of the school year in reading, we are trying to teach them the importance of also applying this skill to math.  We will continue to work on this throughout the week!

Reader's Workshop


This week we learned that we can learn more about a character by looking at what that character says, thinks or does.  We put this into practice while reading The Stranger by Chris Van Allsburg.  At the end of the week, we had a class discussion with regards to who we thought the Stranger was.  There were many different inferences with lots of evidence to support these inferences!  We practiced our discussion skills and reinforced the idea that all of our thinking in reading should be supported with evidence.  You would have been so proud to hear the academic language your students were using during this discussion!  Below are some pictures of students debating and deep in thought along with some of the resources we used.

Effective Effort

We spoke with a lot of parents at conferences this past week regarding "Effective Effort."  Simply put, we have been teaching your children what hard work actually looks like and the strategies used to make your hard work turn into success.  We thought you would like to see the language that we have been using and the strategies that we are teaching.  Thus far, we have taught time, use of feedback, resourcefulness, and focus.  Once taught, we identify students who are employing the strategies and give them a "shout out."  Any way that you can use this language at home would also help your child to own these strategies.

This Week in Fourth Grade....

Conferences this Week......

Thanks to the parents who have signed up for conferences. We still have several openings available.  If you would like to schedule a phone conference we can do that too!  Just a reminder that we have morning times available on Tuesday and Wednesday as well as the afternoon and evening times.

We have sent out a questionnaire form for you to fill out so that we can discuss your questions and concerns in a timely manner.  We look forward to meeting with you later this week.  

Snacks

A number of students have been forgetting to bring their snacks to school more and more over the past couple of weeks.  We have been able to provide a snack at times when this has happened, but cannot keep doing this in the future.  Please remember to pack your child a snack...they are certainly working up an appetite! 

Math Workshop

Last week students were introduced to a new project for math.  They will get the opportunity to “build” a football team and use their addition and subtraction skills to create this team!  We have talked about the importance of being accurate as we build this team otherwise as the owner of the football team we might lose money or have players that might be upset!  There was a lot of excitement in the room at the start of this project on Friday!

Using Feedback

Over the past two weeks, students have been learning about "Effective Effort."  Basically, students have been learning the 6 components of hard work through mini lessons during morning meeting.  So far students have learning about staying focused, being persistent and using feedback.  Students practiced using feedback on Friday by creating "human knots" that they then had to untie.  We stopped a number of times and gave one another feedback to see if that would make the task easier.  Many students agreed that when they used feedback from teachers and peers, they were more successful.  Below are pictures of the activity!

Character Trait Homework

The character trait homework assignment is finally ready to come home tomorrow evening!  We had hoped to send it home last week, but decided to do some more practice at school.  The students have been learning to write about their answers by including evidence and an explanation of the evidence.  This is very new to many students, so we wanted to practice it at school as much as was necessary before sending it home.  Please let me know if you have any questions once the assignment comes home.

We look forward to meeting with many of you this week!

Jaime and Jen

This Week in Fourth Grade

Conferences Are Coming Up!

Conference sign ups are open!  They will take place on October 17th and 18th.  Ours are scheduled a little differently since we have so many families to meet with.  In addition to after school and evening conferences, we also offer some during the school day.  If you are unable to make a conference but would still like to meet with us, we are also happy to talk over the phone with you.  We look forward to seeing everyone soon!

Character Traits

Last week, students began learning about different character traits and how to write our thinking with evidence.  This will support students as they begin to make inferences about the characters they are reading in their books.  You will see an assignment come home later this week that asks students to think of a person they know from their own lives, or a fictional character that exemplifies a new character trait that they have learned.  They will be asked to write evidence to support their choice and to illustrate the character or person in a way that shows off the trait.  We practiced this assignment in school last week and will do some review this week prior to it going home.  Below you can see students thinking deeply about the characters in the picture books they have been reading in school.

Book Orders

Scholastic Book Flyers went out last week.  The orders will be due next Tuesday.  Our classroom code to order online is H3M9C.

Math Workshop

Last week we started our learning on rounding numbers.  Students were introduced to one of two projects to work on throughout the week to showcase and practice their new learning.  After completing the project, students were able to share what they learned through a Flipgrid.  As we start to use Flipgrid to show our learning we will be focusing on making sure that our Flipgrid presentation is used to share what we have actually learned and present our ideas in a clear manner.  This is something that we will focus on as we continue to use this great tool.  

If your child goes to show you his/her Flipgrid from last week, it might not be "active" on the website because he/she might have been missing some of the expectations for presenting the Flipgrid.  If this is the case, your child can revise their Flipgrid this week for homework so that they can practice meeting the expectations. 

Last week we also completed a pre-assessment on addition and subtraction.  This assessment was able to show what your child knows and what your child doesn't know YET.  Students will continue to be pulled in small groups this week to help them learn the parts of addition and subtraction that they need to become proficient in.  Students that already understand how to add and subtract larger numbers will be focused on how to check their work for accuracy.  This will be an important step for ALL students as we are working to develop mathematicians that have an understanding for math concepts, but also want to be accurate in their answers. 

Science

We have started our year learning about Sound.  Students have been introduced to how whales and dolphins communicate with each other.  They were able to create a pictorial representation to show the change in pitch and duration of sound throughout a Humpback whales song.

Students also started to learn about another type of communication that uses sound....Morse Code.  There was a lot of excitement in the classroom as students were trying to "crack" the code and try to figure out what their classmates were communicating.  

Have a great week!

Jen and Jaime