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Saturday, December 19, 2015

December Days

MATH


Fourth graders have been so busy during this second term I hardly know where to begin! We have been cruising ahead in MATH, with several children mastering their multiplication facts and more close!  Whoot!  Go Fourth Grade!  Your students have also had the chance to use their imaginations and math skills (2-3 digit multiplication, area, perimeter) to Design a Dream Bedroom over the last couple weeks!  






Almost forgot this one!  I told you there was a lot!!  This month students used an assessment and math problem rubric to set a goal for themselves, for learning!!  We were thrilled at the honesty and practicality the students applied to this process.

WEB Connection 

A while back I sent home login information for two websites as well as a page of hands on activities for practicing spelling.  Moby Max is a site we have full access to through the district and can be adjusted to focus on a variety, or a few, skill areas.  Spelling City is all about spelling, But our 30 day trial has expired!   I would really love to GET YOUR FEEDBACK about the websites so I can decide whether to try to purchase full access to Spelling City OR just stick with Moby Max.  Please click QUICK SURVEY  (just 6 multiple choice and comment if you choose)




ELA


Our children have been really invested in learning more about animals in their Animal Research projects.  They began by learning about animal groups in science, then focused on looking at non fiction books to see how authors convey information in interesting ways.  Now Reading, Writing, Science and your children's individual curiosities are working together!  Remember you can join us (if you can) Tuesday at 2pm to celebrate their first non fiction writing!


SCIENCE

For the past couple weeks we have forged ahead into the area of human body systems!  Students were given a moving pre-assessment, and shared questions that they wondered about.  The following are some photos taken while exploring this subject.
Mrs. Paul is demonstrating "digestion" using a piece of bread in a bag (stomache) with orange juice (stomach acid)
Daniel is demonstrating how the diaphragm helps our lungs fill with air.

Again, Mrs.Paul and I (Mrs. Boyden) want to share how greatful we are to be teaching such a fabulous, curious, hardworking bunch of learners this year in Fourth Grade!!  We wish you a peaceful winter break (beginning Wed. afternoon- Dec. 23) and look forward to beginning the New Year with our students on Jan. 4th

Saturday, November 14, 2015

October is Done, November has begun!

11/13 Our class celebrated!!!  Our Realistic Fiction stories
 are finished!  Took some time to share stories with classmates!
We won a pizza Party for all the boxtops we
collected!  and Pajama Day!!
Students worked in Jigsaw groups to learn about different
plant adaptations and
share what they learned with the class.
First we want to thank you all!  Many of you parent & caregivers donated craft items to our plant model project and let us borrow shovels for daffodil planting! We received many Boxtops for education and our class earned a Pizza Party!!  Also, many of you took advantage of the scholastic book order sent home, your purchases went toward earning our class 5000 points for classroom books!!! Most of all, we want to thank you for making efforts to attend our open house and parent conferences, both of us (Mrs. Paul and Mrs. Boyden)
 
October was a busy month for our class!  We continued our work toward solidifying fact fluency and understandings in Multiplication in Math.  During our Reading and Writing blocks, we embarked on reading discussion groups and continued our Realistic Writing Fiction unit.  In science we explored the world of plants and studied the plant structures that are necessary for growth and survival.  As a culminating project, children created original plant models designed to survive in a specific region.
We paired nonfiction and fiction to combine forces with science and ELA

Children are studying plant parts and seeds.

We crossed curriculums in our exploration of Daffodils.  We read the Daffodil Principle and listened to the story online.  We investigated daffodil bulbs in class, by taking a close look at them inside and out, and diagraming the parts.  Then  we read about how to plant them. Our bulbs are planted along the fence on the playground, can't wait to see the results this spring!

We learned how to make a diagram and improved
the diagram from our reading.


Pairs read for important fact finding about bulbs.

After creating original plants we walked through
our plant "museum".
Students were looking to find out what kinds of different adaptations classmates used in their design.




The Goal/Objective for writing was to begin to plan and write realistic fiction stories.  Children made connections between realistic fiction that we have read in class, in particular, noting that stories all have some type of problem that needs resolution.  STORIES ARE NOW DONE!!  (**Please note:  DONE does not mean "perfect".  Done for this purpose, means that students planned, wrote, and revised over the course of a couple weeks.  For their "final" draft, students needed to reread their stories and look for 5 things to change, improve or fix in some way, from adding more detail, changing vocabulary, spelling and or punctuation.  Editing and revision can be stressful for any writer, this was how I chose to manage that piece for this assignment)




Saturday, October 3, 2015

Our Brains can Stretch! Everyone can Learn New Things!

Fantastic Elastic Brain Video We read the book

The Dot Story-Video
In September we looked at all three of the above information sources, and instead of me telling the children what I wanted them to learn, the children came upon it themselves!  
I told the children, "We are going to go quickly from one video, to a book, and to an image on the screen and we are not going to stop in between to talk, so save your ideas!  At the end we are going to talk.  We will talk about what these three things have in common- like they do on the radio sometimes with 3 songs and you have to figure out the connection- and why they are important for us here at school."