September 7: Back to School Picnic, 5:30-8:30
September 13: Back To School Night, 7-9
September 14: Individual School Pictures
Welcome to 4th grade! Each week we will send our newsletter to you through our Grade 4 Blog. Please be sure your child's homeroom teacher has your email address. That way you will receive an email each time we update this blog!
PBIS:
Our school is participating in a Positive Behavior Intervention System. By now you're kids should be coming home telling you about their classromm and individual Bulldog Bucks. Students can earn Bulldog Bucks for demonstrating Safe, Respectful, and/or Responsible behavior. They can eran them from any staff member. There are individual and class Bulldog Bucks. Students will be able to use their Bulldog Bucks for rewards both in the classroom and at the school store. More information will be coming soon.
More information about PBIS can be found on the link below:
http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/studentservices/pbis/index.shtm
Helpful information for 4th grade:
9:05-10:25: Writing
10:30-11:15: Specials (T,W, & F) Science (M & Th)
11:20-12:40: Math
12:45-1:45: Recess & Lunch
1:50-3:15: Reading Block
*We invite students to bring a nut-free snack to class each day, as our lunch period is late in the day.
*We invite all students to bring a water bottle to class also.
*Students are also encourage to bring a removable (flash drive) with them to school as well. We do a lot of our work on the computer & many students like to save on their drive to share at home and school. It is not required!
Writing:
This week we will focus on writing personal narratives. We will start by writing for 5 minutes on an important moment or memory in our lives. We will think of 3 moments and then examine each one to determine if any of these moments could be seeds for further development into a writing piece. We will take one seed and spend a significant amount of time writing about the details of that moment. That will help us notice a theme in our writing.
In addition, we will spend time thinking about goals. How do successful people set goals? What do they do to achieve their goals? We will watch a video clip from the 2012 Summer Olympics to gather examples of people who have accomplished goals they set. We will then write our own goals and steps to achieve. Look for our goals as you join us for Back to School Night on Thursday. They will be under your child's picture on the 4th grade bulliten board!
A link to a website for information on the 6 Traits of writing is below:
http://www.edina.k12.mn.us/concord/teacherlinks/sixtraits/sixtraits.htm
Life Science:
Students construct, observe, discuss, and read about land and water ecosystems. Throughout the unit students will explore the concepts of living things and their basic needs, how organisms are classified, the features that make organisms well-suited to their environment, the flow of energy and matter, and how organisms interact with each other and the environment.
This year we are asking you to send in 16-20 oz soda/water bottles instead of 2L. Please rinse them out and send the cap too! We will use these to create mini-terrariums.
This week we will be setting up our aquariums and terrariums. Our animals and plants will arrive and we will prepare their habitats. Some of the animals we will study include crickets, isopods, guppies, snails. We will learn how plants and animals are interdependent.
Math 5:
• Identify and apply prime and composite numbers less than 100 and rules of divisibility.
• Determine and apply the greatest common factor and least common multiple of numbers.
• Recognize and represent functional relationships using graphs, tables, and rules.
• Compare and order integers on a number line.
This week: We will focus on finding least common multiple and continue with prime factorizations. We will use exponents to evaluate prime factorization.
Looking Ahead to next week:
*Compare & Order integers, positive and negative
*Function Tables: determine the valuable for the variables
*Graphing Functions
Math 4:
*Recognize and apply place value patterns in numbers through millions.
• Organize, display, and analyze data using line plots and line graphs.
• Determine and distinguish among mean, median, mode, and range, using concrete materials.
• Classify angles as acute, obtuse, or right.
• Identify and describe the sides, angles, edges, vertices, and faces of solid figures.
• Draw circles, triangles, and quadrilaterals given their dimensions. *Identify and describe points, lines, line segments, and rays.
This week: We will shift our focus from lines/segments/rays to angles:
Acute Angles: measure less than 90 degrees
Right Angles: measure 90 degrees and make a square corners
Obtuse Angles: measure over 90 degrees
Straight Angles: a line that measures 180 degrees (5th grade skill: straight angles form the diameter of a circle)
*Students will have a math quiz each Friday on skills covered in the unit to that point.
A great website that allows students to work at their own pace on word problems/real world application of multiplication & division:
http://www.thinkingblocks.com/
We continue to use the Khan academy website to help practice our math at home. This is a great site where students (if a login is created) can track their progress and have example problems to work on. It has been featured in CNN as an up and coming way for teachers to assess individual students learning.
http://www.khanacademy.org/
Reading:
Students will be using various roles to create literature cirlce discussions about text they choose to read. Teachers will model each job in class and give students the chance to practice each role. Once all roles have been modeled, students will participate in a trial literature circle before participating in their own literature circles. This will take us about two weeks to model & practice before students will use the feedback given to have their own literature circle discussions.
Vocabulary Finder: Students will read their text and find words that they wish to share with their group. These words can be words they do not know how to say, what it means, words that add to the author's description of an event, or words they find interesting
Questioner: As students read their text, they will develop questions to ask their group members about what was read. Questions should be "thick" instead of "thin." A "thick" question requires thought and should not be answered right in the text. It may be an opinion as well. (Would you have acted the same way Sally did?) A "thin" question can be answered right in the text (Who is the main character? What is the setting?)
Connector: Students will make connections to the text they are reading. A connection allows the reader to understand the story closer.
There are 3 types of connections:
*text to self: allows reader to draw from his/her own experiences
*text to text: allows reader to draw from other characters/events in other stories
*text to world: allows reader to draw from the world around them including historical and current events
Summarizer: A summary is a brief description of a passage. These are the main ideas only and not every detail in a passage. This is often the most challenging for students because in other responses they are asked to go into great detail as they write.
Spelling:
*Our spelling program involves the use of developmental word study rather than traditional spelling books. This “Words Their Way” approach allows students to practice target spelling patterns that best address their individual needs as a speller.
•Spelling
will begin with pre-assessments to determine which spelling patterns students
need to practice.
•Students
will study the same pattern of words for two weeks. They will practice the
words both at home and at school.
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