Weekly Newsletter, February 19 to 22

Snack Policy:

We wanted to take the time to clarify our snack policy. We invite students to bring a snack to school as we do have a later lunch this year. We prefer that the snacks be healthy, easy to eat, and require little to no clean-up such as fruit, pretzels, yogurt, etc. Please remember the school-wide policy that all classrooms are nut-free.

 

Writing:

Our focus for Quarter 3 will be writing a persuasive essay. By the end of the unit, writers should be able to provide support for a claim in ways that chunk the supportive evidence into logically grouped categories. Writers will use transitional words, use phrases that convey the relationship between the chunks of text and the main claim, and draw on detailed specifics to support their claims.

Students will explore issues in the community in which we live. This "If I Were Mayor" essay will allow students to share an improvement to the community with Mayor Prats. (see Social Studies section below).

A link to a website for information on the 6 Traits of writing is below:
http://writingfix.com/classroom_tools/post_its.htm

Natural Reader:
This tool can be downloaded on your home computers to assist students with reading text that may be challenging. We use this in class for webpage research and for revising our writing. Students can listen to what they have typed and determine if it sounds right to revise. In addition, when gathering research, this tool allows them to read difficult text. We have this program at school, but it is a great tool for home use as well:
www.naturalreader.com

Social Studies: Working to Create Change in Our Communities:

The "If I Were Mayor" essay contest is a state-wide contest open to all fourth graders in Maryland. Students will write an essay as part of their social studies grade and will have the option of entering the statewide competition. Last year was the first year that LES participated. Although no student from our school went on to win the state-wide contest, Mayor Prats chose 3 winners from our school contest.
First Place: Fadilah Farrin
Second Place: Erin McClure
Third Place: Lauren Smith

Their essays were about building more parks/recreation, protecting the environment, and ending discrimination.

Some helpful websites we will use in class are:

www.laytonsville.md.us/

www.gaithersburgmd.gov

http://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/index.aspx

http://www.dosomething.org/

http://www.toms.com/our-movement/

http://www.kidsforsavingearth.org/

Science: Reef Balls

During quarter 3 students will engage in a hands-on environmental project that will promote habitat restoration in the Chesapeake Bay. This project is an extension of our first quarter science unit on Ecosystems.

Together with WSSC, students in each class will make reef balls out of cement. These reef balls will be deposited at the Memorial Stadium Reef where oysters will attach to them to increase their habitat and population. Click on the video below to see how we will be doing this in class. We are in need of parent volunteers on Thursday mornings for this project. Please contact your child's teacher if you are able to join us.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2mUnvk79Mw

 

Science: Chemistry

In this chemistry unit, students will participate in a variety of hands-on investigations with matter.  THey will observe liquids, solids, and gases and experiment with the effects of temperature on the states of matter.  These investigations will lead students to an understanding of how matter changes states.

 

Enduring Understandings:

• Matter is anything that has mass and takes up space
• Matter can change state without losing any mass
• Each season has different weather conditions
• The Sun causes water to change forms on Earth, but does not change the amount of water on Earth
• The states of matter are solid, liquid, and gas

This week: Students will complete a pre-assessment to answer questions about matter, its properties, adn the various states in which matter can exist.  They will reflect to identify examples of matter in their own lives and discuss what constitutes matter.

Math 5: Unit 4: Data & Statistics
This week our focus will be to compute the mean, median, mode and range of sets of data.  

Helpful Vocabulary:

• Median: the midpoint of a set of data.  If all the pieces of data are lined up in order, the median is the value divides the data in half
• Mode: the value in a data set that occurs most often
• Mean:  sum of the data values divided by the number of data items

Indicators for Unit 4:

• collect and organize data
• select and defend the particular graphic displays
• analyze and interpret stem and leaf plots
• explain how mean, median, and mode are different
• use measures of central tendency to describe a set of data
• compute and compare simple examples of range, median, and mode of simple data sets.

Math 4:  

Fourth grade math will shift focus from how fractions and decimals are related to how perimeter and area are related.  We will recognize perimeter as an attribute of plane figures and distinguish between linear and area measures.  We will solve real world and mathematical problems involving perimeters and areas of polygons.

Our instructional focus for the remainder of quarter three will focus on perimeter, area, elapsed time, multiplication and division.

*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 log in 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:

Our focus in reading will shift to test preparation. A major aim of this unit is to support students in using strategies for each genre that have been taught throughout the year. This unit is about supporting students in thinking logically and flexibly to transfer all they know to their test-taking. 
 

Our reading workshop will teach students how to read, talk about and answer questions about short, test-like texts as well as strategies for answering selected-response questions. Students will also use chapter books to deepen their discussions and practice of reading strategies.

Our focus will shift to poetry.  If a text is a poem, readers should expect to pay attention to what the big meaning of the poem could be, what the poem is mostly about, or what it demonstrates or teaches.  This may be done through imagery, the meaning of a part or line, figurative language (personification, similie, metaphor), or through author's purpose.

 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. Students work in spelling groups to analyze the pattern and look for clues as to how to generalize the correct spelling of words within that pattern/sound. Our next spelling assessment will be February 22.