Our focus for Quarter 4 in Writing will shift from informative essays to personal expression. Students will begin Earth Month (April) with an informative piece before moving on to write Autobiographies and Biographies.
This week our focus will be to write informative text to examine a topic and convey ideas and information clearly. Every year Fitzgerald Auto Mall sponsors an Earth Day Essay Contest for children 12 and under. Children are requested to read a book with the theme of improving our Earth through reducing, reusing, and recycling. In class, students will read various books but students are also encouraged to read books at home or at the library as well.
The one page essay should include 2 parts:
1. What you learned from the book (summarize the text)
2. How you can apply this knowledge to your everyday life at home and school (application)
This informative essay will help students introduce a topic, group related content into paragraphs, and link ideas with transition words. The essay is a part of our grade 4 writing curriculum, however submitting the essay to enter the contest is voluntary. Winner will receive prizes. The grand prize is an iPod Touch. Additional prizes are gift certificates to book stores. Our very own Kristina won Third Place in this same contest last year. The sponsors visited our school to present Kristina with the award and her prize. She also read her essay on our WLES morning show.
The contest is open to all students at LES. As an added bonus, the school with the most entries will receive a donations to their school library. Each grade is working on the essay in a different way. All essays are due to Ms. Hudson by April 12 so that she can deliver all together.
A link to a website for information on the 6 Traits of writing is below:
http://writingfix.com/classroom_tools/post_its.htm
Several students in fourth grade volunteer to meet with students in our School Community Based classes during their lunch and recess. Mrs. Miller's class then writes a newspaper to share information about students they interview. This week, Jasmine was interviewed. To read the newspaper, click on the link below:
http://news2you.n2y.com/getpaper.aspx?paperid=682559f1-17ee-475f-918a-c214732969cf&teacherid=57487http://writingfix.com/classroom_tools/post_its.htm
Several students in fourth grade volunteer to meet with students in our School Community Based classes during their lunch and recess. Mrs. Miller's class then writes a newspaper to share information about students they interview. This week, Jasmine was interviewed. To read the newspaper, click on the link below:
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
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 watch a video segment on matter and revisit their definition of matter. They will then observe a "mystery substance" to determine characteristics of the substance and its properties. This will help us explore how matter changes state (liquid/solid/gas).
Science: Aquarium Field Trip
During quarter 3 students engaged in a hands-on environmental project to 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. In science class, we read materials and gathered research to increase our understanding of how our reef balls will support the health of the Bay.
We are excited to announce that the fourth grade is planning a field trip to the Baltimore Aquarium on Thursday, May 2. During the trip, students will have the opportunity to meet with Aquarium staff in a Chesapeake Exploration Workshop. This is a 45 minute program where students will test water samples, measure oysters, and draw conclusions about the state of the Bay. Students will also have the chance to tour the entire aquarium with their chaperoned group.
A permission slip with more information will be coming home to you soon. The cost of this experience will be $37 per student and $22 per chaperone. Each class can take up to 6 chaperones. We would like to offset this cost per student so that all students are able to attend. Ms. Hudson applied for an Environmental Stewardship grant which would lower the cost of the field trip to $26 per student. We will be notified of our grant approval in the upcoming days. Since we cannot determine the exact cost of the trip at this time, we wanted to make parents aware of the possible costs before a permission slip can be sent home. School funds are available if you need financial assistance for this trip. Please contact our counselor, Mrs. Ward, directly at Cherie_S_Ward@mcpsmd.org for details.
Math 5: Unit 5 Linear Units & Geometry
In Unit 5, students develop measurement skills and explore transformational geometry. Students apply what they have learned about measurement to multi-step problems involving area, perimeter, and volume.
For more information, access the parent newsletter by clicking the link below:
http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/uploadedFiles/curriculum/math/elementary/grade5/MathNewsletterGrade5Unit5-English.pdf
We are excited to announce that the fourth grade is planning a field trip to the Baltimore Aquarium on Thursday, May 2. During the trip, students will have the opportunity to meet with Aquarium staff in a Chesapeake Exploration Workshop. This is a 45 minute program where students will test water samples, measure oysters, and draw conclusions about the state of the Bay. Students will also have the chance to tour the entire aquarium with their chaperoned group.
A permission slip with more information will be coming home to you soon. The cost of this experience will be $37 per student and $22 per chaperone. Each class can take up to 6 chaperones. We would like to offset this cost per student so that all students are able to attend. Ms. Hudson applied for an Environmental Stewardship grant which would lower the cost of the field trip to $26 per student. We will be notified of our grant approval in the upcoming days. Since we cannot determine the exact cost of the trip at this time, we wanted to make parents aware of the possible costs before a permission slip can be sent home. School funds are available if you need financial assistance for this trip. Please contact our counselor, Mrs. Ward, directly at Cherie_S_Ward@mcpsmd.org for details.
Math 5: Unit 5 Linear Units & Geometry
In Unit 5, students develop measurement skills and explore transformational geometry. Students apply what they have learned about measurement to multi-step problems involving area, perimeter, and volume.
For more information, access the parent newsletter by clicking the link below:
http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/uploadedFiles/curriculum/math/elementary/grade5/MathNewsletterGrade5Unit5-English.pdf
Math 2.0:
Our focus of this transitional unit will be to examine unit fractions.
This week we will use Cuisenaire Rods and Expanded sets of Pattern Blocks to represent equal areas of a whole symbolically as unit fractions. Students will also build and represent iterations of unit fractions. They will partition a whole into equal parts and build fractions from unit fractions.
The goal this week is for students to understand that a figure can be partitioned into equal shares. We will discuss the concepts of 1/4, 1/3, and 1/6. We will identify that 1/4 always represents a figure partitioned into four equal shares where one parts is shaded but that 1/4 may not always look the same. The amount determined to be 1/4 will depend upon the size of the WHOLE figure.
By the end of the next two weeks, students will be able to identify how the size of the share is determined by the size of the whole.
Students will discover new vocabulary:
*iteration: a copy of the fraction
*partition: making a whole into equal shares that cover the same area
*equal shares: the partitions of an area that make equivalent fractions
*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:
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:
For the month of April, we will focus on various reading strategies in our Guided Reading Groups. We will begin the week by determining the main idea of portions of a text. We will summarize key ideas and supporting details. We will determine which details in a passage contribute directly to understanding the main idea of the text chapter or of the entire passage.
Text Features such as headings and subheadings are great tools to help determine the main idea in a portion of a text. By reading the headings/subheadings again, students will be able to see the most important part of what they have read.
For this focus, students should be half-way through their guided reading novel at this point. Your teacher will help you determine the best places to identify main idea in the first half of your novel so that you can use that to determine /confirm the main idea in the remaining portion of your novel. Your guided reading group may also read non-fiction text to determine main idea at this point as well.
Text Features such as headings and subheadings are great tools to help determine the main idea in a portion of a text. By reading the headings/subheadings again, students will be able to see the most important part of what they have read.
For this focus, students should be half-way through their guided reading novel at this point. Your teacher will help you determine the best places to identify main idea in the first half of your novel so that you can use that to determine /confirm the main idea in the remaining portion of your novel. Your guided reading group may also read non-fiction text to determine main idea at this point as well.
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.
Due to a short week this week, our next spelling assessment will take place on April 19.
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