Dear 4A Families,
I hope you all had a wonderful weekend. What an excellent first week of school with my wonderful new 4th grade students. It is clear to see that this will be an amazing year—with such a bright, kind, creative and fun group of children. Remember, if you have questions, suggestions, concerns, please contact me! We are partners in your child’s learning.
I plan to complete our class group email list this week. I will be sending hard copies of the newsletter both this week and the 16th. On Sunday the 15th I will also send a test email to the group. If you do not receive this email–or need to add additional emails, please let me know right away. Beginning the week of September 23rd the newsletters will only be accessed online.
Spelling: Each week, we will introduce a new set of spelling words. Students will generally receive the new list of words on Fridays. The first spelling words are number words. This list will support our upcoming math lessons and objectives. On Fridays, all students will take a written spelling test. The first test is this Friday the 13th.
Reading: Last week Ms. Finney started administering a beginning of the year oral reading assessment to the students, and she will finish up this week. This week, we will begin our regular reading routine starting with a wonderful tall tale in our anthology called “Stormalong”. We will focus on understanding characters and the figurative language concepts of hyperbole, simile and metaphor. Just a reminder, students are expected to always have a chapter book they are reading at home and in class. This can be two different books! Students will have library time on Monday to check out books. In addition, our classroom library is open for borrowing.
Language Arts: MAP testing will begin on Tuesday this week with the Language section. The students will also be completing a beginning of the year writing sample and begin reviewing cursive forms, editing and grammar skills. On Tuesday we will begin the Language Arts portion of the MAPs Test.
Math: Last week, students took a baseline math assessment. This information will assist us in planning our math lessons based on the needs of the students. They will also be taking a placement assessment in Happy Numbers. We will be doing addition and subtraction fact review along with the MyMath Curriculum. This week, students will dive into their math workbook, starting with Chapter One: Place Value. Get ready to read, write, and say numbers into the millions and beyond. Expect to see daily math homework that mirrors our class lessons.
Science: The science lesson this week will focus on learning about the four steps of the scientific inquiry. The students will receive a small box with a variety of items inside to observe, problem solve, and make a hypothesis. This lesson will segue into our first lesson about the earth’s features specifically regarding volcanoes! In the following week, students will be recording their scientific inquiry as I model a volcano eruption.
Social Studies: We will begin our year with a review of the continents and oceans. All students will be expected to memorize a “Continent Poem” and be able to name and label the seven continents and five oceans. The students will be given study sheets for the poem and map test during their first SS class this week. The test will take place on Friday, September 26th. Continent poems need to be recited no later than September 27th. Along with the continents and oceans, the students will be learning about latitude and longitude and how to locate places on maps with coordinates.
Religion: Our religion lessons this week will focus on our Steps to Respect lessons and social skills. We began our lessons last week with the concept of empathy and we will move into a lesson on listening with attention. When our class norms clearly support SAFE, RESPECTFUL & RESPONSIBLE behavior, unkind/bullying behaviors are less likely to happen. These lessons will help reinforce norms by connecting words and actions to class rules and expectations for social and learning behavior. We will also begin chapter one in our religion book, God’s Providence: God loves and cares for all creation. God has a loving plan for all of us and it is revealed in many ways.
Thank you all for your patience, support and encouragement.
Have a great week!