Our Week In Review

We accomplished a lot of things this week in Room 24!

In math we have started to talk about strategies for solving multiplication facts.  Some of the  strategie we have discussed are:

• Memorizing ~ the best way to memorize facts is daily practice.  Many children find that the best way to do this is to practice for 5 minutes nightly.  Students received an optional practice chart.  If this is filled in completely and signed, students will earn extra credit.
• Repeated Addition  ~ 2 x 3= 2+2+2  ~ 
• Adding on Addition ~ 7 x 6 ~ if you know 7 x 5 is 35, then add 7 more to get 42
• Break apart the factors ~ 
• Traditional
• Tricks to solving 9 facts  ~ Ask your child to share these!
• We created some rhymes for  a few facts for extra credit.  These may help you remember!
• 9 and 7 like to be free, 9 x 7 is 63 ~ Jake
• 9 and 9 are having fun, 9 x 9 is 81 ~ Lily, Tanmay, Dhashadyu 
• 9 and 9 have a ton of fun, 9 x 9 is 81~ Sameen
• 4 and 7 are great, 4 x 7 is 28 ~ Brendan
• 7 x 8 likes to pick up sticks, 7 x 8 is 56 ~ Derek
• 7 and 8 did some tricks, 7 x 8 is 56 ~ Nate
• I've got 6 and I've got 4, Multiply them together and get 24 ~ Sarah
• 6 and 4 will mean no more, 6 x 4 is 24 ~ Katherine
• 4 and 7 are running late, 4 x 7 is 28 ~ Will
• 9 and 7 broke their knee, 9 x 7 is 63 ~Shreya
• 9 and 9 are almost done, 9 x 9 is 81 ~ Charlene
• 6 and 4 went out the door, 6 x 4 is 24  ~ Ilana

We have also started learning some new math games to go with our multiplication study.  

In reading we have finished reviewing basic strategies for reading.  Students will be "asking questions" on their reading logs this week.  Many of the children have signed up to do book talks.  We love hearing about the books that others enjoyed.  It gives us an idea about books we might like.

Stay tuned for our first Interactive Read Aloud.  We plan on beginning on Tuesday!  

In writing, we have finished our goals and our bio poems.  We also created "heart maps".  We will refer back to our heart maps throughout the year to help guide our writing.  

This week we also reviewed some other strategies for generating ideas for writing.  We have completed some "quick writes" about important people in our lives.  Next week we will "try on" some story ideas about important places and about turning points.  We will begin drafting toward the end of the week.  During poetry workshop with Mrs. Williams, we have continued to learn about Walt Whitman.  We will begin writing list poems next week. Today we got to write one about Mrs. Merten.  

We have been learning about the globe and about the hemispheres in social studies.  We will be moving on to latitude and longitude next week.  We will also begin our first science unit.  We will learn about the water cycle, complete some experiments and create our terrariums.  

We have almost finished our Puff Mobiles, and they all move!  We have been busy testing them and choosing our "puffers".  For some of us, the hardest part of this was compromising!  Mrs. Merten is proud that we have all worked at this.  We will be racing against the other fourth graders next week.  

From the Teacher's Desk:

I'm looking forward to seeing many of you at Open House next Thursday night.  I will be in my classroom at 6:30.   Please see your child's backpack for a notice about letting me know if you are not receiving our emails. I will be sending an email out next week regarding parent/teacher conferences.  This year, sign up will be done electronically.  

What a Week!

It has been a very, very busy week in Room 24.  We have really established a nice community of learners, and the children are excited about all we are doing.

In math, we wrapped up our unit on Place Value and Addition/Subtraction.  We had a great week reviewing these concepts and playing some fun games.  Our favorite is the "CHAMPS" vs. the "Teacher".  We are still the Champs!  On Thursday we spent our math time reviewing our math concepts in centers.

 We were able to practice the things that would be on the test, and ask questions if we were confused.  Then on Friday...we had our first Math Test! Though Mrs. Merten hasn't corrected them yet, she was really proud of how hard we all worked.

In Reading we have been talking about strategies "good readers" use to get better. Everyone has chosen a strategy and is working at practicing that strategy. We will continue learning about some reading strategies next week, and then will begin our first Interactive Read Aloud.  Stay Tuned, I think you will all be excited about our choice!

We had a lot of fun activities this week as well.

On Tuesday we celebrated Constitution Day with the rest of fourth grade.  We watched a couple of quick videos, and then talked about the signing of the Constitution.  One of the videos we watched is the Preamble video by Schoolhouse Rock.



We learned about the Bill of Rights, too!

On Wednesday, we were so lucky to have Storyteller Len Cabral come to JFK. He told some wonderful folk tales and reminded us of the importance of reading.  He also gave us some tips on coming up with ideas for writing.  We just loved hearing his stories!

Today was such an exciting day.  We had Creative Arts Friday today. So far in technology, we have learned to create, name and save a document, choose a printer and print, and set bookmarks and a home page on the Internet.  Mrs. Merten is really impressed with our listening during this time of the day.  During Poetry with Mrs. Williams, we have wrapped up our Biopoems and we started learning about the poet Walt Whitman.  Later in the day, we had a chance to work on our Puff Mobiles with our groups.  We also had our first chance to spend our chips at the class store!  We were so excited to use our chips to buy some fun items.

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Constitution Day

Tomorrow is Constitution Day! Try to wear your red, white and blue!

Our Week In Review

What a busy week we have had in Room 24!  Even with the summery weather, we have accomplished quite a bit.

In Math, we have been working diligently to read and write large numbers and to review the place value system.  We have also learned the skills of rounding and of comparing two numbers.  Today we had a math quiz on these topics.  Next week we will review addition and subtraction and the children will learn a few different ways to solve these types of problems. When we finish with addition and subtraction, we will have a unit test on all of the concepts learned so far.  Your child will receive a study guide to use to help prepare for the test.

If your child is having some difficulty with place value or rounding, I am including a few videos from "Kahn Academy" with some information about place value and rounding.  This may be a good way to review these concepts.

    Place Value 1: Place Value 1

    Rounding Whole Numbers 1: Rounding Whole Numbers 1

In Reading we have been talking about the different genres of books.  We discussed the different clues to help children know what genre their book is.  This week, the children will be tracking GENRE on their reading logs for homework.  We have also been working on Narrative Elements in Reading. We spent some time talking about plot by reading two different books by Chris Van Allsburg.  We will continue this topic next week, along with learning about strategies that good readers use.  All book bags have been filled, and the children now have the responsibility to keep their bag filled.

Today we began our first engineering activity.  Students will be creating "Puff Mobiles" in cooperative groups.  Mr. Adams (Mrs. Adams' husband and an engineer) came to JFK this morning and talked to the whole fourth grade about the engineering process.  Mr. Adams showed us this video:

We learned about teamwork and we started to sketch some designs. We are so excited to start this project!

We also had a chance to share our "puzzle pieces" in front of the class.  This was an option for those who were interested.  We had already shared these pieces with our class in small groups, but we enjoyed hearing about each other in the big group!