On Monday, we listened to SEVEN candidates share their ideas about Student Council. Check all of the candidates out here! We needed to have a tie breaking vote, and we elected this ladybug to represent our class. Congratulations to ALL of our candidates!
We wrapped up our study of Mexico and prepared for our test using a Kahoot! Ask your child about this fun way to review. The review certainly helped our class, because everyone did very well on the assessment. Your child's test and grade can be viewed in Google Classroom.
During reading and writing this week, we have continued to discuss characters. Students are working to "Get to Know" the characters in their books using the word TEALS to guide their thinking. When talking to your child about a book/character, this may help guide your conversations. Students are beginning to understand that it takes a lot of thinking to get to know the characters in their books. We read Skippyjon Jones and No, David books in order to practice these strategies with our teams. This work transfers to writing as we continue to discuss writing our fiction stories. Students will use this information to evaluate whether or not they have written enough about the main character in their story. This writing work will continue for the next few weeks.
During math this week we began to learn about different strategies to multiply. We welcomed our new Math Specialist, Mrs. Weiss, as a guest teacher on Monday. She taught students to use Cuisinaire Rods to show multiplication using the Area Model. We continued to practice with blocks and then using drawings this week. This is a new concept, and can feel challenging for students. We have talked a lot about persevering and working hard, and the students are really trying! We will work on this for another week, and will take an assessment just before Thanksgiving.
We learned about volcanoes and the Ring of Fire this week in Science. We will continue to learn about this in the coming weeks. Students will be working with different fourth grade teachers to understand different aspects of this unit.
On Friday during Creative Arts Friday, we traveled to Mexico! Google Expeditions has been a wonderful way for the students to connect their classroom learning to the real world. Students were able to see top of a volcano, to view a beach in the Yucatan Peninsula, and to stand in the town square in Mexico City. Check out our twitter feed for a video of the students seeing Mexico City for the first time. This was many students' "High of the Week" at our end of the week meeting.
From the Teacher's Desk:
As you know, independence and responsibility are a main focus of fourth grade. One way that students are practicing this is by completing homework, including preparing for tests and nightly reading. Some students are struggling with organization at school and at home, sometimes completing the homework at home but leaving it there, leaving materials at school, or forgetting to obtain parent signatures on reading logs or in assignment notebooks. At the end of each day (sometimes just before lunch) we have a 15 minute dedicated time to write in our assignment notebooks, get our mail and pack up our materials. Please check in with your child to see how he/she feels homework is going. Though our fourth grade focus is on "independence and responsibility", students master this at different rates. If you have been returning to school regularly after hours to collect materials for homework, please let me know. If your child is having difficulties, perhaps an assignment notebook check at home daily would help. Student created checklists (with parent guidance) or an added teacher check could also be something to help with this as well.
Below are some tips to help with homework. Sometimes making one adjustment to homework time can make a big difference. As always, please contact Mrs. Merten with any questions or concerns specific to your child.
GENERAL HOMEWORK TIPS FOR PARENTS
(Reposted from the Department of Education. You can see the full article here.)
✪ Make sure your child has a quiet, well-lit place to do homework.
Avoid having your child do homework with the television on or in places with other distractions, such as people coming and going.
✪ Make sure the materials your child needs, such as paper, pencils and a dictionary, are available. Ask your child if special materials will be needed for some projects and get them in advance.
✪ Help your child with time management. Establish a set time each day for doing homework. Don‘t let your child leave homework until just
before bedtime. Think about using a weekend morning or afternoon for working on big projects, especially if the project involves getting together with classmates.
✪ Be positive about homework. Tell your child how important school is. The attitude you express about homework will be the attitude your child acquires.
✪ When your child does homework, you do homework. Show your child that the skills they are learning are related to things you do as an adult. If your child
is reading, you read too. If your child is doing math, balance your checkbook.
✪ When your child asks for help, provide guidance, not answers. Giving answers means your child will not learn the material. Too much help teaches your child that when the going gets rough, someone will do the work for him or her.
✪ When the teacher asks that you play a role in homework, do it. Cooperate with the teacher. It shows your child that the school and home are a team. Follow the directions given by the teacher.
✪ If homework is meant to be done by your child alone, stay away.
Too much parent involvement can prevent homework from having some positive effects. Homework is a great way for kids to develop independent, lifelong learning skills.
✪ Stay informed. Talk with your child‘s teacher. Make sure you know the purpose of homework and what your child‘s class rules are.
✪ Help your child figure out what is hard homework and what is easy homework. Have your child do the hard work first. This will mean he will be most alert when facing the biggest challenges. Easy material will seem to go fast when fatigue begins to set in.
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