Our First Week In Review

Our first week of fourth grade was TERRIFIC!  We spent most of our week establishing our classroom community.  We want our learning space to be a place where we can all succeed  and feel safe!  We explored our new classroom, and we also learned some new things about each other, even about those friends we have known for a long time! 

We worked on a few collaborative challenges to get practice working together with our new classmates.  Students loved these activities, especially 'Save Fred'. This was the "high" of the week for many students. Your child can share more about this.

On Thursday, we got together with ALL of the fourth graders, and we met the other fourth grade teachers.  We learned about Creative Arts Fridays, and talked about our weekly morning meeting with fourth grade. Our first fourth grade meeting will be Tuesday morning.  Your child can tell you more about both of these. 

In the next week, we will create a list of classroom rules together, and then sign that we agree to follow them.  We also will continue to establish our routines in the classroom, while beginning to focus on academics.  We will start learning about Place Value (our first math unit) on Wednesday, and will practice our Math Workshop while learning about this topic. We will work on our Reader's Workshop routines as well, while also exploring our classroom library.  During Writer's Workshop, we will focus on writing about our Hopes, Dreams and Goals. Science and Social Studies will begin later in the month.

From the Teacher's Desk

Our class blog is written for students and families. At times, I may have a specific message for the parents/guardians.  Those messages are in this section "From the Teacher's Desk".  Look for "adult specific" information here.  Please note that tweets are posted throughout the day/week.  You can find our most recent tweets on the right sidebar, or by following our class @mertenladybugs .  

Our days begin with setting a positive intention for the day, and they end with each student sharing their best part of the day.  We wrap up our week with the students sharing their high and low of the week as well as their 'Bet You Didn't Know'.  Students enjoy this, and when our blog references the "high" of the week, this is when it is shared. 

National Parks Program:

   Once again, this year, the government has announced a program for fourth graders called "Every Kid in a Park".  This initiative is to encourage fourth graders to visit the National Parks FREE OF CHARGE!  All fourth graders in the 2019-2020 school year can receive a pass good for the year.  Information about this program can be found here.