Food Drive ~ Franklin Food Pantry

December, 2011

Dear Parents,

Fourth graders will be reading The Family Under the Bridge as a whole class read-aloud in December. This novel features many worthy themes, one of which is the plight of homelessness. As part of this unit, fourth graders will be invited to participate in a food / supplies drive to help those in need in our own community. The food / supplies drive will take from November 30^th through December 14th. While any donations of non-perishable food items are welcome, the Franklin Food Pantry has put out a list of items that are especially in need during the holidays. Please see the list of items needed now, on the back of the letter sent home with your child.

Volunteers from the Franklin Food Pantry will come to explain to students the daily work of the food pantry as well as collect the food on December 14^th.

We thank you for the opportunity to teach your child a valuable lesson about giving and generosity.

Many thanks,

The Fourth Grade Team

Thanksgiving

Today our class gave some wonderful Thanksgiving speeches. Some students opted to have a photo taken while others agreed to having their speech video taped. I apologize for some of the taping, we had some technical difficulties, and some speeches were cut short. I hope you enjoy! Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Black and White Day!!!!!

Black and White Day was a huge success! We had a lot to do today, so we got right to work! This morning we took our spelling test and a test about Mr. Popper's Penguins. Then we learned about Mexico's history. Mrs. Merten shared a lot about Mexican Independence Day and how it is similar to the Fourth of July. We learned what we need to know for our Mexico test, too (Remember it's TUESDAY). We also worked on our Thanksgiving writing project. You will see the finished result on Monday or Tuesday. If you haven't sent in a wire clothes hanger with your child, we would appreciate one. Finally it was time for our Black and White fun!

We made "Antarctic Art" pictures using black paper and chalk.

Then we did some penguin math. It was challenging, especially the logic puzzle! Then we went over to Mrs. Williams' classroom and played Win, Lose or Draw! We had so much fun drawing words from Mr. Popper's Penguins!


Here we are playing.

OVER 200 BOOKS!

We did it! Some of you noticed last night that our class book count was at 199..... Well today we passed the 200 book mark. As of today, our class has read 209 books this year. Mrs. Merten is so proud!

Here are some pictures of students in our class giving book talks today! We all got some new book ideas.

Happy Birthday! Below is a picture of our only student with a November Birthday. Happy Birthday, Hayden!

From the Teacher's Desk

It was great to meet so many of you last night at Open House. I know that the children were excited to share our classroom with you. If you didn't have a chance to schedule a parent conference for December, please email me (mertenk@franklin.k12.ma.us) , so that we can schedule something that is convenient for both of us.

Today our Student Council candidates gave inspiring speeches to our class! We heard many good ideas for representing our class. We will vote for Student Council on Wednesday when we return to school. Good luck to all of the candidates!!

Our Week In Review

This week was short, though it was filled with a lot of things! We continued reading Mr. Popper's Penguins, and have scheduled Black and White Day for November 18th. Mrs. Merten will give more details about this when the date gets closer.

Our third math test was today. We all worked hard on this, and Mrs. Merten will send them home next week. We also saw Mrs. Y this week, and worked on an Open Response question. Mrs. Merten is hoping to get the 4 on our door!

Today was really busy. First we learned about the Day of the Dead, a holiday celebrated on November 1st in Mexico. We started to design our own Day of the Dead masks. Then we went next door to Mrs. Williams' room for our Party in a Bag. While we snacked, we watched Scooby Doo and The Great Pumpkin.

Finally, we had our PUFF MOBILE RACE!!! You will find pictures of our teams, and winners below!! You can also see some videos of the races. Mrs. Merten had some trouble with the camera so the videos are in Black and White.

Our Week in Review

It was a busy week in Room 24!

In Math, we continued learning about multiplication. We discussed the steps to solving problems, and today we even learned some algebra. Miss Johnson was impressed with our work in math! Next week, on Wednesday, we will be having a test on Unit 3 in Math. You can find some activities to help your child study for the Unit 3 assessment here.


We have been working on revising and editing our writing during Writer's Workshop. This week we discussed "thought shots" and breaking our writing into paragraphs. We also discussed all of the different ways to say "said". Our writing buddies have really helped us with the revising and editing process. We plan to have our first work published by the end of next week!

In reading we have continued to read our interactive read aloud Mr. Popper's Penguins. We are enjoying Mr. Popper and his little group of penguins, and we are excited to see how this story progresses. At the end of this book, we will celebrate with a "Black and White Day". One of the fun parts of this day is when the children bring a "black and white" snack. This is tentatively scheduled for 11/10. The children are also encouraged to give a book talk if they read a book which they LOVE. Below is a student giving a book talk yesterday about a Matt Christopher book. Great Job!

We have also been working on finishing up our Puff Mobiles and choosing a "puffer". Our race will be on Monday- and we are excited to race against the other fourth grade classes. Here we are building our puff mobiles and practicing puffing!

This week, we have been talking about nouns. The Schoolhouse Rock videos are great ways to learn different parts of the curriculum. This one was shown in class, and is a great way for some children to remember nouns. (And some of you parents might remember this from Saturday mornings during your childhood.)

From the Teacher's Desk




Things are progressing very nicely here, and I'm very proud of all of the hard work the children are doing. I want to remind you about the nightly reading assignment. It is the goal for the children to read 5-7 nights for a minimum of 15 minutes. I ask the children to read the same book at home and at school. There are a few reasons for this. One reason is that the children's comprehension is usually stronger when they are focusing on one book, one plot, one set of characters. Another reason is that, in order to discuss the book in the ways that I would like the children to do this, the book needs to be read within a 2 week period of time. I am very agreeable to allowing the children to put a book in the front of their bookbag that they are reading at home. That way, they are still reading the same book at home and school. If your child is interested in this, he/she should bring the book in from home and discuss it with me during our "housekeeping" time.

I also want to say a HUGE thank you to everyone who has donated items for our store! The children and I really appreciate all of the items. We were able to shop today and buy all sorts of Halloween themed items. Thank you so much.

One last note: We will be celebrating Halloween on Monday with a few theme based activities. Students should remember their Party in a Bag for a snack.