We began a new math topic on addition patterns, rounding numbers, and mental math for addition and subtraction problems involving tens and hundreds. We will also be working on different strategies for subtracting numbers in the hundreds while borrowing (or regrouping).

In our word work, we are learning spelling rules for adding the suffixes -ing and -ed. Our grammar is focusing on the conjunction: because, in sentences and how we use it.

We are taste testing 4 types of apples in science. Last week we learned about the term “selection” and how farmers over the years have been able to create different varieties of apples.

During writing workshop, students began learning about opinion writing. Last week we judged 5 different dragons and rated them based on wings, claws, tails, and eyes. Then students determined the winner and had to turn that information into an opinion piece. Students also debated skiing (winter) and waterparks.  Students are learning about opinion statements (thesis), reasons, and examples to support reasons.

We began a “Would You Rather . . . Wednesday” on Seesaw. Be sure to check out your child’s responses and opinions. 🙂

We kicked off our mystery unit in reading last week by using detective skills to solve the mystery of “Which dog ate the slippers?”. Once the mystery was solved, each student received their detective notebook, pencil, and badge to write notes in during our mystery reading. As we learn strategies mystery readers use, students read in partnerships and share their thinking, while I am modeling with a mystery titled, The Absent Author.

Other information: 

Our next School Store will be held January 25th and 26th.

We have just two weeks left until winter break and so much learning and fun to do!

In math we will finish our topic on finding area. This is a challenging task when it comes to irregular or rectilinear figures! Next, we will fit in a mini unit on reading and making different types of graphs.

During grammar time, we have been learning about possessive nouns, verb tenses, and irregular verbs.

On Friday we shared our All About books with each other. These will be sent home before winter break. This week we will begin a mini unit on writing fiction stories and learn strategies writers use to hook in readers and write with detail while including the story elements.

We have completed our reading unit on informational/expository and narrative nonfiction. We will use these last two weeks before break to review both nonfiction and fiction strategies learned to far, to strengthen our reading. I was so impressed by all the returned Thanksgiving reading challenges! Way to go!!

We have completed our social studies unit on geography and will focus on science. In science we will begin a new unit called: The Power of Flowers. In this unit, students discover how plants reproduce by exploring the process of pollination and fruiting. They
also investigate how plant traits are inherited from parent plants, and how favorable plant traits can be enhanced by humans via artificial selection.

Other:

School Store will be this Tuesday and Wednesday during lunch recess if your child plans to shop.

We are collecting new toys for Crusade for Toys through December 15th. Contributions = a hot chocolate ticket for your child to be used on the 16th.

Classroom stocking treats/gifts may be brought in any day until the 17th.

Our class fun for winter break will be on the 17th. I will send out a Sign Up Genius for those interested in contributing. Thank you!!

 

In math, we have started looking at patterns in multiplication and division. We will soon be working on solving and writing word problems with these operations. Students continue to take multiplication Mad Minutes every Tuesday and Thursday to show mastery of facts.

In word study we are continuing to focus on long vowel patterns. In grammar, we focused on irregular plural nouns. This week we will work on capitalization of proper nouns.

We are now working on a social studies unit on the geography of Michigan.

In writing students are learning strategies to add detail to their All About books, write introductions, and write conclusions. During reading workshop students are continuing to practice using nonfiction reading strategies while reading nonfiction. Last week students worked on asking questions while reading and talking and thinking in response to the text. Soon we will use strategies for narrative nonfiction and biographies.

Math

We took our Topic 3 test last week. It mainly focused on the distributive and associative properties of multiplication. We had fun with a “distributive doctor” activity (see photos) to help us review.  Students took the online version of the test for this first time. Although the concepts are the same, the online version is more challenging. We discussed how challenges are good for our brains! The next day, students who scored below 85% on the online version had the opportunity to redo missed/similar problems on a paper version. These test scores will go home on Monday. Our next topic will focus more on division strategies. We have our multiplication Mad Minutes (25 problems in 2 minutes) every Tuesday and Thursday.

Science

Students worked on solving a mosquito problem in the fiction town of Pondville. The lesson focuses on the concepts of environmental change and engineering. Our final lesson will focus on survival in outer space. After a test review and final test, we will switch to a unit in social studies. Our first unit is on the geography of Michigan.

Writing Workshop

Most students have shared their narrative story on our Seesaw Blog. If you have not listened to your child’s story yet, please give it a visit. Students worked hard on adding detail to their writing, along with dialogue and other words besides “said”. Our next unit of writing will be based on a topic each child knows a lot about.

Reading Workshop

We have completed our first unit in fiction reading. Predictions, retells, and questioning were the main focus areas. This week, we will begin our first nonfiction unit in class. For nightly reading, your child may take home a good fit fiction OR nonfiction book in the Book Baggie.

On Monday, we will have Mr. Pete (Pete Grostic) return to Jeffers to share lessons on Mindfulness. He has been working with our schools for 2 years, visiting classrooms on a monthly basis. Ask your child what we did Monday!

Halloween

Halloween looks different again this year at school. We have special “theme” days the week of October 25th. On Friday the 29th, we will do some special fall/Halloween activities in class. ( I apologize, but we are still unable to hold classroom parties with families invited. )

I want to give a BIG SHOUT OUT to all the students in class who were willing to be a representative for Student Council. Here they are (masks lowered for photo):

Molly will be our girl representative, and Ben K. and Evan will split the boy representative.

In science last week we explored the future of animals by studying inherited animal traits and designer dogs. This week, we are taking part in an activity called, Lizard Island, where we explore trait variation, natural selection, and survival.

Reading Workshop-Students are learning to use their Post-its to stop and jot while reading. These serve as a good reminder for our reading brain to stop and think about the text. Students have been working on recalling “Who” is in the text and “What” they are noticing. They are also working on making predictions using evidence from the text and retelling what they read using: Somebody (character), Wanted (what did they want?), But (what gets in the way?), So (what do they do?), Then (how does the story end?).

Grammar-We have been working on verbs and adjectives in our writing. Students are also working to punctuate and format dialogue correctly.

Writing Workshop-We are continuing to write our narrative stories. The main emphasis last week was on slowing our writing down and stretching out our scenes to add more detail. We are working on the “external details” we can see or hear, as well as the “internal details”–thinking and feeling. Students focused on finding “the heart of the story”, or most important part to them, to stretch out and detail for our readers.

Math-We are about to test on Topic 2–multiplication properties and strategies for 2s, 5s, 9s, 0s, and 1s. Has your child shown you at least 2 tricks to help solve the 9s facts? I hope the math tents are helpful. I will send more home during Topic 3, as we learn strategies for additional multiplication facts.

Word Sorts-In class, we worked on word patterns for words having short i, o, and u. Some work is completed in Seesaw, some on activity sheets, and this week I will introduce Spelling City for additional practice of these patterns and their Core Words.

Dates: 

September 29th: Picture Day for our class

October 1st: Dress Up Day for homecoming (wear Laker gear or red and gray)

October 6th and 7th: Conferences, Half Day on the 7th, No School on the 8th

In science we are learning about fossils–so cool! Ask your child why the earth can have layers containing the fossils of ocean animals in the middle of a field of grass. Also, how can you tell a dinosaur had scaly skin and not fur or hair? How can we tell if animals used to be meat eaters or plant eaters by looking at the skulls?

During our reading workshop, we are building our reading stamina and picking out “just right” books. We have built our stamina from 18 minutes to 45 minutes! Ask your child what reading a book like GOLD is compared to reading like a curmudgeon. 🙂

In our grammar, we finished working on nouns. On Fridays, we also have a “WOW” word of the week. It was “rediscover”. With our WOW word, we explore the meaning of the root word (discover) and the meaning of the prefix (re) or the suffix. We also brainstorm other words with the same prefix or suffix.

During writing workshop, we began brainstorming ideas for our narrative, or small-moment stories. We brainstormed people, places, and things that are important to us. We then brainstormed clear memories we have with each. We picked an idea and worked on writing the story “bit by bit”. Ask your child what story or stories he/she is working on.

In math, we are working on learning different strategies to solve both multiplication and division problems. Knowing these strategies will help to solve the more complex problems in 4th grade. Next week we will wrap up the topic with our first math test.

Word work: Words we sorted each day in class had patterns with either open or closed syllables. Identifying these types of syllables can help children decode longer words. Today we also took our first spelling test on the 5 core words.

Other:   Our picture day is Wednesday, September 29th.

Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank you!

 

Happy May! It is great to be back in person! We have been busy!

In reading, we started a 2nd animal to research in new research groups. We will be working on thinking more deeply and comparing and contrasting our 2 different animals and habitats  as well.

In math, we took our quadrilaterals unit test. It was sent home today (Friday). It was a unit that more students struggled on in comparison to other math topics. Traditionally, it has always been a more challenging topic, but being in remote learning for two school weeks may have added to some students’ struggle with this unit. Now, we are working on our final math topic: perimeter. We will have some time to review the big math topics before MSTEP, and we will also touch on some 4th grade skills after completing MSTEP before our school year ends.

In grammar and word study we worked on synonyms and homophones. Next week we will practice identifying antonyms.

In writing, we worked on a special Mother’s Day project. Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms!

We also visited the library on Friday–we loved to pick out our own books and see the new changes and additions in the library!

Hello Families,

Thank you for the donations to our March is Reading Month Read-a-thon. Here our some photos of our day of READING! We read magazines, poetry, choice books, and wrapped up our book clubs.

In writing, we have been drafting literary essays together. The latest essay was on the story, The Giving Tree. Students are getting more practice with the 5-paragraph essay, stating a claim/thesis, and generating reasons and evidence. They are doing a great job! This week they will write their own essay.

In math, we are about to finish our 2nd unit on fractions. We will be taking the test on Tuesday of this week. When we return from break, we will begin a unit on measurement.

In reading workshop, we finished Because of Winn Dixie. This week, we will continue book clubs as we study a new character in the book: Make Way for Diamonde Daniel. We will be learning to compare characters, determine why authors use specific story elements, and what themes are found in these stories.

In our grammar, we have been learning about compound sentences and the coordinating conjunctions of and, but, and or. In our word sorts, we have focused on different prefixes, their meanings, and how they change the meaning of a root word.

The class also filled the marble jar to the next goal line. This was done through good behaviors, working well together, and being on task. As a reward, the kids voted to play several rounds of Knockout–a multiplication game played in teams. I also taught them a game called SKUNK, where math and chance are involved. We had a great time!

Happy March! These days filled with sunshine have been wonderful!

In writing we are beginning to learn how to write literary essays. After our opinion writing unit, this makes for a good transition. We are also using what we are learning in our reading workshop to help us determine character traits to write about.

In math we are nearing the end of our first topic on fractions. We will be taking the test this week. Our next topic is a more in-depth topic on fractions. As we more along in new concepts, we are also practicing multiplication and division facts daily.

During Reading Workshop, we are reading fiction. Our focus is on determining character traits based on what our characters do and say. We are also working to make predictions based on how our characters typically act. This has been helping us with our literary writing discussions. Later this week, students will be in book clubs to dive deeper into their stories.

Our focus in grammar last week was on common and proper nouns.  This week we will practice possessive nouns, joining two sentences with a comma and the conjunction and, as well as the prefixes -un and -re. We are learning so much!!