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The Card File

Mrs. Cards Fourth Grade Class


Pine River Elementary
Room #18
December 3, 2014

-archived on the web at http://cardfourthgrade.weebly.com/

Fourth Grade Literacy


Our class loves to read, and each
student is making great progress in
improving his/her reading skills. The
students are active meaning-makers, and
they are employing a variety of strategies
simultaneously to read and understand
pieces
of
text.
Following
are
characteristics of good comprehenders
that we work on daily in class:
Reading text in its entirety, but
sometimes looking back to reread
to clarify confusing points,
Reading
more
slowly
when
encountering information relevant
to the current reading goal,
Making predictions about reading
based on prior knowledge,
Monitoring the authors craft
including quality and difficulty of
text, and
Pulling and processing main ideas,
summarizing,
and
making
inferences based on information in
the text.
While being exposed to great amounts
of narrative and informational literature,
the children are working to polish their
reading skills by focusing on specific goals
that I set with each student weekly.
Please continue to encourage your child
to read at home each evening, especially
when s/he has minimal or no homework. A
child who reads at least twenty minutes
per day builds his/her vocabulary by
2,000 words annually. This certainly leads

to better reading comprehension and


increased reading achievement!

Animal Adaptations

We are now learning about animal


adaptations, which involves studying the
ways in which animals are equipped with
body parts and behaviors that allow them
to survive in their environments. Animals
use their special parts for obtaining and
consuming food and water, hiding and
escaping
from
predators,
surviving
conditions ranging from extreme heat to
extreme cold, building shelters, moving
through their habitats, and other acts of
survival.
A special project involving constructing
a zoo exhibit diorama will be assigned to
the children before Christmas break. The
diorama should display an animal in its
natural habitat along with what it eats
and a predator looming in the background,
if applicable.
Examples and specific
instructions will be given to the students
soon.
In class, each student will be
researching the chosen animal in order to
gather specific information for a poster
that will be completed at school. The
poster will accompany the diorama in a
special zoo exhibit being planned for
January.

Literary Essays
The students are familiar with writing
about lessons learned from people they
know or interact with, and now they are
going to work on writing about what they
have learned from characters in books.
After close study of books and stories
read in class, the children will use various
approaches to writing about texts by
observing what is happening in the story
and pushing their thinking to higher
thoughts about what they notice. They
will give special attention to characters
traits, motivations, struggles, changes,
and lessons learned. Ultimately, each
student will select an idea that can be
brought forth in a literary essay that
discusses what a text is really about or
how a character changes or learns a
lesson.

Mathematics

Our current unit is Division with Whole


Numbers. As with the first two units, the

students are drawing models to represent


division methods and interpret and apply
mathematical understanding and skills in
solving word problems. Following is an
example of each division model that the
students are learning to use in class. This
week, we will be comparing the three
methods. By the end of the unit, students
will use their preferred method to solve
division problems. Please continue to use
the online textbook to support your
childs learning and homework questions.
At this point, students should be able
to recall multiplication and division facts
instantly. Your child might benefit from
practicing
facts
using
flashcards,
worksheet quizzes, or Mathmagician
(linked to my web site) if s/he is
struggling with instant recall.

Place Value Sections Method

Pro-Solve
Our class is participating in Pro-Solve,
a county-wide mathematics problemsolving competition. Five times during the
next five months, the students will work
to solve six problems that reinforce math
standards, applied mathematics, and
problem-solving strategies. I score the
problem sheet by starring the problems
that were correctly answered and circling
those that are incorrect, and then we go
over the correct solutions and the various
ways to solve the problems in class. The
children will bring home their scored
problem sheets to keep. At the end of
the school year, all students will receive a
certificate of participation, high-scoring
students will receive pins, and the top
scorer in the class will receive a trophy.

Expanded Notation Method

Digit-by-Digit Method

Bully Blocker Program

Human Geography in
the United States
Students
are
expanding
their
understanding of push and pull factors by
exploring immigration in the United
States. They are reading and analyzing
information articles and immigration data
as well as exploring primary sources
including photographs, memoirs, and
artifacts. We are also examining the
effects of immigration on the United
States with an emphasis on how
immigration
has
affected
cultural
development throughout the country, such
as the influence of the Finnish people in
the Upper Peninsula and the impact of
Mexican culture on areas of the
Southwest.
This is a great opportunity to discuss
your family heritage with your child and
show him/her the countries from which
his/her ancestors originated. You might
also discuss family traditions linked to
cultural heritage.

The highlight of each Monday


afternoon is the Bully Blocker program
taught in our classroom by Mrs. Kellie
Parkinson, our school social worker. The
students are learning what constitutes
bullying, how to prevent bullying, how to
build friendships, and how to solve
conflicts. They are practicing positive
social skills by acting out real life
situations with their classmates. Following
is an overview of what students have
learned so far.
Bullying
involves an imbalance of strength
and power
is one-sided
is intentional and repeated
occurs when a victim is subjected
to repeated negative actions
occurs when a single student or a
group of students bullies someone
else
includes both physical and/or
verbal or nonverbal aggression
intended to cause distress or
harm.
Types of Bullying
direct or overt acts (physical
actions, words, or gestures)
indirect or covert acts (spreading
rumors or intentionally excluding
peers)
Bully Blocker Tools
Stay calm.
Ignore bullies.
Think positive thoughts.
Give positive self talk.
Do the secret scrunch.

When

witnessing bullying
Be an upstander, not a bystander.
Dont join in.
Walk away and tell an adult,
because bullying should always be
reported.

Problem
Conflict
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

Solving

Steps

to

Solve

Cool down.
Use I messages.
Use active listening.
Brainstorm and negotiate.
Pick a solution.
Ask how it worked.

Our
class
Christmas
Celebration will
be on Thursday,
December 18, in
the
afternoon.
A committee has
been formed to
provide
treats
for that event,
and notes will
be
sent
home
with
those
students.

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