Teligami

Last week the students we serve with our new iPads were asked to create a "Teligami" to express their opinion about living in the tropics vs. a desert climate.  It was the first time the students had been exposed to the Teligami app.  The app allows the students to record their voice using an animated character.  The students can make choices on the physical features of the character.  They can also choose different backgrounds for the character.  The app is modeled and intended for short messages.  They can not be longer than 90 seconds. We had a brief time on our first trial but we had a couple of successful "Teligamis".  The young women below says..." In my opinion it is much better to live in the tropics than the desert because there are many more usable natural resources in the tropics."  Let us know if you would like us to send you the "Teligami" directly.
  

Updates

Extreme Weather Excitement

Now that we have survived the first bout of “Extreme Winter Weather”, it’s time to get back to business! Last week we did not send home DSL’s, Reading Logs, or spelling lists. With conferences starting on Friday, we have decided to NOT send home Fox Reports this afternoon. If you have any questions about how your student performed last week, we can happily say that everyone had a great two day week! There were no new major assignments, and we are seeing a huge improvement in math homework turn-in. Thank you for your ongoing support from home.

Not quite this extreme

Conferences

As stated above, conferences begin this Friday, November 21^st. We have early release on Friday; kids will be excused at 11:20 and conferences will begin at 3:30. We will continue conferences on Monday, November 24^th. If you have any questions about your conference time, please contact the main office. They have access to our schedules and may be able to make changes.

Your students are welcome to join us, as they are an important part of the conversation. We will also hand out report cards at that time.

Shoebox Speech

This week we are also not sending home a traditional DSL assignment. Instead, we are asking students to begin work on a Shoebox Speech. This is a great assignment that gives us an opportunity to learn a little more about the lives of our learners outside of the classroom. We have attached the assignment here so you can look over the expectations with your child. We will help students begin the outline and write the introduction and conclusion in class, but the practicing and refining of the speech will need to be done at home over the next two weeks. We will begin presenting speeches the Monday after the Thanksgiving holiday, December 1^st.

Shoebox Speech Assignment

Fun in the Fourth Grade

After nearly two months of hard work, last week was a great opportunity to have some fun in the fourth grade.

For the last two weeks our students have been mastering the art of the array. These handy models help students learn the processes behind multi-digit multiplication. If you look carefully at the pic collage above, you will notice the students carefully creating the arrays with our base-ten pieces. This week's focus will be on using sketches of the models to quickly solve two-digit by two-digit algorithms.

In addition to new learning in math, we also completed our second independently written persuasive paper. The students were asked to describe the perfect pet and defend why they thought it was a good choice. We are already seeing huge gains in the writing abilities of our students. It will be fun to share their work at our upcoming conferences.

In Language Arts we have been focused on informational text and learning about climates from around the world. This has tied in nicely to our new ELD unit, which is a series of lessons on the geographical features of Oregon. We will end our studies with a writing piece where students must defend living in either a desert or tropical climate.

And, finally, the fun! On Friday, rather than having a traditional harvest party, our students headed to the computer lab for an afternoon of code.org. This fantastic site is dedicated to helping kids learn the fundamentals of computer coding. While it at first seems like all fun and games, we believe our students will attest to the thinking skills they had to use in order to complete the coding challenges. You could feel the energy in the lab as the kids worked through some pretty tricky puzzles. We want to encourage all our students to visit the code.org website and continue the course two activities.

Friday was wrapped up with one of our favorite art projects. Students used crayon, Sharpie, water colors, and a straw to create the masterpieces shown above. If you are in the building, be sure to take a closer look in the fourth grade hallway.

We were lucky to have two of our moms donate time to come in and cut apples and scoop caramel for our special "harvest" snack. A special thank you from Mrs. Harrington and Ms. Kinsman for not only providing the help in getting the food ready, but also cleaning up the classroom after the art and eating!

October 31st is Sneaking Up!

We are preparing for a bit of fun in the afternoon on Friday, October 31st!  We are actually going to be doing a bit of computer "code" writing.  The students have really enjoyed this in the past, and it is highly engaging and great for critical thinking.  We would also like to enjoy a little treat on this day.  Are you willing to send in a few fresh, crunchy apples or a container of soft-serve dipping caramel?  After doing our last health unit on eating more fruits and vegetables, apples seem like a good compromise. :)  Please send us an e-mail if you can help with sending in these items.  You are appreciated.

Routines

Routines

In the fourth grade, we take a lot of pride in helping our students learn and maintain routines that lead to ongoing success. This is why we spend a lot of time working on establishing and practicing day-to-day organization skills. Below, we have included our Back-to-School night presentation, which discusses some of our routines.

If you have any questions, please contact Mrs. Harrington or Ms. Kinsman. We are here to help!

And in the Classroom...

We had another busy week. With school pictures, our first spelling tests, and technology class, there was not a dull moment to be had!

Math

We are nearly to the end of our first unit on multiplication. The students have been learning about different strategies they can use to solve simple multiplication problems. Many of these skills will be transferred into more complicated equations in the coming months. 

In addition, we have continued using our longer math block to provide daily math fact fluency quizzes. For students that need the practice, we will continue to focus on subtraction fluency through the end of the month. About eight of our students have started their multiplication facts; in November, all of our kids will be practicing multiplication facts.

Language Arts

We are wrapping up our study of My Name is Maria Isabel and will be assessing the students ability to identify the main idea, characters, and theme of a story by reading Tómas and the Library Lady next week. 

In addition, we started reading Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing aloud. Next quarter we are going to look at how the story has been adapted into different formats, like plays and films. Plus, it is a great read.

Our students also finished their family writing essays. These pieces of writing will be ready for you to read at conferences next month. For many of our learners, this is their first "five paragraph essay". We have been very impressed with their hard work and dedication in making these great pieces of writing.

Technology

We also had our monthly technology class last week. The students reviewed the logging in process, opening Word documents, and practiced using a search engine. Our hope is to provide students with enough exposure and education to technology that they can use it with ease and responsibility. Our new state tests are computer-based and will require a good deal of typing. We are very fortunate to be able to offer this class to our students to help them prepare for the spring!

Back to School Night Presentation 2014-2015

Back to School Spanish2

Come Back to School on Thursday Night

Back to School Night

Yes, that's right, on Thursday evening, from 6:00-7:30pm, we will be holding our Back-to-School Night.  This is an important event where we will cover the following topics:

• Our goals at Free Orchards Elementary
• Our goals in the fourth grade
• Our homework policy (with a video, no less!)
• A chance to meet the teachers face-to-face and ask any questions you may have about the year

A Glance at Last Week

Last week we accomplished so much with our students. Take a look below to see what we have been working on.

Math

Last week we focused on multiplication models and improving our subtraction fluency. Based on a pretest, we saw that students needed some extra work with subtraction. Each morning students were given a quick, two and a half minute, timed test on basic subtraction facts. Most kids had score of 15 or less on the 50 question quiz on Monday; by Friday, nearly every score had doubled, or even tripled!

We will continue to work on multiplication arrays next week and will be learning about prime and composite numbers. If you need a quick review, here's a great song to help students remember their prime numbers (don't worry, we'll watch this in class at least 50 times this year!):

Reading

Our students received their first "Reading Menu" of the year. This is a fun, student-driven set of activities designed to help students focus on a variety of reading skills. They are given a selection of 5-10 reading exercises to complete over the course of two weeks. Some of the activities review basic skills, while others extend learning beyond the text we are reading in class. 

We have been reading The Kid in the Red Jacket aloud and Grandfather's Journey in smaller groups. Both stories tell about characters that have dealt with life-changing moves. We are focused on finding the main ideas, character's traits, and the themes of these pieces.

A-Z Reading Challenge

We also introduced the A-Z Reading Challenge on Friday. This is a fun way to help motivate our students to read throughout the year. We included the PowerPoint presentation below in case you or your student have any questions about this fun activity.

A to Z Reading Challenge

Homework

We also assigned our nightly math homework, provided a reading log, and gave our second DSL (writing homework) of the year. If you are not seeing these items every night, please be sure to ask your student to see their homework folder. If you have any questions, you may contact Mrs. Harrington or Ms. Kinsman by phone or email.

We are looking forward to seeing all of you next week!

"I Pick" books

Yesterday in class we worked on choosing books that are the right fit.  These are books that the students will read during independent reading time.

I  - Chose the book

P - There is a PURPOSE for the book: pleasure, research, etc.
I - You have to be drawn in or have an INTEREST in the book.
C- You have to be able to COMPREHEND or understand the book.
K- You have to KNOW the words.  The book needs to be at a level that you can figure out the words.

At the end of the period all of our 4th grade class had 3-5 books chosen.  If you are a parent reading this, take a minute and ask your student what books they chose and what they like about what they have read so far.