Weekly Update

Announcements for the Week:

Field Trip: Rescheduled for Thursday, November 20^th

Field Trip:

It was unfortunate that our field trip was postponed due to rain last but we are rescheduling it for this coming Thursday, November 20th.  Please pack a lunch and come prepare students for a great day of learning about the world of organic farming!

Literacy:  Non Fiction: Water is Life

Last week, we began our non-fiction unit research unit by using an I see, I think, I wonder strategy to build our background and make connections to water.  Students will be thinking about water based on six different themes:  Water and People, Water and Conflict, Water and Land, Water and Technology, Water and Government, Water Changes/Water Stays the Same.  

On Monday afternoon, we will team up with 4A and visit the CIC with our librarian, Jett Willette, will give us an overview of the online and print resources we will use for our research unit.

In Reading Workshop this week we will focus on “Non-Fiction Reading Basics”:

·                Learn about different text features (bold face, italics, heading, captions) and identify how these help the reader.

·                Learn how reading non-fiction requires different comprehension strategies.  We will practice asking questions and making connections.

·                Read non-fiction texts in partnerships and share our thinking with others and in writing.

In Writing Workshop this week we will focus on categorizing water-related words and ideas and identify possible water-related topics.  We will:

·                Create a word bank of water vocabulary, then categorize the words based on our water themes.  

·                Group words together, and form topics.

·                Ask “Thick Juicy Questions” about our topics.

·                Identify possible topics, and think about what we know, and what we might like to find out about these topics.

Math: Multiplication and Division

We continue to work with multiplication and long division concepts, including function problems called “in and out boxes” which involve recognizing patterns and using algebraic thinking.  “In and Out” Boxes look like this.  

Again, the math objectives are:

·                Solve double digit multiplication problems.

·                Solve long division problems with a one-digit divisor and a four digit quotient.

·                Use reasoning skills to assess if your answer is correct.

·                Use an algorithm to check to see if your answer is correct.

·                Find factors of numbers through one-hundred.

·                Solve two-step word problems.

·                Discuss problems that have more than one right answer.

Social Studies: Life in South Asia

We will shift our focus this week to studying Life in South Asia.  We will begin with a big data mining project where students will compare and contrast different data points in South Asia and around the world.  We will consider, in the coming weeks, life expectancy, school life expectancy, poverty, and access to water.  This is a powerful unit!  Students will begin to see the discrepancies in the quality of life related to resources.  We hope that students will share some thoughts with their families.  Some of the things we will do are:

·                Create graphs comparing and contrasting data around resources.

·                Make inferences about life in countries based on what we see in graphs.

·                Expand our thinking in writing about graphs and data.

·                Work collaboratively to create a presentation about the data we research.

Ask your fourth grader about what they are learning in social studies this week!

Have a great week!