Classroom Update - Week of January 29th

Field Trip to the Coast:

Today a field trip packet went home with your child. Please take the time to review it as soon as possible. If you are able to chaperone, please send in that information sheet, as soon as possible, (even if you are unable to pay right away), so I can be prepared and ensure that your status has been approved in the volunteer system. I also have an assumption of risk form that you need to complete prior to the trip, as well.

Just a few reminders:

• All paperwork and payments are due by February 27th.

• Siblings are not allowed to attend the field trip.

• Online payments are preferred, however you are welcome to send in payment via check, if that works better for you.

Homework:

Homework in the upcoming weeks will be a little different than normal, so it will be important to pay close attention to your child's agenda each night. First of all, the students will now be given a weekly reading assignment that will cover the genre that we are studying in class, along with specific questions/written responses that we are discussing. This is assigned on Monday and will be due on Friday. The students are also engaged in a novel study during small groups in reading. They are given specific pages to read after their group meets and it is their responsibility to keep up with the required reading. Most of the reading they are able to complete in class, however whatever they do not finish is homework. The students also were given a Social Studies Industry Homework Project today and they will have until Wednesday, February 14th to work on it. I am requiring the students to submit their topic to me by this Wednesday and they should have researched the questions by Wednesday, February 7th, therefore leaving the last week for them to work on their presentation. Please be checking in with your child to ensure that they are staying on top of these tasks. Finally, due to the additional social studies homework, I am not sending home a math review this week or next to allow more time to be spent on this project. Please feel free to email me regarding questions on this.

Upcoming Events / Reminders:

• Report Cards went home last Friday. Please make sure that you have taken the time to review them and send the report card envelope back to school signed. The report card is yours to keep, we just need the envelope back. :)

• Friday, February 9th is an Early Release Day. School will dismiss at 1:15PM.

• Our class will celebrate Valentine's Day briefly in the morning on Wednesday, February 14th by exchanging valentines. Students are not required to pass out valentines, however, if they choose to do so, they should have a valentine for every student in this class. We currently have 24 students: Valentina, Ananya, Ryan, Savannah, Lily, Colin, Yonae, Julia, Abhi, Liam, Darina, Gigi, Adithi, Andrea, Anjana, Tamanna, Puspakhi, Shunav, Sohaan, Camden, Simoni, Lorenzo, Archith, and Serena.

• Friday, March 2nd is an Early Release Day. School will dismiss at 1:15PM

• Interims will go home on Friday, March 2nd.

• 4th Grade Field Trip to the North Carolina Aquarium and Masonboro Island is Thursday, March 22nd.

• Friday, March 23rd is the end of quarter three and track-out day.

Reader's Workshop:

This week, the students will continue to focus on reading the complex text of historical fiction. The readers will learn to keep track of multiple plot lines, unfamiliar characters, and shifts in time and place. The students will also learn the importance of supporting historical fiction with nonfiction texts and photographs to deepen their understanding of this time period.

Some specific mini-lesson topics this week will include:

• Making personal connections to the text

• Recalling significant moments that make them stop and think

• Analyzing photographs and firsthand/secondhand accounts to deepen their understanding of historical fiction texts.

• Recognizing the archaic language that author’s use in historical fiction texts to portray the time period.

Questions to Ask Your Child at Home:

• How does the setting affect the character?

• What factors influence the behaviors of the main character?

• What personal connections are you able to make to your novel?

• What archaic language do you notice in your novel? What do you think the words means?

Writer's Workshop:

This week, the students will continue to work on opinion writing. They will be completing their planning page, starting their introductions and then composing their body paragraphs. Each students will be working at their own pace as they follow a class model and confer regularly with the teacher. As the students construct their body it is very important that they include the Fabulous Five in each paragraph.

Fabulous Five Must Haves in Each Nonfiction Paragraph:

1. Clear topic sentence that tells the main idea of your paragraph

2. At least 3-5 relevant details that will support the topic

3. Different transitional words throughout the paragraph

4. Content specific vocabulary

5. Concluding statement that sums up their paragraph in a new and different way from their topic sentence.

Questions to Ask Your Child at Home:

• What technique are you using to "hook" your readers?

• Tell me more about your 3 supporting paragraphs and how you used the Fabulous Five Must Haves?

Math:

Today, the students learned solving word problems involving area and perimeter. Tomorrow, the students will take their first math assessment for the quarter on area and perimeter. The students will start their second math unit on Wednesday that will focus on activating their prior knowledge of fractions and understanding and being able to represent unit fractions. They will also work on adding and subtracting fractions with like denominators and end the week by comparing and ordering fractions. It is very important that the students are able to represent these fractions with pictures and/or models, as well as explain their thinking about fractions using words. Therefore, the students will be refraining from using tricks (such as cross multiplication) to compare fractions and instead only use this as a means of checking their work.

Questions to Ask Your Child at Home:

• What is a unit fraction?

• What is the numerator and denominator in a fraction? What do these terms mean?

• Show me how you can draw a picture or a number line to compare the following fractions

Social Studies:

This week in Social Studies the students will continue their unit on economics. They will learn what an entrepreneur is and how business owners made decisions when resources are limited. Students will end the week by understanding the differences between capital, human, and natural resources and how these are used to determine prices. They will end the week by learning about positive and negative incentives and what they look like in the classroom and at home. This quarter’s unit has a great deal of vocabulary that the students will be responsible for knowing, so it is important that they try to study these words a little each night (they have a copy in their social studies journal and LIGHTHOUSE binder). They will be assessed on these words this Thursday, February 1st.

Questions to Ask Your Child at Home:

• What is an entrepreneur and how to they make decisions when resources are limited?

• What are the differences between capital, human, and natural resources?

• Have you been studying your economics vocabulary words?