This Week in Room 9

This week we have been working really hard!  We are getting better at staying focused during instruction and work time, however transitions between activities still tend to be a bit tricky for the class as a whole.  We will keep working on it!!

In literacy we have been focusing on the genre of realistic fiction, which are stories that could be true, but are made up by the author.  Most chapter books that elementary students choose to read for pleasure are realistic fiction.  In reading we have been reading the book Tiger Rising by Kate DiCamillo, and talking a lot about what the author does to help us learn all about the main character Rob.  We have also been talking about what it means to "read intensely" and are practicing strategies like "figure out the confusing parts" and "make a movie in your mind".  In writing we are now in the drafting stage of our realistic fiction stories.  We spent a few days planning what our main character would be like, as well as using a story mountain to plan the plot of our stories.  Now we are drafting each scene of our stories and will learn about writing good beginnings and endings.

In math we have been learning about factors, prime, composite, and square numbers.  Students made posters to show all the factors of numbers 1-36 and we used those to observe that some could be made into only one array, while other could make several arrays.

In science we took a pre-assessment on oceans and salmon, and got our notebooks ready to start our science unit next week.  We will begin by learning about ocean layers, currents, and the ocean floor.

Here are some pictures from our week:

We have been setting goals for Independent Reading (Read to Self)

In writing we have been working on developing a character

MineCraftGirl1774 and Frosty Pineapple sharing their writing

Dr. Jim and #Thewezel sharing their writing

Thinking about how to plan the plot of our realistic fiction stories

Bubba and Frosty Pineapple enjoying PJ day and free choice

Room 9 boys enjoying free choice

Person and Stinky Raptor's free choice creation

What have we been up to?

Last week we got our first units rolling in reading and writing.  We have been talking about and reading realistic fiction.  Our class read aloud book is Tiger Rising by Kate DiCamillo, and we are enjoying learning more about our main character, Rob, and what his personality is like.  Soon we will begin planning and drafting our own realistic fiction stories.

We have also been talking a lot about being scientists and practicing some things real scientists do in our mini science notebooks.  One important thing scientists do is observe and sketch things they cannot take into a lab with them.  To practice this we studied something we are very familiar with....pencils!  Students studied and learned the names of the parts, read how pencils are made and watched a video.  This week we will finish up these notebooks by comparing pencils to markers.  Then we will be ready to being our first official science unit about salmon!

Here are a few pictures of Room 9 scientists:

Agent 1182514

#Thewezel

NotFred

Person's completed sketch before adding color

Last week we also had buddies for the first time!  We are older buddies to the first graders in Mrs. S's class.  We got to know each other and filled out a Double Bubble Map to compare and contrast our interests and hobbies.  There were lots of smiles and it is so fun to see Room 9 students helping the younger S.B. students.

Bear Marie

Cool Teddy and Epic Taco

Le Stevensen

Frosty Pineapple

Stinky Raptor

Maddie Heart

Ashley Heart

Puggirl

Mr. AAA

Gerald McSweats

#Thewezel

Gabbi Fryer

Agent 1182514

Taco Joe

Person

Bubble Gum

Mr. Pokemon

Coco

J.R.

KrXO18

Dr. Jim

Rhianna

Welcome to the Room 9 Blog!

I am excited to finally have the classroom blog up and running!  I will update the blog often with daily posts of what we are learning and doing in class and information/reminders about upcoming events.

So far this year we have been working hard on learning the routines and procedures for all the different parts of our day, and reminding ourselves how to be responsible intermediate students.  This week we will launch into some of our first units, including our first reading and writing genre, realistic fiction.  We are also a bit into our first math unit of the year, which reviews models for multiplication and division, introduces multiples, factors, primes, and composites, and extends students work with multiplicative comparisons.

Because we are shifting from Curriculum Night to Open House, some families may be wondering about the scope of the 4th grade curriculum and what exactly their student will be learning this year. I will provide families with a handout containing more information about what to expect over the course of this year at Open House this Thursday.  Throughout the year I will inform parents about what we are learning through communication on the blog and flyers sent home.

Check back this week for more updates!