News and Notes 5/9

News and Notes

From Fourth Grade

The Family

This week the fourth grade mathematicians met a new family.  This family is actually used as a tool to help us remember the steps of long division.  Dad, Mom, Sister, Brother, Rover, and Chester are the family members to help us remember to divide, multiply, subtract, bring down, remainder/repeat, and check.  The math curriculum in fourth grade has a large focus on computation skills, and we've come to the time of the year when the students are ready for the challenge of long division.  This week we marked the date when many of the students solved their first long division problem independently.  What a significant milestone in our math learning adventures!  We have more long division practice and application coming our way, but we are certainly off to a great start!  

Learned or Inherited?

Hair color, singing abilities, and favorite foods are all characteristics we explored this week in science.  To begin our study of ecology, this week we discussed genetics and the nature versus nurture debate.  We discovered that some characteristics are inherited while others are learned.  We even recognized that some characteristics might be a mixture of both nature and nurture.  The fourth grade scientists showed great interest in the topic of genetics.  Multiple days this week there was a line at the end of the day of students who simply wanted to share connections about the topic of genetics.  As we look ahead to other aspects of ecology, we expect that these fourth grade scientists will continue to show such good engagement and scientific thinking!

Functional Texts

As teachers, we recognize that not everyone will grow up to be an avid reader of classic literature or poetry.  Not every adult will spend endless hours in libraries researching and studying.  We also recognize that everyday, as adults, we are expected to be reading and making decisions based on our reading.  The

kinds of texts we explored this week are called "functional" texts.  From menus and recipes to maps and directions to instructions and manuals, these practical texts require the reader to understand the content and make decisions based on their reading.  The fourth graders showed great understanding of many of the sample functional texts we explored.  Since functional texts so clearly relate to our everyday lives, it was easy to help the students stay engaged and interested in reading and exploring them!  Now the next time you need help with the instructions for building that bookshelf, ordering take-out, or checking a weather forecast or bus schedule, you know a fourth grader who should be both eager and able to lend a hand!

Community

This week as we were working on a variety of independent projects and trying to finish up some "I Owe You" work, I was struck my the community that has been built in our class.  Countless times this week students found simple and practical ways to help each other.  From sharing notes with classmates who were absent to repeating instructions that were missed, to assisting each other with classroom jobs and reminding each other to stay positive and work hard, it was encouraging and uplifting to see the fourth graders work together as a respectful and cooperative community!