News and Notes 4/3

News and Notes

From Fourth Grade

Take Three

This week the fourth graders participated in our "Math Day Monday - Take Three."  The focus of this week's math day was fractions and decimals.  The fourth graders did an amazing job recalling prior knowledge of fractions, making connections to new concepts, and finding ways that fractions apply to "real life."  We found that much of the discussion of fractions related to our work this year in place value and general computation skills.  It was exciting to see how to fourth grade mathematicians were able to explore new ideas relating to fractions on their own.  What great insights and strategies they formulated to solve problems they had never encountered before.  These "Math Day Mondays" have served as a good review and preview of math content and have also given us a chance to see how math connects to our lives beyond the classroom.   

Heat and Light

This week the fourth grade scientists continued their study of energy by exploring heat and light energy.  They melted ice cubes and planned obstacle courses for light.  By mixing hands-on exploration with whole class discussion, informational book reading, and video watching, the fourth grade scientists are growing in their understanding of the different types of energy they experience every day.  Some of our discussions got complicated and it was exciting to see how the students were able to dig deeply to ask questions and formulate hypotheses about energy.  Starting next week we will be exploring fuel energy and electricity.  It seems very likely that the fourth grade scientists will approach these types of energy with the same curiosity and thoughtful exploration!  These fourth grade scientists really are enjoying getting "energized!"

Questions

As we continue along the path to writing our very first research paper, this week we focused on more of our prewriting activities.  The fourth grade writers were given the task of formulating guiding questions relating to their research topics.  Using their thesis statement as a starting point, the fourth grade writers created some impressive lists of questions.  These questions will be very important in guiding our research in the coming weeks!

Let the Testing Begin

Monday marks the first day of our standardized testing with the new SBAC test.  This "Smarter Balanced" test is a new format of assessment which will be completed online.  The fourth graders have done an excellent job of working through the process of testing online during our recent practice tests.  We are eager to show what we know, even if we all (teachers included) are feeling a bit anxious about what this new format of testing will bring to us.  One thing is sure though, these fourth graders will most certainly shine if they work hard and show off their smarts!  Many thanks in advance to our families for helping us get good sleep, healthy food, and lots of time to be outside and enjoy play during these next few testing weeks.