November

Mrs. Lenaburg dressed for
Halloween by the students.

Mr. McClintock dressed for
Halloween by the students.

Holidays! Halloween has come and gone. We had a fun party donning costumes, eating treats, and playing games. We even dressed up Mrs. Lenaburg and Mr. McClintock in random costume attire! Thanksgiving is here, and we are so thankful for our wonderful nine students and their families. Next, the season of Advent will arrive and we will enjoy this season of waiting for the birth of Jesus. It is a special time at St. Edward, where we will have a special Advent prayer chain and celebrate our good deeds as we strive to be like Jesus.

Science: We have studied the weather and are moving on to learn about geology -- the earth’s surface, features and resources. In this unit, we will become experts at using a science textbook to answer questions in a packet about Earth.

Third Grade Math: We have finished chapter two and are diving into multi-digit subtraction with regrouping (borrowing). After that, we will jump into multiplication. If possible, please have your child do “Xtra Math” at home a few times a week.

Fourth Grade Math: We finished chapter two and plan to cruise through chapter three, which will focus on front-end estimation and multi-digit subtraction. While it appears the students have done this before, I have noticed we need extra practice. After that, we will multiply by one and two digits and the skills we will need to successfully do so. If possible, please have your child do “Xtra Math” at home a few times a week.

Social Studies: This fall, our students honed in on their map skills and learned early history of Wisconsin. We have taken a break from social studies the last few weeks but get back into it amidst Christmas program practices. Each student will take a virtual tour of Wisconsin, writing hand made postcards from different regions of our wonderful state.

Art: Art is on Fridays and we missed a two Fridays in the last few weeks, so we cannot wait to get back to it! We hope you enjoyed the pumpkin art on display in the hall. Our November project focuses on each student making a paper mosaic of something for which he/she is thankful. It is taking a lot of time to make them, so hopefully they will turn out beautifully.

Reading:  We are presently reading books by Patricia Polacco as she is our author study right now.  We also have our guided reading groups.  

Reading Buddies:  We have reading buddies with the kindergarten.  We wrote books called “It Looked Like Spilt Milk” and shared them with our buddies.  We also shared our turkey stories with them.



Sharing books with our reading buddies.

Religion:  We are learning about sin and how it harms our relationship with God.  We will be playing a folder game about venial and mortal sin.

Sept. 2017                       GO PACKERS!

Religion

We are presently learning about the Blessed Trinity.  Do you know how the Blessed Trinity and a Twix candy bar are alike?  Ask your 3rd or 4th grader.  They will be able to tell you.  Come back next month for my explanation.


Reading

     Presently I am doing Running Records to determine my Guided Reading Groups.  I will give more information about these groups next month.
     In our large reading group we are learning about the author Tomie dePaola.  We have read several of his books and are doing projects.  The students used the Chromes to research Mr. dePaola and fill in a paper about his life.  We have also used his books to work on the following skills:  fact and

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opinion, text-to-self, and the authors point of view.  I have included some pictures of the author's point of view project.  We are now working on the skill cause and effect.
     We watched a video that was an interview with Tomie dePaola.  At the end of the video he said he feels it is important for children to just spend some time reading.  He then ended by telling the student to go and spend some time reading.  The following are pictures of them doing just that.

Sharing a good book

Spelling
   
     We take a pretest on Mondays unless we don't have school on Monday for some reason.  Then we take the pretest on Tuesday.  These tests are written in their planners and will give you an idea of which words your child needs to spend more time on.  Our posttests are taken on Fridays.  If your child gets 100% on the pretest he/she does not have to take the test on Friday.

English

We are working on what is a sentence and what is a fragment.  The students are doing an interactive notebook for this skill.  When they determine that a group of words is a fragment they must tell what part is missing and how to fix it.

Reading Buddies

We are doing Reading Buddies with the Kindergarten.  Every Tuesday we  either go to their room or they come to our room.  We read books to them that are at their level.  Some times my students pick the books and some times Mrs. Lowe's students pick the books.  Both classes look forward to this time.  I have included some pictures of the buddies.

Writing

We have written a paragraph about new planet that the students discover while falling back into space.  This was a combined writing and art project.  I have included a few of the paragraphs here. We are now working on our own books based on the book It Looked Like Spilt Milk.

Library

We have library on Wednesdays.  Please remind your child to return their books to school by then.

Working on art

Feb. 6 - 10 in Grade 4

READING
Guided Reading groups are finishing up.  We will be starting new chapter books next week.
The students are working with partners to create advertisements.  We will be video taping the ads as they are finished.

MATH
We are presently working on multiplication of 2-digits times 1-digit.  Later this week we will be starting 2-digits times 2-digits.  The fourth graders need to practice their multiplication.  This is very important because our nest chapter is division.  Your child will find this next chapter much easier if they know their facts.

SPELLING
This week we are working on spelling words with the /k/ sound.  We have learned that this sound can be spelled with a k, c, or ck.  We have also learned to spell the /kw/ sound with a qu.  Our spelling test is on Friday.  Please make sure your child is practicing their spelling words.

ENGLISH
We are working on identifying verbs and the verb tense.  We also just finished writing stories about angels playing hockey in heaven.  They are displayed in the hallway by the fourth grade room.  Stop in and read them sometime.  We have some every creative writers.

Story Time!

by Randi Jo and Madison

In story time Miss Ploederl reads to our class. The first book we read was Wonder. It was about a boy that was deformed. His name was August, but everybody called him Auggie. He was ten. He was home-schooled until fifth grade. Then he went to a public school. In the end he made lots of friends and even won an award. It was a great book.

Now we are reading Mrs. Meyer is on Fire.  We are about half way through the book. It is funny.

We also do D.E.A.R. time. D.E.A.R. stands for Drop Everything and Read. We usually do it for fifteen minutes or less.

Reading Buddies

By Bradey and Prestynn

We do Reading Buddies with the Kindergarteners.  Braeden’s reading buddy is Levi.  He is a nice buddy.  He likes John Deere tractors.  He is an  active kid.

Prestynn’s reading buddy is Nicholas, and he likes reading I Spy books.  He likes sports.

Courtney’s reading buddy is Iley.  She is nice and sweet. She likes to listen to books.

Bradey’s reading buddy is Nick.  He likes tractors, and his favorite color is light blue. He likes the book Velcome, and he likes to read.

Jett’s reading buddy is Maximo.

What’s Happening in Our Fourth Grade Guided Reading?

By Braeden and Jett

The Amber Brown Group is reading Amber Brown You Can’t Eat Chicken Pox.  A personal rating from Bradey and Prestynn is good.The book is fiction, and it’s exciting! It’s easy to understand.

The Lion The Witch And The Wardrobe group gives their book a rating of five out of five stars.  They have read through chapter eleven. They have had a couple of vocabulary worksheets. There are five kids in this group.  There are three girls and two boys.

The Winn Dixie Reading group is reading Because of Winn Dixie.  The story is about a girl who found a dog in the store, and takes the dog home with her.  She keeps the dog, but it is in rough shape.  The star rating for this book is four out of five stars.  In fact this is my, Jett’s, reading group.

Math

By Jack and Walker

          

In the first quarter we learned place value.  We learned ones, tens, hundreds and thousands.  Then we learned millions, ten millions and hundred millions.The last thing we learned was roman numerals.

This quarter we have learned how to subtract correctly, and how to check our math problems to see if we are right.  We have math class before lunch.  Math class is sometimes interrupted by play practice or Music.  Usually we have homework in math.

Now we are working on front end estimating and adding and subtracting four and five digit numbers.

Math

By Jack and Walker

          

In the first quarter we learned place value.  We learned ones, tens, hundreds and thousands.  Then we learned millions, ten millions and hundred millions.The last thing we learned was roman numerals.

This quarter we have learned how to subtract correctly, and how to check our math problems to see if we are right.  We have math class before lunch.  Math class is sometimes interrupted by play practice or Music.  Usually we have homework in math.

Now we are working on front end estimating and adding and subtracting four and five digit numbers.

English Class

By Courtney, Jade, Terese

In English class our teacher is Miss Ploederl. One of the projects we did was a Dear Deer homophone letter.  All thirteen kids had to make a paper deer to go with the project. Before we made the Dear Deer letter, we made practice homophone balls. After we finished, we started our rough draft on the Dear Deer homophone letter. Once we were done with the rough draf,t Miss Ploederl had to look over them. Then when they were done being looked over, we had to type. Then we printed them. On the other days we got different homework pages. Another project we did was a camping paragraph. For the camping paragraph first we had to list things that we heard, saw, and did while camping. After that we picked three things from our list. Then we put them into a paragraph. We drew a picture of us camping to go with it. That is what we do in English class.