Weekly Update 1/23/17

Happy New Year!  I hope that everyone had a wonderful holiday season and enjoyed the long track out.  Track four even got lucky getting to experience the snow days without the Saturday make-ups!  I hope that everyone is ready for another great quarter!

Updates/Reminders: 

• Please sign and return report card envelopes.
• Our field trip to the North Carolina Legislative Building and the North Carolina History Museum is scheduled for Tuesday, February 7th.  All parents have already filled out the field trip permission forms.  The trip will cost $6.00 per child and you can pay online using the following site: https://osp.osmsinc.com/WakeNC/Default.aspx (which is preferred) or you can send in a check or cash for the exact amount.  I will also need five chaperones for this field trip.  I will take the first five parents to email me at jbracke@wpcss.net.
• Friday, February 10th is another early release day.  School will be dismissed at 1:15.
• Our class will celebrate Valentine's Day briefly at the end of the day on Tuesday, February 14th by exchanging valentines.  They do not have to pass out valentines if they would prefer not to, however, if they choose to do so, they should have a valentine for every student in this class.  We currently have 23 students. 
• Student Names: Georgia, Saachi, Eva, Abigail B., Ethan, Savannah, Porter, Jack, Chris, Vincent, Vedant, Hrisha, Alex, Kelly, Jada, Brody, Abigail M., Jackson, Evelyn, Ved, Sydney, Holt, Kayla
• Our incredible PTA organizes a Science Go Round every year.  This year's event will be held on Thursday, February 23rd.  For this the classes get to learn about various science topics from volunteers, who come to talk to the children.  It is a very fun event and one that the students look forward to each year!
• Field trip paperwork for our trip to the coast went home with your child today.  This field trip is scheduled for Thursday, April 27th and is always a favorite fourth grade memory!  We are hoping to have all field trip paperwork and payments received by February 20th.  If you have any questions or concerns about the trip, please feel free to contact me. 

What We Are Learning This Week:
Reading: 

This quarter, the students will focus on reading the often complex text of historical fiction. The students will all be participating in a novel study on this genre.  Each student will be assigned a book to read and given a certain number of pages that have to be read by their next reading group.  If the students do not have time to complete this assigned reading in class, it will become homework.  The students should be copying their novel study page numbers each night into their agenda, along with the date that it is due.  In this unit, 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:

        •Paying close attention to the setting when reading historical fiction texts, as it will most likely be unfamiliar.

        •Taking notes on the “important stuff”, so they can begin to grasp the who, what, where, when, and why of a book.

        •Seeing big ideas in small details when reading.

Questions You Can Ask Your Child At Home:

*What historical fiction novel are you reading for your book club?

*How does the setting affect the character?

*What “important stuff” are you stopping to notice and note as you read? 

*What are some big ideas that are forming in your novel? 

Writing: 

This quarter the students will be engaging in opinion writing.  They will begin the unit by brainstorming lots of things that they have opinions about.  This can be a great topic of discussion at home with your child, as sometimes coming up with topics that we are passionate to write about can be the hardest part!  The students will then work on following their ideas into an organized five paragraph essay (introduction, 3 body paragraphs, and conclusion).  One great way that you can help to support your child at home with this is asking their opinion on different topics and encourage them to give you elaborated reasons to support their belief (ie. ask them why questions). The students will be writing three opinion papers this quarter and it will serve as a wonderful precursor to our fourth quarter writing unit, that will focus on persuasive writing.  

Questions You Can Ask You Child At Home:

*What topics are you passionate or feel strongly about?

*What topics do you dislike and want to change?

*What topic did you have the strongest argument on?

Math: 

In math, the students will be working on solving problems that involve area and perimeter.  The students will be working on practicing these strategies during taught mini-lessons, daily quick checks and small guided math instruction.  This is a very quick unit and the students will be taking the area & perimeter assessment on Monday, January 30th.   

Questions You Can Ask Your Child At Home: 

*Apply the area and perimeter formulas for rectangles in real world and mathematical problems.

*Solve area & perimeter problems

*Compose and decompose complex figures to calculate the area & perimeter. 

Social Studies: 

This week in Social Studies the students will begin their unit on economics.  They will learn what a market economy is and the relationship between supply and demand through a lemonade stand activity and online game.  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 will have a copy in their social studies journal and LIGHTHOUSE binder, as they will be assessed on them Monday, February 6th.  

Questions You Can Ask Your Child At Home: 

*What is a market economy?

*How does supply and demand affect prices?

*What is scarcity?

*What would it take to open a successful lemonade stand?

*Have you been studying your economics vocabulary words?