Grade 4 Weekly Newsletter
March 11 - 15
Curriculum
Reading:
This week we will continue our social issues book club unit. Students will be stopping and thinking about the texts they are reading. They will be looking for evidence to support their ideas to help them grow their understanding of the text, characters, and themes or social issues.They will be sharing their ideas with their book club members and building upon each other’s ideas.
The lessons for this week are:
Lesson 1: Identifying important scenes to cite evidence.
Lesson 2: Books have multiple issues and issues connect to other issues
Lesson 3: Dip into nonfiction to better understand your book’s social issue
Essential Questions
How can I determine and reflect on the social issues in texts?
Writing:
This week students will continue our Literary Essay unit. This unit aims to make reading a more intense, analytical experience for our grade 4 students. It builds upon our students prior work with writing personal and persuasive essays. Students will address the theme of a story or stories and interpret and analyze the ways words, phrases, and ideas are used in a text. Students will be encouraged to use quotes, micro stories, and lists as evidence to support their theories.
Some of the books we will be reading in grade 4 during this unit are:
The lessons for this week are:
Lesson 1: Using Lists as Evidence
Lesson 2: Putting It All Together
Lesson 3: Writing to Discover What a Story is Really About
Essential Questions
How do writers select a claim to write a literary essay?
How can I show evidence that supports the idea or claim I am making about a text?
How do writers analyze text for reasoning?
Mathematics:
This week we will be continuing Module 5 - Fraction Equivalence, Ordering, and Operations.
This module builds on students’ grade 3 work with unit fractions as they explore fraction equivalence and extend this understanding to mixed numbers. This leads to comparison of fractions and mixed numbers and the representation of both in a variety of models. Benchmark fractions (ie. ½) play an important role when students reason about fraction and mixed number sizes. Students have the opportunity to apply what they know to be true to new situations and problems.
Math Mid-Module Reflection Feedback: Please give your student’s teacher any feedback you have on the “I can” Student Reflection students brought home to help them reflect on their mid-module assessment. Do you feel it helps your child identify strengths and areas of growth? How could we improve it?
Essential Questions:
Why express quantities, measurements and fraction number relationships in different ways?
How can fraction number relationships be expressed in different ways?
The lessons for this week are:
Lesson 1: Adding mixed numbers and fractions
Lesson 2: Adding mixed fractions
Lesson 3: Subtracting a fraction from a mixed number
Lesson 4: Subtracting a mixed number from a mixed number
Lesson 5: Using the associative property to solve fraction multiplication problems, eg. 4 X ⅗
Parent Tip Sheets: Topic A, Topic B, Topic C, Topic D, Topic E, Topic F, Topic G, Topic H.
Here is the LINK to the Growth Mindset video (Jo Boaler). We suggest you watch it with your child and discuss what might create a positive math classroom at school. How can you build a positive math relationship with your child? What type of dialogue will you use? You might like the following sentence starters to help you!
Social Studies: The Road to Independence
In this unit we will be looking at the causes of the American Revolution and discussing the issues of the day from multiple perspectives. In the culminating project the students will be selecting a famous person from the time (American or British) and created a ‘Facebook’ page for them on Glogster. This poster will include famous quotes, pictures, and some oral recordings that the students make as they attempt to become their character.
Essential Questions:
How do people, government and key events connect to build a nation?
Week 3/4 Focus:
Lesson 9 Focus: Research, Students are to continue researching their character for their Facebook/Glogster
work. Mini-Lesson: Argument Talk Rules
Give students this first attempt at thinking and strengthening their perspective planning
Lesson 10 Focus: Declaration of Independence: Watch Liberty Kids Dec. of Independence.
Was this right or wrong? Look at it from both perspectives. (British and US)
Lesson 11 Focus: Research: Students are to continue researching their character for their Facebook/Glogster work. Mini-lesson - citing sources using MLA
Grade 4 Homework:
Daily homework tasks will be written into student planners each day. Tasks may include reading for 20-30 minutes per night, writing for 10 minutes per night along with additional mathematics work, that is differentiated according to student needs. Homework may differ according to teachers and students. Any mathematics homework that students find challenging please advise their homeroom teacher so they can progress accordingly. Homework is not meant to be impossible, challenging for students to grow their brains, but not impossible!
Grade 4 Guidance Update
Guidance Update – Upcoming Puberty Talks
Dear Grade 4 Families,
As part of the health and social education your child receives, we will be providing puberty classes for all 4th and 5th grade students this month. This program revolves around the belief that if children are better informed they will be more comfortable with the changes they are going through and more willing to seek support from their parents and other trusted adults.
The dates for the Grade 4 puberty lessons are Thursday, March 22nd and Thursday, March 29th.
Please click on this Puberty - Letter for Parents link for important information regarding the topics that will be addressed and the video that will be showed.
All the best,
Carey Harris
charris@g-cacegypt.org
Guidance Update Gr. 4– Responding to Cyber Bullying
There are many ways to socialize with friends, such as talking to them in person or using technology to send emails or texts. Using technology to communicate can be really fun and useful, but technology can also be used to hurt or cyber bully other people. Cyber bullying is using electronic technology to purposefully hurt someone else. It is immediate, long lasting and can spread further and faster than people are usually aware. Students will learn that everything they say or do online can be tracked, nothing electronic is private and there is a lasting digital footprint.
Students will:
Discuss the importance of keeping their personal information (Y.A.P.P.Y your name, address, phone number, passwords or your plans) safe.
Review the 3 steps for handling hurtful messages:
1. Do not respond
2. Save it
3. Tell an Adult;
· Demonstrate ways to support and/or stand up for someone being hurt online (such as reporting to an adult or leaving a chat group).
Shelter Drill
We will be having a drill on March 12 to practice shelter procedures. Teachers will discuss this as “shelter practice” with students in age-appropriate ways, but you may also want to also talk to your child about the subject. Last year, we shared this article with helpful suggestions for talking to children about safety procedures and practices. One of the things addressed is the impact of the terminology we use. Staff members will be going over this in advance, as we work together to ensure that students feel safe, protected, and aware of what to do in different situations.http://www.huffingtonpost.com/judith-simon-prager-phd/talking-to-kids-about-a-lockdown_b_4117330.html
The drill will be held at 12:00 pm, so if you are on campus, we ask that you follow instructions when asked to go to a safe place. Everyone who is outside will be moved to the ES Hall.
Typing Program
Our grades 3, 4, and 5 students learn touch typing in their classes to prepare for the work they do on computers in upper elementary and in middle school. The program we use is called ‘Typing Club’ and is an online program from Google. Link here. Students can access the program from home.
Upcoming Events
Wednesday, Mar. 7th - Early Release Day
Thursday, Mar. 8th - CAC Holiday
March 12th - Shelter Drill 12pm.
Tuesday, March 13, 2018, 7:55am - 8:25am - CAC ES Walk-A-Thon and Fundraiser for African Hope Food Program
Thursday, March 15, 3:10 pm - 4:15 pm: Movie Night
Repeat Announcements
Core Value of the Month
During the month of March we will focus on the Core Value of Perseverance.
No comments:
Post a Comment