The Fourth Grade is Off and Running
We are energized by our new students and eager for them to learn more about the culture of the MCCPS community. To that end we are working to assist 4th graders to become better acquainted with rules and procedures as well as helping them to organize their binders and other materials in the classroom. Academic work began immediately with skills building and assessment in every content area of the curriculum. We are anxious to share their progress and more about our program at Parent Teacher Night this Thursday at 6:30 P.M. Please don’t miss this opportunity to learn about all the exciting learning opportunities your children will have this school year.
See you on Thursday!
Fourth Grade Teachers
Playwrights, Actors, Poets, Mathematicians, Biologists and More
4th Graders Study about China and Life Cycles
A month into our third trimester, fourth graders are finishing up a whirlwind Global Studies “tour” of our northern neighbor, Canada, and will soon conduct a brief “journey” to our southern one, Mexico. The curriculum focus is on the geography, history and culture, and how each country gained its independence.
After April vacation, we will begin to concentrate our energies on Ancient China, when fourth graders will learn about this fascinating civilization from the Confucius to the First Emperor, from the terracotta soldiers to the unbelievable array of inventions made in Ancient China. Fourth graders will be reading a Chinese folktale, “A Grain of Rice,” and developing a script based on this story.
In Writing, students are starting to share and appreciate different forms of poetry and we will be composing various types of poems, from couplets to haikus to free verse. In Reading, fourth graders are discussing folktales, with a spotlight on American tall tales such as John Henry and Pecos Bill. This trimester we will also be talking about myths, which dovetails well with our current classroom read aloud, The Lightning Thief, the first novel in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series.
New Year, New Projects, New Excitement
The Fourth Grade has many new and exciting content areas to understand and skills to refine for this second trimester. Work has already begun to integrate those content areas and skills in Exhibition projects for Trimester 2.
Our major focus in the Humanities is on nonfiction reading, research, and writing. Students have selected states to discover their state’s history, products, resources, geography, climate, and location. Students are using various resources to find information, from atlases to websites. They will design and publish a state brochure to demonstrate their learning. Not only will students become knowledgeable about their states, but will also understand the unique regions (Northeast, Southeast, Midwest, Southwest, and West) of our country. Students will identify all states and their capitals, as well as the major rivers and mountain ranges of the U.S.
For nonfiction reading, students have chosen a biography of a person from their state. This month, they are grasping what a biography is, why a biography is written, and how to better comprehend nonfiction text. To apply their understanding, students will be composing an hourglass bio-poem and creating a bio-doll about their state’s famous person. In addition, students will be reading in small group, leveled-text, biography book clubs.
First Trimester
Students are completing their bridge designs, buying materials from the warehouse and building their bridges. Each student performs one of four important roles in the project: architect, carpenter, accountant and construction manager. Every student is writing about their experience with the project in a journal and applying what they have practiced in math to construction and purchasing. In math class students are beginning work on multiplication and division, number sentences and algebra. In Global Studies, fourth graders have completed their research, graphic organizers, and first draft of their immigration stories. In Modern Languages, students, on their way to America, are learning to communicate as “immigrants” with a French immigration official. In Writing, students have been creating haunted stories in their writing journals, identifying homophones, and practicing dictionary skills. In Reading, students have complete “Sees Behind Trees,” a novel about a Native American boy’s passage to adulthood, and will begin reading “Hannah’s Journal,” a diary-like novel about a Russian girl’s journey to America.
Students have started writing stories in their writing journals as well as learning about “reading as thinking.” They are beginning to search for books in our classroom libraries and enjoying D.I.R.T. (Daily Independent Reading Time) during Advisory. The Traits of Writing and the Writing Process will be introduced shortly, with a focus on the Ideas and Organization traits. As for grammar, sentences, nouns, and verbs will be emphasized. Students have completed the NWEA testing in both reading and math.
Fourth graders have just begun our unit on “Many Dreams, One Nation,” which starts with understanding the lives of Native Americans – who are they? Where did they come from? How did they get to North America? What did they contribute to our American culture? In Reading, we are connecting this topic with the novel, “Sees Behind Trees,” by Michael Dorris.
As part of their first exhibition, fourth grade students will learn about immigration and will choose their countries of origin. Plans are under way for designing and building bridges and students are learning American Sign Language for their performance on exhibition night.
Students will be extending their ideas about data collection, organization, display, and analysis and reviewing procedures for addition and subtraction of multi-digit whole numbers. After the Unit II assessment, 4th graders can look forward to working towards total recall of multiplication facts and using these facts to find basic division facts as well as learning a problem solving scheme to solve number stories and find mathematical models for more complicated problems. Students will also learn new algebra vocabulary.
Students are learning about energy as they experience hands-on science and work in lab groups to explore various forms of energy. Soon we will begin our study of bridges as we address the technology & engineering standards for fourth grade. Students will complete lab activities, use computer simulations, and watch a video to understand concepts involved in bridge building. As soon as students have completed their lab work, bridge companies will be formed and students will begin designing their own bridges.