First Full Week!

This week in social studies, the 4th graders have learned all seven continents and all five oceans. They can find them on a world map, and they can even sing them all in order from largest to smallest!

We also reviewed cardinal and intermediate directions. Students have labeled them on a compass rose, and today we practiced navigating with them.

If you came to Parent Night on Tuesday night, you might’ve seen your child’s “I am from…” poem on display. They wrote the poems in class on Monday using an outline which encouraged them to write about family traditions, special foods and more. On Tuesday we typed and printed them.

We also kicked off our first class novel, Newbery-honor winner, Charlotte’s Web. The students were amazed to learn that the book was written back in 1952, so it qualifies as ‘traditional literature’ and a ‘fantasy’ book. Throughout the week, we read three chapters – two aloud together and one at home. In class, I read the narration and the kids assume the character parts, reading dialogue aloud.

One skill we are working on this quarter is summarizing. We learned an efficient way to summarize any book, movie, chapter, etc. We use the ‘Somebody Wanted But So’ method. Students to identify who the main character is in the chapter, what the character wanted to do, what the obstacles were, and what the end result was. They have written their brief summaries in their Reader’s Notebooks.

The Reader’s Notebook is one of my favorite tools. Students keep track of all the books they read and they record the genre. They write down books they plan to read, ones they hear about from classmates, teachers, or Patchwork guests. They use it as a place to write about their reading, and it holds their weekly reading log.

In morphology this week, we reviewed the suffix -s or -es and when to use each one.

In Morning Meeting this week, we enjoyed games of Elevens, the middle name greeting, Two Arms/One Arm/No Arms, and Agreeable Corners. We also shared our goals for the year which helped us create our classroom expectations.

This week, all students in K-7 had school pictures made, and today we gathered for a group photo of the entire grade.

We were all excited to gather in Brown Gym today for the captains’ speeches. Nine 8th graders were nominated by their peers, and all students in Grades 4-8 cast votes. Congrats to all nominees, including Benjamin Hudson, Luke Jones, Evan Clardy, Claire Schneider, and the winners, Dalton Weprin, Hayes Hampton, Jaxon Hopkins and Betsy Blair.