Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday! I have had early morning bus duty this week so I have to be at school by 7:15. I am very happy about it being Thursday because I only have one more day of it! I will not see it again for 7 weeks! I am so not a morning person! This week has been a great week. We are accomplishing a lot every single day. The students are pretty much adjusted to 4th grade. They are getting their organizational skills down, and they know to use their study hall wisely. I am very proud of all of them. We will continue to work on these things throughout the year but they are doing great.
Language Arts - We are reading a story called Me and Uncle Romie. This is a fiction story but it is based on a real live collage artist named Romare Bearden. Is a story that makes you feel good. A boy is going to stay with his aunt and uncle whom he has never meant before because his mother is having twins soon. He will also celebrate his birthday while he is there. He is nervous and scared to go but in the end he has a great time and makes a wonderful connection with Uncle Romie. He even try to create meaningful art like him. We are still working on Verbs this week. We focused on present progressing and past progressive verbs tenses. It all boils down to the helping verb we use that decides present or past. The action verb will be the same in both, and it ends in -ing. If the helping verb is: am, is or are than it is present tense and if it is was or were then it is past tense. This is also what will be on their assessment on Friday. They will be asked to choose the correct tense to place in a sentence. Our vocabulary strategy this week was on figures of speech. Like saying "hang in there", we don't take the words literally. I went over several examples and even had them come up with a few. I made sure to cover all the ones that will show up on their assessment. I do not plan to do a story for Language arts next week. The week is to short and too busy with Mass on our short day. I, in not way, can make a story meaningful by rushing through it. We will share Halloween stories next week, we will have a writing activity and will get started in our Handwriting books. I also will do some read aloud and free reading time for them. Be sure to study vocabulary words and spelling words tonight.
Math - We have started this week learning how to multiply by tens, hundreds, and thousands. We applied that knowledge to estimating products to see if answers are reasonable or not reasonable. We will move onto the Distributive property either Friday or Monday. This is not hard once you understand it. I had a grandfather visit one day during this math lesson. He was surprised at how much this made sense after being taught how it works. He couldn't stop talking about it because he had learned something new and it made complete sense. He has been my inspiration and great reminder that what we are teaching is good stuff. I see a lot of negativity online about the "new" math. This is not new stuff it has been around a very long time. It was just not required for us to teach it so we didn't. We only taught kids one way to do things. Well, are we only going to teach them one way to get out of a burning building? What happens when that way is blocked? How do they use their own problem-solving skills to get out? Same applies to building a house with only a hammer. How does that happen. I am filling their tool belt with strategies and skills that will make them think about other ways in case one way is blocked or just doesn't work for them. I know they may bring it home and you may not be able to help them. I am here by 7:45 every morning they can come in early to get help and I stress to them from 2:30-3:00 every day I am available to them. They have to ask me questions! I try to make my math happen with the least amount of stress and give them time to work on their homework so it doesn't come home.
Social Studies - This week we have learned about Nigara Falls and how important it is to the state of New York. Not only is it beautiful but it supplies New York with most of its electricity. We also learned about 6 mountain ranges and where they are located and for some how they go their names. The last thing was about the difference between the coastline in Maine and in New Jersey. We are working on a map skill dealing with the directions using a compass rose. We learned about how to properly go about reading a Cross-section Diagram. By Friday we will be ready to put our first state into our interactive notebooks. Whew! That was a lot of stuff to pick up on in a week's time. We are truly working hard! They also seem to be enjoying it all as we do it. For some reason Social Studies always becomes a 4th graders favorite topic to study. I think it might be because of my love for it. We also do lots of group work, that also may be it. Our topic of the 50 states seems to help to. We will keep up the hard work.
Book it - Next week is the end of the month. Please be sure to sign your student's book it calendars so they can turn them in. I will not accept them with out a parent signature. I can't wait to see how much some of them have been reading. I have not read as much this month as I normally do. Remember they need to turn it in even if they didn't meet the goal. I will give a prize at end for those who turned in all 6 calendars even though they did not meet the goal. I just want to track their minutes. There is a great poster in the hallway for book fair showing the correlation of reading so many minutes per day and standardized test scores! After reading that, you may want to have more free reading happen in your household. To me it made sense. Check it out.
Server Training - There will be a server training for those Catholic students in 3-4-5 grades on November 3rd and 4th after mass. We are really needing servers at this level so if you have a child that is able please be sure to have them attend one of the training sessions. Thank you.
Conferences - Reminder conferences are next week! Be sure to sign up for a time to meet with me. Last I looked I had many signed up but was still looking for a few more. I will remind your student if you still need to sign up. Thank you! I look forward to meeting with you.
Halloween Activities - We will be painting pumpkins here at school one day. The pumpkins are brought in by Taylor's family. I have painting shirts here all ready so it will protect them from paint on clothing. This will just be a fun "extra" art activity for us to do. On Wednesday, we will have Halloween activities put on by the Civics Club. We will have a small Halloween party in our classroom before with a snack and drinks. It will be an absolute crazy week but we will get through it! I look forward to having fun with the kids.
I hope all of you have a great weekend! I look to have a nice relaxing one. Next week will be crazy with Halloween activities! This is the reason I plan to relax and enjoy the weekend!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, October 25, 2018
Thursday, October 18, 2018
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday! I hope all of you are enjoying the sunshine. I know I am! It was so nice to be out a recess with the kids with the sun! Conferences are quickly approaching. They are two week from today. I have emailed out a sign-up so that you can sign up for a time to meet with me. I sent it to the emails that you provided the school. I also put it out on our 4th grade Facebook page. Please find the link and sign up. I have a large gap from 4:20 to 6:00 that I am not available. From 5:00 - 6:00 we have supper hour and I have my own daughter's conference at 4:45 at the High School. I need to drive out there for that. There is more than enough time slots left over but I apologize if these times are ones you were looking forward to signing up for. Here is the link in case anyone has not seen it yet.
https://www.signupgenius.com/go/20f0544a5a72ca1fe3-4thgrade5
Language Arts - This week in Language Arts we are reading a story called Coming Disasters: Questioning Movies. This story talks about some of the special effects that movies contain. It also points out the "unrealistic events" that take place in movies. One example is, when a parent loses a job, they still live in big gorgeous homes and drive brand new vehicles. They also point out severe car crashes where the car flips in the air and catches fire and people walk or run away form those accidents. The last one is when there is fight scenes going on and women are wearing high heels while fighting bad guys. These are all things that would have different outcomes in real life. We also read a short article on the different kinds of special effects out there and concentrated on how they created the dinosaurs for Jurassic Park. We reviewed verb tenses this week. We talked about the three kinds: past, present and future. We also talked about when a sentence has two verbs in it we have to keep the tenses the same. If the sentence is a past tense sentence then both verbs should be past tense. Our vocabulary strategy this week was on Greek and Latin word parts. We talked about phon, graph, tele, photo, auto. We looked at their meanings and then looked at words that contained these word parts. They will need to study their vocabulary packets and spelling words for tomorrow.
Math - We have spent the last week working on multiplication comparisons. We learned how to write an equation from a comparison sentence and we learned how to draw a model to match. After everyone mastered this skill we moved on to word problems that contained a multiplication comparison. We then spent two days figuring out word problems using our new strategy. When I was confident that the students had the hang of it, I assigned the worksheet to go along with it. That happened today. I reviewed the strategy using problems they had worked on their own and them allowed them time to work on the worksheet in class so that if they had questions they could ask. Most of them completed the worksheet. I feel they all are understanding this concept and how to work these problems. Tomorrow we will go to the Food Pantry to help unload the truck so we will not start the third lesson until Monday. That lesson will be over multiplying tens, hundreds and thousands.
Social Studies - We have started a lesson on the Northeast region. Our focus has been vocabulary words so far. We had an introduction to the first lesson yesterday and began reading it today. They learned how important Niagara Falls is to the state of New York. Not only is the tourism important because the falls are so beautiful, but there are hydropower plants on the Niagara River that supply most of the state of New York with electricity. We will move on to talk about mountain ranges in the region. After lesson 1 we will put our first Northeast state into the Interactive notebooks and I will begin teaching them the states and Capitals song.
Muffins with Mom - Thanks to all the moms that attended this morning's event. It was fun for all. It is so great to have a packed gym full of loving moms having breakfast. I am sure your child appreciates you coming also.
Book Reports- Remember that all book reports are due by Friday, November 16th. I have some students that are done with their book and beginning their reports and I still have some students reading their books. Please just check with them on where they are. They have everything they need in their expanded files. If they have lost things let me know so I can get them more copies. I just want to be sure all students are working on this. I check with them here but just hoping you are doing the same at home. They are welcome to bring their boxes to school and work on them here if they would want.
Happy Thursday! I hope all of you are enjoying the sunshine. I know I am! It was so nice to be out a recess with the kids with the sun! Conferences are quickly approaching. They are two week from today. I have emailed out a sign-up so that you can sign up for a time to meet with me. I sent it to the emails that you provided the school. I also put it out on our 4th grade Facebook page. Please find the link and sign up. I have a large gap from 4:20 to 6:00 that I am not available. From 5:00 - 6:00 we have supper hour and I have my own daughter's conference at 4:45 at the High School. I need to drive out there for that. There is more than enough time slots left over but I apologize if these times are ones you were looking forward to signing up for. Here is the link in case anyone has not seen it yet.
https://www.signupgenius.com/go/20f0544a5a72ca1fe3-4thgrade5
Language Arts - This week in Language Arts we are reading a story called Coming Disasters: Questioning Movies. This story talks about some of the special effects that movies contain. It also points out the "unrealistic events" that take place in movies. One example is, when a parent loses a job, they still live in big gorgeous homes and drive brand new vehicles. They also point out severe car crashes where the car flips in the air and catches fire and people walk or run away form those accidents. The last one is when there is fight scenes going on and women are wearing high heels while fighting bad guys. These are all things that would have different outcomes in real life. We also read a short article on the different kinds of special effects out there and concentrated on how they created the dinosaurs for Jurassic Park. We reviewed verb tenses this week. We talked about the three kinds: past, present and future. We also talked about when a sentence has two verbs in it we have to keep the tenses the same. If the sentence is a past tense sentence then both verbs should be past tense. Our vocabulary strategy this week was on Greek and Latin word parts. We talked about phon, graph, tele, photo, auto. We looked at their meanings and then looked at words that contained these word parts. They will need to study their vocabulary packets and spelling words for tomorrow.
Math - We have spent the last week working on multiplication comparisons. We learned how to write an equation from a comparison sentence and we learned how to draw a model to match. After everyone mastered this skill we moved on to word problems that contained a multiplication comparison. We then spent two days figuring out word problems using our new strategy. When I was confident that the students had the hang of it, I assigned the worksheet to go along with it. That happened today. I reviewed the strategy using problems they had worked on their own and them allowed them time to work on the worksheet in class so that if they had questions they could ask. Most of them completed the worksheet. I feel they all are understanding this concept and how to work these problems. Tomorrow we will go to the Food Pantry to help unload the truck so we will not start the third lesson until Monday. That lesson will be over multiplying tens, hundreds and thousands.
Social Studies - We have started a lesson on the Northeast region. Our focus has been vocabulary words so far. We had an introduction to the first lesson yesterday and began reading it today. They learned how important Niagara Falls is to the state of New York. Not only is the tourism important because the falls are so beautiful, but there are hydropower plants on the Niagara River that supply most of the state of New York with electricity. We will move on to talk about mountain ranges in the region. After lesson 1 we will put our first Northeast state into the Interactive notebooks and I will begin teaching them the states and Capitals song.
Muffins with Mom - Thanks to all the moms that attended this morning's event. It was fun for all. It is so great to have a packed gym full of loving moms having breakfast. I am sure your child appreciates you coming also.
Book Reports- Remember that all book reports are due by Friday, November 16th. I have some students that are done with their book and beginning their reports and I still have some students reading their books. Please just check with them on where they are. They have everything they need in their expanded files. If they have lost things let me know so I can get them more copies. I just want to be sure all students are working on this. I check with them here but just hoping you are doing the same at home. They are welcome to bring their boxes to school and work on them here if they would want.
I hope all of you have a great weekend.
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, October 11, 2018
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday! Hello welcome to the cold! I am thinking we are actually having a Fall! I am packing up by capris and pulling out the sweaters! I am happy to have Fall for once. Normally we skip it. We are back to a pretty normal week this week but so far I have had one student absent every day this week. All different kids! I hope tomorrow is perfect attendance! We will see!
Language Arts - This week we are reading the story "Invasion From Mars". This is a piece out of War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells. In 1938, since they had no TV, radio shows read books or even acted books out over the radio. On October 30, 1938, they were acting out this section on the radio. If you didn't know that it was a radio show, you would be terrified hearing it. Many Americans tuned in after is started and it caused panic. You can pull it up on Youtube. Today I will let the kids listen to it. We are working on Verbs in grammar. We learned about action verbs, helping verbs and linking verbs. Our vocabulary strategy focus was on suffixes -y, and -ous. Please remember to study the vocabulary words (yellow packet) tonight and spelling words for the post test.
Math - We have begun chapter 2. The first couple of lessons are about multiplication comparisons. We have covered the first lesson. We will be practicing more of it today and they will then do their worksheet. This is pretty easy to understand but lesson 2 when I put this into practice with word problems it tends to get a little more difficult or tedious. This is one strategy to working word problems that are making comparisons. I will drill this into them and they will be able to work these problems well. This whole chapter is focusing on multiplication. Any fact work you can do at home will be great! Anytime you can do flashcards or find a computer game drilling basic facts, that would be fabulous.
Social Studies - We are learning this week how to put items in our Interactive notebooks. All the kids were to have a composition book. This composition book is what we use for their interactive notebooks. We started this week with the United States. We made a book on important facts like: largest city, national bird, national nickname, national flower, capital city, and when it was established. We also colored the US Flag. Tomorrow we will glue all these things into our notebook. This is a routine thing we will do with all 50 states throughout the year. At the end of the year they will have a notebook with facts and information about all 50 states. It's a pretty cool thing for them to have. We will begin digging into the Northeast Region next week. We begin by talking about some natural resources the it has.
The students are doing a great job reading their book report books at school. I feel like most are keeping track of their minutes for book it. I can't believe we are almost mid way through October. In a teacher's perspective the end of the year is close. Once we hit Halloween, it is conferences, then Thanksgiving and then Christmas. We have a lot of breaks in there and days off from school. It always seems to go very fast! Weather is changing please be sure your child dresses appropriately. I know they can still wear shorts BUT they will be going to recess and freeing when the highs for the day are lower 40's. I hope everyone has a great weekend!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Thursday! Hello welcome to the cold! I am thinking we are actually having a Fall! I am packing up by capris and pulling out the sweaters! I am happy to have Fall for once. Normally we skip it. We are back to a pretty normal week this week but so far I have had one student absent every day this week. All different kids! I hope tomorrow is perfect attendance! We will see!
Language Arts - This week we are reading the story "Invasion From Mars". This is a piece out of War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells. In 1938, since they had no TV, radio shows read books or even acted books out over the radio. On October 30, 1938, they were acting out this section on the radio. If you didn't know that it was a radio show, you would be terrified hearing it. Many Americans tuned in after is started and it caused panic. You can pull it up on Youtube. Today I will let the kids listen to it. We are working on Verbs in grammar. We learned about action verbs, helping verbs and linking verbs. Our vocabulary strategy focus was on suffixes -y, and -ous. Please remember to study the vocabulary words (yellow packet) tonight and spelling words for the post test.
Math - We have begun chapter 2. The first couple of lessons are about multiplication comparisons. We have covered the first lesson. We will be practicing more of it today and they will then do their worksheet. This is pretty easy to understand but lesson 2 when I put this into practice with word problems it tends to get a little more difficult or tedious. This is one strategy to working word problems that are making comparisons. I will drill this into them and they will be able to work these problems well. This whole chapter is focusing on multiplication. Any fact work you can do at home will be great! Anytime you can do flashcards or find a computer game drilling basic facts, that would be fabulous.
Social Studies - We are learning this week how to put items in our Interactive notebooks. All the kids were to have a composition book. This composition book is what we use for their interactive notebooks. We started this week with the United States. We made a book on important facts like: largest city, national bird, national nickname, national flower, capital city, and when it was established. We also colored the US Flag. Tomorrow we will glue all these things into our notebook. This is a routine thing we will do with all 50 states throughout the year. At the end of the year they will have a notebook with facts and information about all 50 states. It's a pretty cool thing for them to have. We will begin digging into the Northeast Region next week. We begin by talking about some natural resources the it has.
The students are doing a great job reading their book report books at school. I feel like most are keeping track of their minutes for book it. I can't believe we are almost mid way through October. In a teacher's perspective the end of the year is close. Once we hit Halloween, it is conferences, then Thanksgiving and then Christmas. We have a lot of breaks in there and days off from school. It always seems to go very fast! Weather is changing please be sure your child dresses appropriately. I know they can still wear shorts BUT they will be going to recess and freeing when the highs for the day are lower 40's. I hope everyone has a great weekend!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Wednesday, October 3, 2018
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday! I am "out of the office" today. Ms. Surma and I are taking a class. It is called Tier two. It is over our FAST testing that we are doing in our classrooms. We will have to attend classes 3 different times this year. I am also going to be attending a different class on the 16th and 30th of this month. It is a classroom teaching strategies. I am looking forward to this one. I know a couple people who have taken it and really liked it. It gives you ways to keep the kids engaged in their learning. I hate being gone from my class but I feel it will definitely be beneficial. We as teachers are still constantly learning and gaining information to help us, help our students learn and be able to take ownership in their own learning. It is kind of exciting! I am looking forward to it. I am not looking forward to the extra planning it takes to be gone though.
Language Arts - This week has been a Unit Test week!!! There are advantages to this week and disadvantages. The advantages are no spelling test, no homework, no daily lessons, more reading time to count reading minutes and more read aloud. These are all great things. The disadvantage is you have to take a very large test consisting of about 55 problems and several stories to read. These assessments are not easy! It also tells me how well they are retaining material. I use these results to help me see what strategies tended to work better with the kids and how well they are reading and comprehending. Again these assessments are quite challenging. If the student rushes through the test and doesn't take their time they will do poorly. Usually after the first unit test I can share the results with the students and have them ask themselves if you did poorly, did you rush? Usually lots of them end up getting an idea that if they take their time and work slowly being sure to read everything, they will do better. It is a larger lesson learned! We will have another Unit test in 5 weeks!
Math - We finished our first chapter in Math this week. The students are working on taking a math test. They started it on Wednesday and will finish it Thursday. I am working with them on taking their time and proving their answers. They take the test online but have a paper test to show their work or prove their answer on. They are required to show work on any problem that needs it. I only allowed them to complete half the test on Wednesday and the other on Thursday. Some didn't even finish the first half, which is fine, it means they didn't rush. Others did finish the first half which could mean they total understand all the problems. If the test is not finished we will spend Friday finishing up. After we wrap things up with the test we will then begin chapter 2!
Social Studies - The students corrected their tests on Wednesday. I will look at those corrections and give a final score. I will then send the tests home with the students to have signed by a parent and returned. The students will be working on map skills on and off this year. They will start with the first map skills assignment on Thursday. It will just brush up their knowledge of the kinds of maps that are out there and what information they give. We will then work with all those kinds of maps throughout the year. We will also begin working on the Northeast Region. We will begin learning how to put together our interactive notebooks and learn our states and capitals song. Again that can be purchased at Itunes. It is by Macho Nacho. I like this part, we are really getting down to business now!
Book Reports- I assigned the first book report on Wednesday. The report is not due until November 16th. The students have plenty of time to read a book and complete the report. This is meant to be fun for the students not stressful. I try to talk to the kids about challenging themselves and enjoying a book then using their creativity to put together something that shows what you read. They all we be completing a cereal box book report. You will see all the directions in their expanded file. I gave them a whole packet on things and went over them in full. The students were asking questions as we went along. I have given them some rules about the books they choose to read. Mainly about book size and challenging themselves. I shared my book blog that I have with them. I showed them that after I read a book I write a small article about what I thought of the book. I told them I am careful not to give away anything from the book that would ruin it. I pulled up my blog and shared the book Before We Were Yours with them. So I said I kind of write a report about the books I read when I am done. Some were very impressed. I am trying to show them that I do because I want to not because I have to. Again trying to make it a positive experience. Some are very excited about it!
Looks like we have a rainy weekend ahead of us! Probably more than anyone wants. My apologies to all the farming families out there who will have a halt put into their harvesting plans. I don't mind the Fall temps I could just do without the rain. It makes it colder. I will once again be luck enough to have all 3 kids under my roof for the weekend. God is good!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Thursday! I am "out of the office" today. Ms. Surma and I are taking a class. It is called Tier two. It is over our FAST testing that we are doing in our classrooms. We will have to attend classes 3 different times this year. I am also going to be attending a different class on the 16th and 30th of this month. It is a classroom teaching strategies. I am looking forward to this one. I know a couple people who have taken it and really liked it. It gives you ways to keep the kids engaged in their learning. I hate being gone from my class but I feel it will definitely be beneficial. We as teachers are still constantly learning and gaining information to help us, help our students learn and be able to take ownership in their own learning. It is kind of exciting! I am looking forward to it. I am not looking forward to the extra planning it takes to be gone though.
Language Arts - This week has been a Unit Test week!!! There are advantages to this week and disadvantages. The advantages are no spelling test, no homework, no daily lessons, more reading time to count reading minutes and more read aloud. These are all great things. The disadvantage is you have to take a very large test consisting of about 55 problems and several stories to read. These assessments are not easy! It also tells me how well they are retaining material. I use these results to help me see what strategies tended to work better with the kids and how well they are reading and comprehending. Again these assessments are quite challenging. If the student rushes through the test and doesn't take their time they will do poorly. Usually after the first unit test I can share the results with the students and have them ask themselves if you did poorly, did you rush? Usually lots of them end up getting an idea that if they take their time and work slowly being sure to read everything, they will do better. It is a larger lesson learned! We will have another Unit test in 5 weeks!
Math - We finished our first chapter in Math this week. The students are working on taking a math test. They started it on Wednesday and will finish it Thursday. I am working with them on taking their time and proving their answers. They take the test online but have a paper test to show their work or prove their answer on. They are required to show work on any problem that needs it. I only allowed them to complete half the test on Wednesday and the other on Thursday. Some didn't even finish the first half, which is fine, it means they didn't rush. Others did finish the first half which could mean they total understand all the problems. If the test is not finished we will spend Friday finishing up. After we wrap things up with the test we will then begin chapter 2!
Social Studies - The students corrected their tests on Wednesday. I will look at those corrections and give a final score. I will then send the tests home with the students to have signed by a parent and returned. The students will be working on map skills on and off this year. They will start with the first map skills assignment on Thursday. It will just brush up their knowledge of the kinds of maps that are out there and what information they give. We will then work with all those kinds of maps throughout the year. We will also begin working on the Northeast Region. We will begin learning how to put together our interactive notebooks and learn our states and capitals song. Again that can be purchased at Itunes. It is by Macho Nacho. I like this part, we are really getting down to business now!
Book Reports- I assigned the first book report on Wednesday. The report is not due until November 16th. The students have plenty of time to read a book and complete the report. This is meant to be fun for the students not stressful. I try to talk to the kids about challenging themselves and enjoying a book then using their creativity to put together something that shows what you read. They all we be completing a cereal box book report. You will see all the directions in their expanded file. I gave them a whole packet on things and went over them in full. The students were asking questions as we went along. I have given them some rules about the books they choose to read. Mainly about book size and challenging themselves. I shared my book blog that I have with them. I showed them that after I read a book I write a small article about what I thought of the book. I told them I am careful not to give away anything from the book that would ruin it. I pulled up my blog and shared the book Before We Were Yours with them. So I said I kind of write a report about the books I read when I am done. Some were very impressed. I am trying to show them that I do because I want to not because I have to. Again trying to make it a positive experience. Some are very excited about it!
Looks like we have a rainy weekend ahead of us! Probably more than anyone wants. My apologies to all the farming families out there who will have a halt put into their harvesting plans. I don't mind the Fall temps I could just do without the rain. It makes it colder. I will once again be luck enough to have all 3 kids under my roof for the weekend. God is good!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
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