Happy Thursday! What a rainy week! YUCK! I am ready for it to stop raining for sure. I had to shut the blinds at school so kids weren't trying to watch it rain, and share how hard it is raining. Everything is very wet. Recess outside will not be across the street for a while for sure. If they get to go out it will be on courtyard only most likely. I don't mind the Fall temps, just get rid of the damp. The kids really struggled this week to pay attention and listen to directions. Their work is showing that. Take a look in the take home folder for papers that will prove this.
Language Arts - First of all their test scores from last week will be coming home today, Most scores were very poor. The grammar on Quotations is very hard for 4th graders. I think it is the way they are tested that makes it hard. Too much to look at in 4 sentences. The first 10 questions were over a story that they had to read. They had the story in a paper copy that they could look up the answers and they chose not to look them up. They were just guessing. Next time I will require them to highlight their answers on the story and turn it in when finished with the test. That should help increase the scores. The students want to answer quick and not take the time to look anything up. I told them that was being a lazy student. The next 10 (11-20) were on vocabulary words and vocabulary strategy. I expect perfect scores here. They can study the vocab. The next 10 (21-30) was over their comprehension of the story they have read 3 different times that week. The story was kind of dry so I get the low scores but still they could have done better. The last 10 (31-40) was the grammar questions and it was hard. I am not stressing about that. They will understand better as they get older.
The story we read this week was called The Power of W.O.W. It is a drama(play), The story has characters and written like a play would be. We worked with the story all week. We had to pay attention to the theme of the story. The vocabulary strategy this week was prefixes: non- and mis-. We went over what it means and how it changes the meaning of words. The grammar this week is over run-on sentences. We first worked on whether a group of words was a sentence or a fragment. They did pretty well on this page. Then we worked on whether a sentence was a run-on sentence or if it was okay. This might be harder for them. Tomorrow is our normal Friday with a spelling post test and end of week test. Please be sure they are studying their vocab words! They are in a yellow packet.
Math - We are finishing up the chapter this week. I am teaching the last lesson to them today. They will begin a review tomorrow, we will check it on Monday and take the Chapter 1 test Tuesday. This lesson is on word problems. They are learning a certain strategy to help them figure out the problem. They are learning to show the work, draw a picture ( bar model this chapter) and write a complete sentence to state the answer. This is also to help us with writing in math. I took a class this summer that talked about writing being a part of every subject and how much students should be writing each day. I needed to make sure I was doing a better job of incorporating it into math class. We are looking forward to finishing this chapter and moving on to Chapter 2. This one was a shorter chapter with 8 lessons. The next one has like 14 lessons so it will take up longer to do. It is also a little more difficult. I try to move through it at a good pace, but I also want them to understand what they are learning. I don't move on until I know they get it.
Social Studies - The students are working on a study guide right now. They are struggling to understand that they need to actually look up the answers in the book. They want to just make wild guesses and move on to get it done. I talked with them yesterday about proving they are correct. I also tried to share about how to work effectively with a partner, and having trust in your partner. Also, not to argue over an answer. If they disagree they may each write their own answer down and then when we check it they will find out who was right or who was wrong. We will check the study guide tomorrow and take a Chapter 2 test on Monday, so they have the weekend to study. They have vocabulary flash cards we made for them to study their vocab. They will have the study guide to study for the rest. They must write complete sentences on their essay questions. If they have a one word answer the question will be marked wrong, even if that one word is correct. I am stressing the need to put answers in complete sentences, just like in Math. I have been talking about this with them and will continue to remind them, even the day they take the test, I will remind them!
Next week is Homecoming! We will be getting out 3 hours early on Friday, so 12:10 dismissal. The parade was moved up to 1:30 due to an earlier start time for football game.
We are beginning to forget things and lose things. I have been giving late slips out this week like crazy. They are forgetting books at school and losing homework papers. I remind them everyday what they will need in order to do the assignment. Sometimes, I know, we just plain misplace things, but it seems like we are in a rut. Also, following directions are an issue. I am giving more and more work back to correct due to not following directions. Worksheets that have a score and then the word "Correct" written on them need corrected and returned the next day. I will recheck and change the score for more credit. I am not sure why we are struggling with these things but maybe we can blame the weather?? I don't know. Hopefully next week is a better week for some.
Have a great weekend!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
No comments:
Post a Comment