Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday!! I hope your week is going well. We have had a pretty good full week. Of course next week we go back to a short week with no school on Monday. I have found that this class struggles on the day we come back from a weekend. Whether it be a Monday or a Tuesday we are very talkative and less attentive, but then the next day and the rest of the week are okay. Hopefully this is just a beginning of the year thing and it will wear off.
Language Arts - This week we are reading My Camel is a Librarian. This is informational text which I think is interesting but the students not so much. It talks about some remote and isolated places in the world that do not have access to internet or books. This story tells about the creative ways people have figured out to get the books to the. One is by camel, elephant, boat, wagon pulled by donkey, and through the mail. I try to tell the students how lucky they are to have a school with a classroom bookshelf, a library and also a public library. I also point out the electronic devices they can read books on. We talked about them having access to books pretty much 24/7. Of course they are not too impressed with this. They did feel bad for the kids who didn't have books though. On spelling this week their list was on short i and long i words. In grammar they reviewed quotation marks.
Math - We have talked about comparing numbers this week. They are using the symbols <,> and =. They have also learned how to put numbers in correct order. The only struggle they have is paying attention to which order to put them: greatest to least or least to greatest. We have done some activities this week using dice and a deck of cards to show place value and comparing numbers. I think I have made it fun for them. We will move on today with a new lesson. I do have some kids who need to make corrections on some homework. I think they are just going through the homework too quickly to get it done and not focusing on doing it well. They will always get it back to correct with me, so maybe they will learn to take their time.
Social Studies- This week we have talked about the 3 levels of government. The students were divided into groups. Each group was assigned a branch of government to read about. The group was to take some notes over important information about that branch. The next day they were grouped again but in different groups. One member from each branch was matched with a member from the other two and they had to teach each other about the branches. This puts the students accountable for their learning and not just the teacher teaching in the front of the room. I did put photos on the Facebook page to show them working in. They worked hard on taking notes from each other. Tomorrow we are going to learn about Time Zones.
I am trying very hard to pay attention to how much homework I am giving the students. I do not want them to be bombarded with it at home. But I also need them to show me they can work independently and show the knowledge they are gaining. There are things we do in class as a class and things I expect them to be able to do on their own. This is when I figure out if a student is struggling. I hope everyone has a great Balloon Days Weekend! Hopefully everyone gets to see the balloons go up at least once. Art this week was the students creating a picture with hot air balloons. My kids are coming home so I am happy to have a full house again!
Remember NO SCHOOL MONDAY, September 18th!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, September 14, 2017
Thursday, September 7, 2017
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday!! It's a short week this week! I hope everyone had a great long weekend! My older girls and I went to Chicago for the weekend! We had a very nice time. Always enjoy the long weekend!! The kids were a little crazy on Tuesday. I think excited to be back in the room together, but very talkative!! I spent a lot of time trying to quiet them. I asked them to go home have a good night but come back tomorrow with a better "school" attitude. They did just that! Wednesday was definitely a better day.
Language Arts - This week we read My Brother Martin. This is a biography about Martin Luther King, Jr written by his sister. She tells the story of their childhood and what events led Martin to be the leader he became. Some students already knew the reason behind him becoming a Civil Rights leader, some did not. We are working on the 4 kinds of sentences in grammar. Your students have practiced declarative, interrogative, imperative, and exclamatory statements. Spelling list this week is over short e and long e. I know this has been a short week but they will be taking a spelling post test and end of week assessment on Friday like normal.
Math - We have been working on Place Value this week. We have talked about the correct way to say numbers, place value positions, values of numbers using place value and the base 10 system as a whole. The students are doing well so far. We will see for sure after I get their first assignment. This entire first chapter is focusing on place value. It will get a little rough when we begin estimation and rounding. Students understand how to round a number but when rounding very large numbers it gets difficult.
Social Studies - This week we are learning about the Native Americans that were here in North America before Columbus arrived. We have talked about the 2 major theories of how those Native Americas got here. We talked about them using the Bering Strait, which was a land bridge that connected Russia with Alaska. We also talked about the fact that they may have just used a boat to get here. I introduced some explorers to them. These men were exploring the new land to see what they could find. Most all explorers were looking riches. They also wanted to find to claim for their home country. Next week we will be moving on to talk about government. We just talk about the 3 branches of government and what they do for us. We do not go to deep.
Tomorrow the kids are encouraged to support "Iowa" by wearing their favorite Iowa team. The big Cy-Hawk game is on Saturday. You can also represent UNI if you like. It is a "Spirit" day tomorrow.
I hope all of you have a great weekend. Have a safe trip if you are headed up to the big game. It's an early one! I am going up to spend the day with my kids. Also, I hope all of you are enjoying this wonderful weather. Temperatures have been pretty perfect. It can't last forever. It will either get extremely hot or cold one or the other. We won't be spoiled long.
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Thursday!! It's a short week this week! I hope everyone had a great long weekend! My older girls and I went to Chicago for the weekend! We had a very nice time. Always enjoy the long weekend!! The kids were a little crazy on Tuesday. I think excited to be back in the room together, but very talkative!! I spent a lot of time trying to quiet them. I asked them to go home have a good night but come back tomorrow with a better "school" attitude. They did just that! Wednesday was definitely a better day.
Language Arts - This week we read My Brother Martin. This is a biography about Martin Luther King, Jr written by his sister. She tells the story of their childhood and what events led Martin to be the leader he became. Some students already knew the reason behind him becoming a Civil Rights leader, some did not. We are working on the 4 kinds of sentences in grammar. Your students have practiced declarative, interrogative, imperative, and exclamatory statements. Spelling list this week is over short e and long e. I know this has been a short week but they will be taking a spelling post test and end of week assessment on Friday like normal.
Math - We have been working on Place Value this week. We have talked about the correct way to say numbers, place value positions, values of numbers using place value and the base 10 system as a whole. The students are doing well so far. We will see for sure after I get their first assignment. This entire first chapter is focusing on place value. It will get a little rough when we begin estimation and rounding. Students understand how to round a number but when rounding very large numbers it gets difficult.
Social Studies - This week we are learning about the Native Americans that were here in North America before Columbus arrived. We have talked about the 2 major theories of how those Native Americas got here. We talked about them using the Bering Strait, which was a land bridge that connected Russia with Alaska. We also talked about the fact that they may have just used a boat to get here. I introduced some explorers to them. These men were exploring the new land to see what they could find. Most all explorers were looking riches. They also wanted to find to claim for their home country. Next week we will be moving on to talk about government. We just talk about the 3 branches of government and what they do for us. We do not go to deep.
Tomorrow the kids are encouraged to support "Iowa" by wearing their favorite Iowa team. The big Cy-Hawk game is on Saturday. You can also represent UNI if you like. It is a "Spirit" day tomorrow.
I hope all of you have a great weekend. Have a safe trip if you are headed up to the big game. It's an early one! I am going up to spend the day with my kids. Also, I hope all of you are enjoying this wonderful weather. Temperatures have been pretty perfect. It can't last forever. It will either get extremely hot or cold one or the other. We won't be spoiled long.
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Wednesday, August 30, 2017
Dear Parents,
HELLO, HELLO, HELLO!! Welcome to 4th grade!!!! I am very excited about working with your kids this year! I have already seen some changes in some of the kids this year! Some very positive changes. I have lots of ideas and new things to bring to the classroom! Let's keep communication open. If you need anything you can email me at msickels@crestonstmalachy.org. I will get back to you. There is not a ton of time in the day but I will respond quickly if necessary, but if not then at the end of the day. You can call the school, I available 7:45 - 8:10 in morning, 10:15-10:45 is my prep period, 11:55-12:40 all days but Tuesday and Wednesday. I have lunch and recess responsibilities those days. Please reach out for any reason. I want this to be a positive year for your child, you and myself. I feel that will happen when we communicate. Remember everything we do at St. Malachy is in the best interest of your child. I have started a Facebook group called St. Malachy Fantastic 4th graders. Please go find it and ask to be in the group. I will accept you. You may tell grandparents also. I hope to put pictures of things we are doing in the classroom and also post messages to the parents here.
Language Arts- We have begun our first story this week in Language Arts. We are reading Because of Winn-Dixie. This is a real book of fiction by Kate DiCamillo. We are reading just a small section of the book. Usually it triggers students to want to read the whole book, which I thought I had on my shelf, but I have not been able to locate it yet. In grammar, we are talking about complete and simple subjects and predicates. I know this topic is a tough one for this age. The students also have spelling words. I know the manner in which I cover spelling words is very different from last year. We take a spelling pretest on Monday, we practice any misspelled words on Wednesday, and take a post test on Friday. On Tuesday and Thursday they students will have a homework sheet that deals with the spelling list for that week. You will find the list of 20 words on those worksheets. I do NOT send home a list of spelling words. The students have access to their list in their spelling notebook and there is a place in their assignment book that they can write them and have them for all week. If students get a perfect paper on Monday they will still take the Friday post test. If they really know how to spell the words they will do it again on Friday. I am very picky about handwriting and the correct formation of letters. Some of your kids are finding out they need to exhibit their best handwriting skills. Also, we don't capitalize words unless they are proper nouns and need to be capitalized. My classroom assessments are all digital. This means the kids take all their tests online. In doing them online, the students receive immediate feedback. They have their score in a click of a button and they go back over the questions they miss and look at what they should have picked. Instant feedback and the fact that it automatically links everything to the standards and benchmarks they are assessed over are the two main reasons I use the online format. If I were to check the tests, they wouldn't get them back until Monday and then we would have to use up more instructional time to go over the tests. You will find all results to spelling tests, all Friday assessments and homework/classroom work on Power teacher. If you are not familiar with Power teacher please get into the office and get comfortable with it. I will post all scores on there, so you will always know what work your child is doing, how well they are doing it and if they are missing any assignments. We will take our first Friday assessment this week! Your student should be studying vocabulary words and spelling words,
Math - We took a chapter 1 pretest this week. This will help me decide what lessons I need to cover in a whole group setting and maybe what ones I need to cover in a small group. The students will feel a great sense of accomplishment when they can compare their pretest score with their post test score. Usually they display tons of improvement after we have covered the chapter. This really helps to build their confidence. The first chapter is over Place Value. This really is the basis of all Math. We will move pretty quickly through this first chapter. Students will begin to see more homework when we start adding Math assignments into the mix.
Social Studies - We begin the year talking about the United States as a whole. We have discussed that the U.S. is broken down into 5 regions. We will cover our government and how if functions. Then we will dig right into the regions by studying them a region at a time. We will talk about Native Americans, climate, and resources from each region. We will keep an interactive notebook over the 50 states as we cover the regions. They will color the state flag, look at it's population, state motto, the abbreviation for the State, state flower and state nickname. They will walk away at the end of the year with a book of all 50 states, made by themselves.
Homework - Please be sure to check with your student and see if they have homework. So far this week there has been a couple days they have been assigned work. A few people have had to take some home to do. I will push for them to use their time wisely at school, so they don't have to take any or much home with them. I prefer they do it at school in case they need help and then I am there to help them. I try not to go overboard on homework, and if I do I make sure they have ample time at school to get the majority done. Your child really should not bring home more than 30 minutes of work. If they are bringing home more than that on several days, let me know so that I can be sure I am helping them to keep organized and also get the work done at school.
Again I look forward to our year together. I will be leaving Friday at noon. My family and I are taking advantage of the long weekend and going to Chicago. We have family there and usually go twice a year. We were unable to make it this summer due to work schedules for my college kids, so we are going now. The other time we go is for Thanksgiving every year. Kids will have a sub for the afternoon. Enjoy your long weekend together!!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
HELLO, HELLO, HELLO!! Welcome to 4th grade!!!! I am very excited about working with your kids this year! I have already seen some changes in some of the kids this year! Some very positive changes. I have lots of ideas and new things to bring to the classroom! Let's keep communication open. If you need anything you can email me at msickels@crestonstmalachy.org. I will get back to you. There is not a ton of time in the day but I will respond quickly if necessary, but if not then at the end of the day. You can call the school, I available 7:45 - 8:10 in morning, 10:15-10:45 is my prep period, 11:55-12:40 all days but Tuesday and Wednesday. I have lunch and recess responsibilities those days. Please reach out for any reason. I want this to be a positive year for your child, you and myself. I feel that will happen when we communicate. Remember everything we do at St. Malachy is in the best interest of your child. I have started a Facebook group called St. Malachy Fantastic 4th graders. Please go find it and ask to be in the group. I will accept you. You may tell grandparents also. I hope to put pictures of things we are doing in the classroom and also post messages to the parents here.
Language Arts- We have begun our first story this week in Language Arts. We are reading Because of Winn-Dixie. This is a real book of fiction by Kate DiCamillo. We are reading just a small section of the book. Usually it triggers students to want to read the whole book, which I thought I had on my shelf, but I have not been able to locate it yet. In grammar, we are talking about complete and simple subjects and predicates. I know this topic is a tough one for this age. The students also have spelling words. I know the manner in which I cover spelling words is very different from last year. We take a spelling pretest on Monday, we practice any misspelled words on Wednesday, and take a post test on Friday. On Tuesday and Thursday they students will have a homework sheet that deals with the spelling list for that week. You will find the list of 20 words on those worksheets. I do NOT send home a list of spelling words. The students have access to their list in their spelling notebook and there is a place in their assignment book that they can write them and have them for all week. If students get a perfect paper on Monday they will still take the Friday post test. If they really know how to spell the words they will do it again on Friday. I am very picky about handwriting and the correct formation of letters. Some of your kids are finding out they need to exhibit their best handwriting skills. Also, we don't capitalize words unless they are proper nouns and need to be capitalized. My classroom assessments are all digital. This means the kids take all their tests online. In doing them online, the students receive immediate feedback. They have their score in a click of a button and they go back over the questions they miss and look at what they should have picked. Instant feedback and the fact that it automatically links everything to the standards and benchmarks they are assessed over are the two main reasons I use the online format. If I were to check the tests, they wouldn't get them back until Monday and then we would have to use up more instructional time to go over the tests. You will find all results to spelling tests, all Friday assessments and homework/classroom work on Power teacher. If you are not familiar with Power teacher please get into the office and get comfortable with it. I will post all scores on there, so you will always know what work your child is doing, how well they are doing it and if they are missing any assignments. We will take our first Friday assessment this week! Your student should be studying vocabulary words and spelling words,
Math - We took a chapter 1 pretest this week. This will help me decide what lessons I need to cover in a whole group setting and maybe what ones I need to cover in a small group. The students will feel a great sense of accomplishment when they can compare their pretest score with their post test score. Usually they display tons of improvement after we have covered the chapter. This really helps to build their confidence. The first chapter is over Place Value. This really is the basis of all Math. We will move pretty quickly through this first chapter. Students will begin to see more homework when we start adding Math assignments into the mix.
Social Studies - We begin the year talking about the United States as a whole. We have discussed that the U.S. is broken down into 5 regions. We will cover our government and how if functions. Then we will dig right into the regions by studying them a region at a time. We will talk about Native Americans, climate, and resources from each region. We will keep an interactive notebook over the 50 states as we cover the regions. They will color the state flag, look at it's population, state motto, the abbreviation for the State, state flower and state nickname. They will walk away at the end of the year with a book of all 50 states, made by themselves.
Homework - Please be sure to check with your student and see if they have homework. So far this week there has been a couple days they have been assigned work. A few people have had to take some home to do. I will push for them to use their time wisely at school, so they don't have to take any or much home with them. I prefer they do it at school in case they need help and then I am there to help them. I try not to go overboard on homework, and if I do I make sure they have ample time at school to get the majority done. Your child really should not bring home more than 30 minutes of work. If they are bringing home more than that on several days, let me know so that I can be sure I am helping them to keep organized and also get the work done at school.
Again I look forward to our year together. I will be leaving Friday at noon. My family and I are taking advantage of the long weekend and going to Chicago. We have family there and usually go twice a year. We were unable to make it this summer due to work schedules for my college kids, so we are going now. The other time we go is for Thanksgiving every year. Kids will have a sub for the afternoon. Enjoy your long weekend together!!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, May 25, 2017
Dear Parents,
Happy Happy Thursday!! It is a happy one! This is the last Thursday your kiddos will be with me! The sad thing is.... I am not even there! My daughter Jami is having a cyst removed from her wrist today. It has been a problem for a while now and is limiting the amount of movement and use of her wrist. Since she is a waitress that is very restrictive. I will return on Friday! This my last blog for the year, still seems very weird to say that! I have loved teaching your kids this year! I know we had lots of ups and downs but that is part of it! It is a huge part of their growth as students. It is always so hard for me to see them move on! Parents you all do a wonderful job with your kids, keep it up! But now I do pass the torch to you for the summer months, until they join Ms. Surma next year!
Language Arts - We have finished the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory book! Today while I am gone they are watching the movie. I see the movie every year but LOVE it and I am sad that I am missing. I love watching the kids watch the movie. I like watching their faces. Tomorrow I have an activity to compare and contrast the book and the movie. We do a crossword over the whole book and Tuesday morning the will take a Unit test over the entire book. Yes, I have a unit test. It's amazing what you can find out there! I think they have enjoyed a more relaxed atmosphere and reading a fun book with different people these last couple of weeks. I hope they will pick up a book and read at least one over the summer. I all ready have 8 on my shelf and 3 on my kindle ready for my summer reading!
Math - We are finishing the year working on fractions. We have learned equivalent fractions, putting fractions into simplest form and today they will learn common denominators. This will be very helpful for Ms. Surma next year. They have done a great job with Math this year. My advice is keep working on division problems over the year. They all caught on to multiplication quite well but division was a struggle and some are still not confident.
Social Studies - Tomorrow is the big map test. They will be labeling a map with the state and it's capital. Some of your students have not done a very good job of studying the regions. We have taken map tests over each region to get them ready. Some didn't try very hard! Please be sure they are studying. You can see your kids scores on Power School for these map test. The final grade for this benchmark will be based off this test. We have quickly discussed the last three regions in the book. Focusing on climates, landforms, and resources in the regions. We will be completing the last two states in our interactive notebook tomorrow. We have been very busy! Next year in social studies they will have 9-10 weeks of Iowa History, then we move into learning about the founding of the 13 Colonies and up to the Revolutionary War.
Tuesday, May 30 - You will need to bring a sack lunch on this day! NO Drinks, we will provide milk for them. There will be Preschool graduation in the chapel form 12:15 - 1:00. And then from 1:00 - 3:00 we have FIELD DAY! Everyone loves field day! Great way to celebrate the end of the year, having FUN!
Wednesday, May 31 - This is the LAST DAY! There will be no lunch served today because we dismiss at noon. We will have end of the year Mass at 9:15. Today is a free day so no Mass attire is needed!! Mass will include: Sports recognition, commissioning of 7th and 8th grade students, recognizing teachers, and a summer blessing from Father Halbur. We will then spend the rest of morning turning in books and cleaning up the room for the summer.
I have truly enjoyed having your kids in my room. I hope your summer is very enjoyable! Have some great family time.
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Happy Thursday!! It is a happy one! This is the last Thursday your kiddos will be with me! The sad thing is.... I am not even there! My daughter Jami is having a cyst removed from her wrist today. It has been a problem for a while now and is limiting the amount of movement and use of her wrist. Since she is a waitress that is very restrictive. I will return on Friday! This my last blog for the year, still seems very weird to say that! I have loved teaching your kids this year! I know we had lots of ups and downs but that is part of it! It is a huge part of their growth as students. It is always so hard for me to see them move on! Parents you all do a wonderful job with your kids, keep it up! But now I do pass the torch to you for the summer months, until they join Ms. Surma next year!
Language Arts - We have finished the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory book! Today while I am gone they are watching the movie. I see the movie every year but LOVE it and I am sad that I am missing. I love watching the kids watch the movie. I like watching their faces. Tomorrow I have an activity to compare and contrast the book and the movie. We do a crossword over the whole book and Tuesday morning the will take a Unit test over the entire book. Yes, I have a unit test. It's amazing what you can find out there! I think they have enjoyed a more relaxed atmosphere and reading a fun book with different people these last couple of weeks. I hope they will pick up a book and read at least one over the summer. I all ready have 8 on my shelf and 3 on my kindle ready for my summer reading!
Math - We are finishing the year working on fractions. We have learned equivalent fractions, putting fractions into simplest form and today they will learn common denominators. This will be very helpful for Ms. Surma next year. They have done a great job with Math this year. My advice is keep working on division problems over the year. They all caught on to multiplication quite well but division was a struggle and some are still not confident.
Social Studies - Tomorrow is the big map test. They will be labeling a map with the state and it's capital. Some of your students have not done a very good job of studying the regions. We have taken map tests over each region to get them ready. Some didn't try very hard! Please be sure they are studying. You can see your kids scores on Power School for these map test. The final grade for this benchmark will be based off this test. We have quickly discussed the last three regions in the book. Focusing on climates, landforms, and resources in the regions. We will be completing the last two states in our interactive notebook tomorrow. We have been very busy! Next year in social studies they will have 9-10 weeks of Iowa History, then we move into learning about the founding of the 13 Colonies and up to the Revolutionary War.
Tuesday, May 30 - You will need to bring a sack lunch on this day! NO Drinks, we will provide milk for them. There will be Preschool graduation in the chapel form 12:15 - 1:00. And then from 1:00 - 3:00 we have FIELD DAY! Everyone loves field day! Great way to celebrate the end of the year, having FUN!
Wednesday, May 31 - This is the LAST DAY! There will be no lunch served today because we dismiss at noon. We will have end of the year Mass at 9:15. Today is a free day so no Mass attire is needed!! Mass will include: Sports recognition, commissioning of 7th and 8th grade students, recognizing teachers, and a summer blessing from Father Halbur. We will then spend the rest of morning turning in books and cleaning up the room for the summer.
I have truly enjoyed having your kids in my room. I hope your summer is very enjoyable! Have some great family time.
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, May 18, 2017
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday! I hope you are all surviving the crazy weather we are having. Rain, sun, rain, sun, storms, sun and so on. I don't mind some rain but Mother Nature can keep the storms. My plants have been outside, then inside, then back out, and back in. I am ready for them to stay outside for good!! We have 8 more school days together. I can't believe how quickly time has flown by. These last few days can be stressful. The kids are just plain done and don't want to be here anymore, or they know their time together is ending so they are trying to be as social as they can before the end. Either was this is not a good mix for the end of the year. They will still have homework and things that need to be done by the end of the year. I plan to work them hard through next week. You will be receiving a note letting you know what the last 2 days look like as a school. Please look for that in today's folder.
Language Arts - We are off and running in our Charlie and the Chocolate Factory books! We have a short period of time to get the book read and do some activities with it. We have read through chapter 17 so far. The students are keeping a journal where they can either write a short paragraph describing each chapter or draw a picture that describes the chapter. We are doing lots of activities that deal with grammar and sentences. We are working on the parts of speech and plural nouns. They are completing comprehension questions with each section also. They seem to be having fun reading. Today a few told me their favorite part was reading the story. It is nice to read a fun fiction book instead of informational text all the time. I am trying to get us through the book and show the movie by the end of next week. I think I will succeed! The last Tuesday I plan on doing a venn diagram activity comparing the movie and the book. We will be using hula hoops and post it notes. Reminder I am showing the 1960's movie, I like it better. It is not so "dark".
Math - We have started a chapter on fractions. We have worked on equivalent fractions this week. The first two lessons deal with equivalent fractions. I showed them using my fractions stacks what they look like and we have spent 3 days generating equivalent fractions. We will also learn how to put fractions into simplest form and find common denominators. If time allows before the end we will work on comparing and ordering fractions. Usually I end the year with division. This class has been great and we are able to do some fraction work before they leave me. This will help them tremendously in 5th grade. This helps Ms. Surma when she gets to this section with them next year.
Social Studies - We are moving along working on our map testing. Some of the students have not done a very good job studying for their map tests. We are testing over a section at a time so they learn one section before learning the next one. Some have not studied and are finding themselves behind. The scores to these quizzes can be found on Power School. I gave them maps for the West Region today and we will test over it next Tuesday. Then Next Friday will be the grand daddy test of them all. They will need to label all 50 states and name their capitals. I will give them blank maps to practice on and a map with answers to study. Please help them to study these items for next week! We are also learning about resources and things that boost the economy in each regions. We have also quickly talked about climate in each. I hope to have their interactive notebooks finished up by the end of the year too. This has been a trial year for these. I really like them and plan to revamp my social studies class for next year. I will be making changes to what I cover and what activities we do to better suit our learning.
I will only be writing one more blog this year! I can't believe we are there all ready. I have truly enjoyed the year. I know we have trials and tribulations all year but I really do care for your kids. I will greatly miss them. Thank goodness I see them in Social Studies still.
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Thursday! I hope you are all surviving the crazy weather we are having. Rain, sun, rain, sun, storms, sun and so on. I don't mind some rain but Mother Nature can keep the storms. My plants have been outside, then inside, then back out, and back in. I am ready for them to stay outside for good!! We have 8 more school days together. I can't believe how quickly time has flown by. These last few days can be stressful. The kids are just plain done and don't want to be here anymore, or they know their time together is ending so they are trying to be as social as they can before the end. Either was this is not a good mix for the end of the year. They will still have homework and things that need to be done by the end of the year. I plan to work them hard through next week. You will be receiving a note letting you know what the last 2 days look like as a school. Please look for that in today's folder.
Language Arts - We are off and running in our Charlie and the Chocolate Factory books! We have a short period of time to get the book read and do some activities with it. We have read through chapter 17 so far. The students are keeping a journal where they can either write a short paragraph describing each chapter or draw a picture that describes the chapter. We are doing lots of activities that deal with grammar and sentences. We are working on the parts of speech and plural nouns. They are completing comprehension questions with each section also. They seem to be having fun reading. Today a few told me their favorite part was reading the story. It is nice to read a fun fiction book instead of informational text all the time. I am trying to get us through the book and show the movie by the end of next week. I think I will succeed! The last Tuesday I plan on doing a venn diagram activity comparing the movie and the book. We will be using hula hoops and post it notes. Reminder I am showing the 1960's movie, I like it better. It is not so "dark".
Math - We have started a chapter on fractions. We have worked on equivalent fractions this week. The first two lessons deal with equivalent fractions. I showed them using my fractions stacks what they look like and we have spent 3 days generating equivalent fractions. We will also learn how to put fractions into simplest form and find common denominators. If time allows before the end we will work on comparing and ordering fractions. Usually I end the year with division. This class has been great and we are able to do some fraction work before they leave me. This will help them tremendously in 5th grade. This helps Ms. Surma when she gets to this section with them next year.
Social Studies - We are moving along working on our map testing. Some of the students have not done a very good job studying for their map tests. We are testing over a section at a time so they learn one section before learning the next one. Some have not studied and are finding themselves behind. The scores to these quizzes can be found on Power School. I gave them maps for the West Region today and we will test over it next Tuesday. Then Next Friday will be the grand daddy test of them all. They will need to label all 50 states and name their capitals. I will give them blank maps to practice on and a map with answers to study. Please help them to study these items for next week! We are also learning about resources and things that boost the economy in each regions. We have also quickly talked about climate in each. I hope to have their interactive notebooks finished up by the end of the year too. This has been a trial year for these. I really like them and plan to revamp my social studies class for next year. I will be making changes to what I cover and what activities we do to better suit our learning.
I will only be writing one more blog this year! I can't believe we are there all ready. I have truly enjoyed the year. I know we have trials and tribulations all year but I really do care for your kids. I will greatly miss them. Thank goodness I see them in Social Studies still.
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, May 11, 2017
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday!! Wow! Only 14 more school days. It makes me sad to count down the days until summer. It just reminds me of the limited number of days I have with your kids! We are still working hard and I intend to right up until that last day. I know they are getting very busy with their activities, but please remember school comes first and their work needs to still be done everyday. We will get down to having less work outside of class, but will work hard here at school. I understand the business of the month. Plus there is lots of a teacher to accomplish to finish our the year.
Language Arts - This week was a Unit test week. They have worked this week to complete the Unit 5 Benchmark test. This is the last unit test we will take. Tomorrow I plan on passing out Charlie and the Chocolate Factory books to them. We will read this story through the end of the year and watch the 1960's movie. We will ready in partners/small groups. There will be questions to answer about the chapters. We will also have a few fun quick project things to do. They will not be big. Normally there is one big book project at the end but we do not have time to complete one of those. I just want to show them the joy of reading and how we are learning things when we even read for fun. We will pick out grammar items and touch upon things we have learned all year long. But I do want it to be more about enjoyment. We may even use our technology to look at books that might interest us as a summer read this summer. If you all ready have a copy of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory please send it with your child tomorrow. If you want to purchase it on their kindle, Nook, or tablet I will allow those to be brought in also. I have some books to hand out but only like 15. That makes me 7 books short so if you could help by sending in a copy or getting on device I would appreciate it.
Math - We are working on the chapter 4 post test. We will be finishing it up today. I plan to move onto fractions tomorrow or Monday. This division chapter has been a long one. I feel like we have been doing it forever. It will be nice to move onto a new concept. I will have them take the pretest over fractions to see where I need to focus. I am not sure we will have time to take a post test before the end of the year.
Social Studies - We have been talking about the Midwest this week. The students have maps they are studying for a map test tomorrow over the Midwest. Some did not do well on the Southeast. Please, please be sure they are studying for the map tests. They are practice heading up to the "BIG" map test they take at the end of the year. Next week we will work on the Southwest which is only 4 states. We will only give them a couple days to study those and then we will move on to the West Region. There will be no more tests in Social Studies except for the map test. So this is a subject of less stress for the rest of the year.
I feel like our year has just flown by. Yes, I always look forward to summer and I am building up a stack of books to read over the summer. So far I have 5 books on my summer reading shelf. I will miss your kids. I know they are ready for a summer and a shift to 5th grade, but it is always bittersweet for me. They have all grown and matured so much. Some have learned some big lessons this year. Thank you for sharing your precious little ones with me.
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Thursday!! Wow! Only 14 more school days. It makes me sad to count down the days until summer. It just reminds me of the limited number of days I have with your kids! We are still working hard and I intend to right up until that last day. I know they are getting very busy with their activities, but please remember school comes first and their work needs to still be done everyday. We will get down to having less work outside of class, but will work hard here at school. I understand the business of the month. Plus there is lots of a teacher to accomplish to finish our the year.
Language Arts - This week was a Unit test week. They have worked this week to complete the Unit 5 Benchmark test. This is the last unit test we will take. Tomorrow I plan on passing out Charlie and the Chocolate Factory books to them. We will read this story through the end of the year and watch the 1960's movie. We will ready in partners/small groups. There will be questions to answer about the chapters. We will also have a few fun quick project things to do. They will not be big. Normally there is one big book project at the end but we do not have time to complete one of those. I just want to show them the joy of reading and how we are learning things when we even read for fun. We will pick out grammar items and touch upon things we have learned all year long. But I do want it to be more about enjoyment. We may even use our technology to look at books that might interest us as a summer read this summer. If you all ready have a copy of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory please send it with your child tomorrow. If you want to purchase it on their kindle, Nook, or tablet I will allow those to be brought in also. I have some books to hand out but only like 15. That makes me 7 books short so if you could help by sending in a copy or getting on device I would appreciate it.
Math - We are working on the chapter 4 post test. We will be finishing it up today. I plan to move onto fractions tomorrow or Monday. This division chapter has been a long one. I feel like we have been doing it forever. It will be nice to move onto a new concept. I will have them take the pretest over fractions to see where I need to focus. I am not sure we will have time to take a post test before the end of the year.
Social Studies - We have been talking about the Midwest this week. The students have maps they are studying for a map test tomorrow over the Midwest. Some did not do well on the Southeast. Please, please be sure they are studying for the map tests. They are practice heading up to the "BIG" map test they take at the end of the year. Next week we will work on the Southwest which is only 4 states. We will only give them a couple days to study those and then we will move on to the West Region. There will be no more tests in Social Studies except for the map test. So this is a subject of less stress for the rest of the year.
I feel like our year has just flown by. Yes, I always look forward to summer and I am building up a stack of books to read over the summer. So far I have 5 books on my summer reading shelf. I will miss your kids. I know they are ready for a summer and a shift to 5th grade, but it is always bittersweet for me. They have all grown and matured so much. Some have learned some big lessons this year. Thank you for sharing your precious little ones with me.
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Thursday, May 4, 2017
Dear Parents,
Happy Thursday!! I hope all of you are having a great day! WOW! May is here. The kids are gearing up for summer to be here and it shows. I keep stressing we still have about 3-4 weeks left to work really hard and get ready for 5th grade. Please be sure to stay on top of them about homework and projects
Language Arts- This week we are reading a story called The Fun They Had. It is a science fiction story about school in the year 2157 compared to school now. No books in the future. It is all digital. The book words run across your screen at the bottom like the news channels have at bottom of screen. They are discussing books and how funny it is that they are printed on paper and the words do not move. We have talked about capitalizing titles in movies, books, and newspaper articles. We worked on appropriate punctuation at the end of sentences and the 4 main kinds of sentences. I introduced Greek word parts therm and meter. Also Latin word parts aud and fac. Tomorrow is the end of the week and this is the last week of stories we are doing this year. We will be working on some writing activities until the end of the year and also a fun book. Make sure the kids study their vocabulary and spelling words for tomorrow!
Book Report - The kids have a book report due on Monday. Please be sure to help them finish up their books and get the project done. I have allowed some DEAR time here at school when I can that forces them to read here. Some of the students have worked on their summaries, vocab words, and top of the box here at school and I have printed it for them. Some have had me help with figuring our vocab words and finding pictures that might match their characters. I am willing to help in any way I can. Some are still struggling to get the book read. Please check on your student's progress.
Math - I think we are finally at the point of moving forward in our chapter. Division has been a struggle for this group. The funny thing is, they caught on to the other strategies and have hard a very hard time catching on to the process of the standard algorithm. Well, today we will finish up the last lesson in the chapter and it looks like Monday we will work on the chapter review, the test about Wednesday. There should be some major improvements from the pretest for sure. A lot of kids didn't have a clue what to do. Seeing the learning will be great! We will then move on into a chapter on Fractions. We may not get to take another test by the end of the year but we will work hard on learning what we can about fractions before they leave me. Hard to believe we are at the end!
Social Studies - We had a great discussion on Wednesday. We read a lesson about how the Civil War effected the Southeast. First we skimmed the surface on what the Civil War was fighting about, the we talked about the destruction to the South that happened. We also read a little bit about the reconstruction period. When it was and what happened during that time. then We ended talking about the Civil Rights Movement and Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rosa Parks. The kids asked GREAT questions and were very inquisitive about that time in history. We talked a lot about he confederate states and the flag. We talked about the flag being a symbol of history and a specific time in the United States, but I did talk about how that flag can be offensive to some people. Students were very in tune to this. I was really impressed with the discussion we had. We even spent extra time on Social Studies today because the participation and questioning was so wonderful. Tomorrow I plan to introduce the Midwest States.
Lap-a-thon - This event was held this morning! Everyone did a great job running! I was very impressed with how hard they worked! Pat on the back to all my great 4th graders!
I hope all of you have a wonderful weekend! My daughter at Iowa State comes home today. Summer has started for her. So weird thinking that her first year of college is done. It will be nice to have everyone in the same house again for a while!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Happy Thursday!! I hope all of you are having a great day! WOW! May is here. The kids are gearing up for summer to be here and it shows. I keep stressing we still have about 3-4 weeks left to work really hard and get ready for 5th grade. Please be sure to stay on top of them about homework and projects
Language Arts- This week we are reading a story called The Fun They Had. It is a science fiction story about school in the year 2157 compared to school now. No books in the future. It is all digital. The book words run across your screen at the bottom like the news channels have at bottom of screen. They are discussing books and how funny it is that they are printed on paper and the words do not move. We have talked about capitalizing titles in movies, books, and newspaper articles. We worked on appropriate punctuation at the end of sentences and the 4 main kinds of sentences. I introduced Greek word parts therm and meter. Also Latin word parts aud and fac. Tomorrow is the end of the week and this is the last week of stories we are doing this year. We will be working on some writing activities until the end of the year and also a fun book. Make sure the kids study their vocabulary and spelling words for tomorrow!
Book Report - The kids have a book report due on Monday. Please be sure to help them finish up their books and get the project done. I have allowed some DEAR time here at school when I can that forces them to read here. Some of the students have worked on their summaries, vocab words, and top of the box here at school and I have printed it for them. Some have had me help with figuring our vocab words and finding pictures that might match their characters. I am willing to help in any way I can. Some are still struggling to get the book read. Please check on your student's progress.
Math - I think we are finally at the point of moving forward in our chapter. Division has been a struggle for this group. The funny thing is, they caught on to the other strategies and have hard a very hard time catching on to the process of the standard algorithm. Well, today we will finish up the last lesson in the chapter and it looks like Monday we will work on the chapter review, the test about Wednesday. There should be some major improvements from the pretest for sure. A lot of kids didn't have a clue what to do. Seeing the learning will be great! We will then move on into a chapter on Fractions. We may not get to take another test by the end of the year but we will work hard on learning what we can about fractions before they leave me. Hard to believe we are at the end!
Social Studies - We had a great discussion on Wednesday. We read a lesson about how the Civil War effected the Southeast. First we skimmed the surface on what the Civil War was fighting about, the we talked about the destruction to the South that happened. We also read a little bit about the reconstruction period. When it was and what happened during that time. then We ended talking about the Civil Rights Movement and Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rosa Parks. The kids asked GREAT questions and were very inquisitive about that time in history. We talked a lot about he confederate states and the flag. We talked about the flag being a symbol of history and a specific time in the United States, but I did talk about how that flag can be offensive to some people. Students were very in tune to this. I was really impressed with the discussion we had. We even spent extra time on Social Studies today because the participation and questioning was so wonderful. Tomorrow I plan to introduce the Midwest States.
Lap-a-thon - This event was held this morning! Everyone did a great job running! I was very impressed with how hard they worked! Pat on the back to all my great 4th graders!
I hope all of you have a wonderful weekend! My daughter at Iowa State comes home today. Summer has started for her. So weird thinking that her first year of college is done. It will be nice to have everyone in the same house again for a while!
God Bless,
Mrs. Sickels
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)