I hope you’ve all had a relaxing week off!  I can’t believe that it is already May.  We have a lot of exciting things ahead of us in the next 8 weeks as we finish off fourth grade.

Throughout the month of April we studied poetry and were able to try out a few different kinds of poems.  April is poetry month, so it was a great time to learn some new types of writing before we begin our Historical Fiction writing unit when we return next week!

In social studies we created a timeline on one of the bulletin boards in our classroom, called “The Road to Revolution”. We have been studying the causes of the Revolutionary War and read different passages about the causes of the Revolution.  We discussed the French and Indian War, The Battle of Lake George, Sugar and Stamp Acts, Quartering Act, Sons of Liberty, Boston Massacre, Boston Tea Party, and the Intolerable Acts.  We will continue learning about the Revolutionary War and the important battles as we begin our new writing unit next week.

In Math we are still on topic 14, Measuring Units and Conversions. We have learned about different customary units of length, capacity, and weight.  Next week we will learn about the metric system!

A few reminders as you gear up to come back to school on Monday:

-If you have not sent in your Nature’s Classroom Deposit, that is due ASAP.

-We are still in need of as many 2-liter bottles as you can send in!  Please make sure the caps are included. It takes 3 bottles to make each ecosystem and each student will build their own ecosystem. If you have more at home please send them in.  We appreciate it!

-As we get into the warmer spring months, please make sure you are sending a water bottle with your child each day!  It’s important to make sure the students drink up and stay hydrated as temperatures start to rise. Keeping the sugary drinks at home will help eliminate spills and ants in our classroom, and we all appreciate that!

Thanks for your continued support!!

Goodbye Testing!

We have finally completed our last day of NYS testing.  Yahoo!  We worked hard these last few weeks.  It feels good to have the tests behind us, knowing that we can get back into our routine next week!

This week we took the Topic 13 math test.  Overall, the students did very well on this topic.  Next week we will begin topic 14, Measuring Units and Conversions. 

This week we used mentor poems to inspire us while writing poetry.  First we wrote a “Where I’m From” poem, using repeating phrases in each stanza of the poem. We learned what a Haiku was, and looked at different pictures to inspire us to write a Haiku.  We each shared one of the Haiku’s we wrote with the class to inspire us further. 

In Social Studies we completed a map of the original 13 colonies and discussed the different regions and which colonies were part of each region.  The regions were divided into New England, Middle Colonies, and Southern Colonies.  We learned a lot about what life was like in Colonial New York compared to present day New York. 

We reviewed the life cycles of a butterfly and frog, and watched two short clips on the different stages of each.  These are previous topics taught in first and second grade which may be on the NYS science test in May.

We finished putting together our flower project we started with our buddies last week.  They turned out great and definitely brighten up our room for the Spring!

We were very lucky to have a guest speaker that came to Glenmont this week to talk to the fourth graders!  Marcos Pontes is a Brazilian Air Force pilot and astronaut and spoke to the students about what it was like to go into space! It wasn’t always easy for him, but he persevered and believed that anything was possible!  The students loved his presentations and seeing pictures and hearing stories about what it was like inside the space shuttle.  Thanks to a couple fourth grade parents for organizing this!

I hope you all enjoy this beautiful weekend!

This week was busy with NYS ELA testing Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.  Our fourth graders worked very hard!

We introduced some poetry this week in honor of National Poetry Month.  We look forward to exploring more poetry throughout the month, as well as writing some poetry!  

In math, we have come to the end of topic 13, Extending Fraction Concepts.  This week we learned about equivalent fractions and decimals, decimal place value, comparing and ordering decimals, and using money to understand decimals.  Next week we will review on Monday and have a topic test on Tuesday.  We have also been working on reviewing some of the topics that were taught at the end of third grade.  We made flashcards with partners to refresh our minds on some of the vocabulary that we might see on the test next week.  I introduced the students to protractors this week, and they enjoyed exploring different angles.  We played with a protractor gadget on the smartboard, and the students enjoyed making and measuring new angles!

We met with our buddies to work on a spring craft this week and got a little messy with paint!  I will post pictures of the finished products once they are completed. 

This past week we ran the pacer test in PE.  I decided to give it a go and run it with the kids!  It was fun, and they all did great!

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend!

Mrs. Riegel 

Welcome April!  It doesn’t quite feel like it with the current weather we are having!  Last week seemed to fly by, we were busy with lots of things!

In writing workshop we are working on writing essays and supporting our answers with evidence from the text.  This week we focused on using meaningful transitions.  We created a class chart for transitions we could use at the beginning of an essay, transitions that we could use to show a second or third piece of evidence, and transitions to use for the conclusion.  We have also been practicing citing our evidence and stating exactly where this evidence comes from so that it really proves our ideas. 

In reading workshop we have been reading short passages and responding to questions about the text. We also did a close reading this week of the song “Wild Things” by Alessia Cara.  This is a song on the radio right now, which some of the students were familiar with.  It’s really eye opening when you stop to think about what the words in a song really mean.  We concluded that this song was all about being your own person, not following the crowd, and simply being who you are!  The students really enjoyed it.  April is national poetry month.  On Friday we also looked at a poem called A Bird Came Down The Walk by Emily Dickinson. 

In Math, we began Topic 13, which dives deeper into fractions and fraction concepts.  We learned how to multiply fractions by whole numbers using both models and symbols.  In addition, we learned about decimals and how we can name a fraction as a decimal, as well as how to show these values on a number line.

Glenmont Elementary is collecting cards for veterans that have been chosen to participate in the Leatherstocking Honor Flight down to D.C. for the day.  These veterans from WWII and the Korean War get to see the monuments and are also honored for their services.  This week with our buddy class, we learned about the flight, and made cards for the veterans to receive as their “mail call” while on the airplane.  We watched s short clip of some of the vets opening and reading their cards, many of which are from people they don’t know.  It is amazing to see how much gratitude we can spread with such a simple act!

A reminder that this week we have the NYS ELA test Tuesday-Thursday.  This is a chance for our students to show what they know!

Thanks for your continued support!