Sulima's Scoop - Week of October 1

Welcome October!



Weekly Reminders:
*Mrs. Cavoto's students need their worms on Monday.
*Lesson 5 spelling pretest on Monday.
*Final magazine turn-in on Tuesday. Will our class earn a pig? Will the 4th grade teachers serenade the fourth graders...in their pajamas?
*Unit 5 English test on Tuesday.
*Lesson 5 spelling test on Friday.
*Worm Race Tracks due Friday. (Mrs. Sulima's Class)
*No school on Monday, October 8 - Columbus Day.

English:
The children will take the Unit 5 English test on Tuesday. A "how to study" sheet was sent home on Thursday. The concept that seems to be tricky for some is quotations. Please practice correct use of quotations with your child. The rest of the week, we will use our English time to work on our picture books. We will take our next English pretest during the week of October 8th.

Reading:
This week our focus will be on the four types of questions. On Tuesday, we will review "right there" questions. The answers to these questions are found right there in the text. We will also discuss "on my own" questions. These questions can usually be answered by using your own personal knowledge. On Wednesday, we will work with "think and search" questions. The answers to these questions are found throughout the text not just in one place. On Thursday, our focus will be "author and me" questions. These are inference questions. The reader needs to use there own personal knowledge plus information the author gives in the text to answer this type of question. We will be using these 4 types of questions throughout our first novel unit which we will begin during the week of October 8.

Science:
Mrs. Sulima's Class - We will continue our worm observations this week. The questions we will focus on this week are: Can a worm detect odor? On which surface does a worm move most easily? All of our experiments will help us in the next step of our worm study. Each child will create a race track based on their worm observations. The children will receive the race track guidelines on Wednesday. Our worm races will be on Friday.
Mrs. Cavoto's Class - The children will bring in their worms on Monday. To begin the week, we will just observe our worms. On Tuesday, we will begin our experiments to answer the following questions: On which surface does a worm move most easily? Does the worm prefer damp or dry surfaces? How do different parts of a worm react to touch? and Can worms detect odor? Worm containers will be brought home over the weekend to make sure our worms have fresh moist soil.

Social Studies:
Mrs. Cavoto will begin the Northeast unit. Please visit her blog at http://ccavotoccsdorg.blogspot.com/ to find out more about what your child will be learning this week. Northeast maps are due on Monday.

Math: (For Mrs. Sulima's Math Students Only)
On Monday, the children will be doing a checkpoint review. This will cover the mental math addition and subtraction strategies, estimating sums and differences, and adding greater numbers with regrouping. The rest of the week our focus will be on subtraction with regrouping.

Website of the Week

Find out more about the four types of questions at:
http://www.literacymatters.org/content/readandwrite/question.htm

Sulima's Scoop - Week of September 24

Arboretum Field Trip:

We had a wonderful time at the Arboretum (with the mosquitoes). Our class would like to thank Mrs. Harris, Mrs. Pinto, and Mrs. Pur for volunteering for this field trip.

Fourth Grade Scrapbooks:

Each child will be making a scrapbook of fourth grade memories. We will be using the cameras that each student brought in to take pictures of classroom activities, field trips, holiday parties, and much more. I will be sending home a camera with each child throughout the school year. To help in the cost of these scrapbooks, I am asking for each family to be responsible for the photo processing of one camera. I will decide who will take each camera by drawing names. Thank you in advance for your help with this wonderful school memory.

Weekly Reminders:

*Lesson 4 spelling pretest on Monday.

*Chapter 2 (lessons 2 & 3) test on Monday.

*Magazine turn-in day on Tuesday.

*Our worms will have their first day of school on Tuesday (Mrs. Sulima's class only).

*Magazine turn-in day on Thursday.

*Lesson 4 spelling test on Friday.

*English Test on Tuesday, October 2.

English:

This week we will complete our English lessons. We will continue learning about the proper use of quotation marks and writing book, magazine, and newspaper titles. On Thursday, the children will fill out a "how to study" sheet, and we will review for the test. Our test will be on Tuesday, October 2.

Reading:

The children will continue working on their picture books this week. Many of the children have chosen to do an expository picture book. They have spent the last couple days researching their chosen topic. They will have Monday and a small bit of time on Tuesday to finalize their research. If they are not done on Tuesday, they will need to finish their research for homework. Those who have chosen to do a narrative picture book have spent the last couple days filling out our CLAPS (Character, Location, Action, Problem, Solution) writing organizer and writing their rough drafts. On Monday, they need to finalize their rough drafts and begin plotting their writing on a picture book story board with 16 squares. Each square represents a page of their book. If children are not done with their narrative rough draft on Monday it will become homework. We will be going to the computer lab at the end of the week to word process the words of our stories.

Science:

I will be teaching both Mrs. Cavoto's & my class science for the next unit. Our next unit is the worm study. The children will observe worm behavior, explore the purpose of decomposers, find out how earthworms are important to our Earth, and much more. My class will need to have their worms (in a butter or whipped cream tub) to school on Tuesday. Mrs. Cavoto's students will not need their worms until Monday, October 1.

Social Studies:

Mrs. Cavoto will be teaching both classes social studies beginning Thursday. Please visit her blog at http://ccavotoccsdorg.blogspot.com/ to find out what your child will be learning in social studies. *We are trying this out for one unit.*

Math (For Mrs. Sulima's math students only):

The place value tests will be returned on Monday. We will go over any questions that students found difficult. On Monday and Tuesday, our main focus will be mental math. We will review a few addition and a few subtraction mental math strategies to (hopefully) help the children come to a sum or difference more quickly. We are trying to eliminate the need to count on fingers. On Wednesday, we will practice the concepts of estimating sums and differences. On Thursday and Friday the children will be adding 2-, 3-, and 4-digit numbers with regrouping (carrying). The students will be taking a checkpoint review on Monday, October 1.

Website of the Week

Find out more about worms at:

http://yucky.discovery.com/flash/worm/

Sulima's Scoop - Week of September 17

Weekly Reminders:
*Arboretum Field Trip on Monday. Please bring a sack lunch/drink. Also wear long pants and good walking shoes.
*Lesson 3 Spelling Pretest on Monday.
*District-wide Magazine Drive Kick-off on Monday.
*Early Dismissal on Tuesday. We dismiss at 11:00.
*Picture Day on Thursday.
*Lesson 3 Spelling Test on Friday.
*Plant Test on Friday.
*Social Studies Test on Monday, Sept. 24.

English:
We will continue our unit on capitalization and punctuation. Our lessons this week will cover commas in a series, more uses for commas, and an introduction to quotation marks.

Reading:
The children will begin writing their own picture books this week. They will have the choice of writing an expository or narrative picture book. By Thursday, they should know which format they will be writing. This week our focus will be on researching for those who are doing an expository or writing a rough draft for those choosing narrative.

Science:
We will begin the week by finishing our study of the life cycle of a bean plant. The children will fill out a "how to study" sheet on Wednesday to help them know how to study for our test which will be on Friday. We will play a review game in class on Thursday to also help us prepare for this test.

Social Studies:
The children are learning about rights and responsibilities of United States citizens. On Thursday, we will fill out a "how to study" sheet for our test which will be on Monday, Sept. 24. This test will cover Chapter 2, lessons 2 and 3 only.

Math (For my math students only!):
Wow! Can you believe we have already finished our first unit in math. On Tuesday, we will play a couple games to continue our study of place value. On Wednesday, we will do a chapter review together. This would be a great study tool. Our Place Value test will be on Thursday. Don't forget, if you fill out at least 3 ways you studied for the test on the "how to study" sheet and return it on the day of the test with a parent signature, you will receive 2 bonus points. On Friday, the children will take a pretest for chapter 2 on Addition and Subtraction.

Website of the Week:

Review for our Plant Test at:

http://www.urbanext.uiuc.edu/gpe/

Homework for Tuesday, September 11

Please be aware...
There was an error on the assignment board today. The science assignment is Lesson 2 Assessment (not Lesson 3 assessment). Use pages A15-A18 to help with this assignment.

Sorry for this mistake!

Parts of a Flower Quiz
We will be taking the parts of a flower quiz on Thursday. The children will receive a picture, much like the one below, that they will need to label. A word bank will be given with all the parts of a flower. There will also be a bonus questions (worth 2 points). I told the class the bonus question today. Was your child listening?

Mrs. Sulima

Sulima's Scoop - Week of September 10

This will be our first full week of school. Here are the weekly highlights...

Reminders:

*Beginning Band Parent Meeting on Wednesday at 7:30.
*Parts of a Flower Quiz on Thursday.

*Band Recruitment Concert on Friday at 12:30.

*Lesson 2 Spelling Pretest on Friday.

*Arboretum field trip will be on Monday, September 17.

English:

We will continue our unit on Capitalization and Punctuation. Our lessons will cover names of people and pets, names of places and things, and abbreviations.

Reading:

The students will continue practicing the use of the self-monitoring strategy while they are reading. This strategy begins with making a prediction, reading, and finally proving or disproving their prediction. We will also continue our picture book study this week. We will finish reviewing picture book structures and begin types of illustrations found in picture books. Next week the children will begin writing their own picture book.

Science:

As botanists we will continue our study of plants. This week we will dissect a flower to find the sepals, petals, pistil, and stamen. The children will be taking a quiz on the parts of a flower on Thursday. We will also learn about the processes of pollination and fertilization. We will finish the week by exploring the life cycle of a bean plant.

Social Studies:

We will begin the week by reviewing our Patriotic Quest from last week. The rest of the week our focus will be on our constitutional rights and responsibilities as U.S. citizens. Our test on the "Living in the United States" theme will be during the week of September 17.

Math (for my math students only):

We will continue our study of place value this week. On Monday, we will review place value to the millions. We need your help by working with your child on reading numbers to the hundred millions place. On Tuesday, we will work on number patterns. The children will be learning about Wubbles (oh, they can be trouble). On Wednesday and Thursday, our focus will be rounding to the nearest 10, 100, or 1,000. We will finish the week with a checkpoint review. Our Place Value test will be on Wednesday, September 19.

I would like to thank all the families who have donated items to the classroom. If there is anything else our classroom needs I will list those items in our weekly blog.

Website of the week:

Check out what we will see at the Arboretum.

http://www.mortonarb.org/

Book Adventure

I was browsing the Internet and found a very interesting website. "Book Adventure" is a free online reading motivation program for students in grades K-8. After children read a book, they can take an online comprehension quiz. There are over 7,000 book choices/quizzes on "Book Adventure." Students will earn points for each quiz they complete. There are also prizes that can be earned. If you would like to check out this website and register, please visit http://www.bookadventure.org/. When registering, our class name is Sulima and the teacher name is SSulima. To register, click on New Users (Register Now). Then click on Kids Register. Follow the directions carefully. Parents please help your child register. E-mail me if you register & let me know what you think.

Curriculum Night

I would like to thank all the parents that were able to attend the fourth grade curriculum night. I hope I was able to answer any questions that you may have had. If not, please e-mail me with any further questions. If you were unable to attend, I will be sending home a packet of information. Please look through it and contact me, if needed, for further clarification. I will be contacting parents who were unable to sign up for conferences to set up a time.

Remember...We are all pieces of the puzzle! Let's work together to make this the best school year ever.

Sulima's Scoop - Week of September 3

We have just completed our first week of school. The children have done a wonderful job adapting to fourth grade routines. We will continue to practice these and learn more routines and procedures during this week. I hope you all had a wonderful Labor Day weekend and are ready for another wonderful week in fourth grade!

Reminders:
*Curriculum Night (parents only) will be on Wednesday, September 5 at 7:00. We will all begin the evening in the multi-purpose room. Mrs. Schultz will go over a few important items. Then we will meet in our classroom for a brief overview of the fourth grade curriculum and classroom routines. The last few minutes of the evening you will be able to meet you child's math teacher.
*Our spelling test will be on Friday, September 7. Please have your child practice their words in cursive. All tests and quizzes will need to be done in cursive during first trimester.

English
The children have taken their first English pretest on Unit 5, Capitalization and Punctuation. They will receive their learning contract on Tuesday. For homework on Tuesday, your child will need to choose their enrichment options. (All enrichment work must be done in school!) We will begin the unit on Wednesday. This week we will review the four types of sentences, how to correct run-on sentences & fragments, and capitalizing names of people and pets.

Reading
We will review predicting, inferring, and self-monitoring this week. Our emphasis will be on using the text clues to make and prove our predictions. To practice this at home ask your child, "What will happen next?" and "What clues from the test & illustrations are leading you to that prediction?"

Science
This week the children will become botanists as we begin our plant study. We will find out what is inside a seed, plant our own seeds, classify types of plants, and discover the parts of a flower.

Social Studies
"Living in the United States" is the name of our first theme. This week the children will use their textbook to complete a Patriotic Quest. This quest will help the children understand the United States government and the responsibilities of U.S. citizens.

Can you lend a helping hand? We still have a few remaining items needed from our helping hands board. If you can donate any of the following items we would greatly appreciate it. I would also like to thank those of you who have already donated items to our classroom.
-Treasure box prizes (not candy)
-Granola Bites
-Stickers (any seasonal design)

I hope to see you all at Curriculum Night!