Oct 22 - 31

A Few Reminders: 

• Oct 31  - Halloween Parade at 9:00am in the gymnasium. Parents and family are invited!
• Oct 31 - Last day to donate Socks for Socktober!
• Nov. 1 - No School, PD Day.
• Nov. 6 - BOKS Starts 
• Nov. 7 - Early Dismissal 
• Nov. 8 - Christmas Card Orders are due (pictures coming on Monday)
• Nov 12 - No School, Mid Term Break. 

We were so lucky to have Earth Rangers visit us last Tuesday! They brought along a few friends too! Students learned about climate change and its effect on animals adaptations and habitats. They can join Earth Rangers and help make a difference!

HALLOWEEN!

If you made it to the parade on Wednesday, you would have seen all the awesome costumes! I am blown away every year by the creativity of students and their families. 

Thank you for sending in snacks! WE LOVED THEM :)

Students had a refresher on nouns and adjectives, through a sorting activity and then watching spooky scary music videos (With's Brew and Spooky Scary Skeletons) recording nouns and adjectives they heard. 

And we did some fun Halloween Art!

ELA

Reading

During read to self, students are continuing to work with their book clubs and discuss their mystery books! They are practicing summarizing chapters, and describing characters and plot.

We also spent some time working on reading comprehension with non-fiction text. We did some science based reading, and discussed the strategy of pre-reading the questions beforehand. This will help us be aware, while we're reading, what information might be important to highlight.
After reading, they can use their highlighted sections to answers their questions quickly!


Writing
SORTA KINDA HAUNTED HOUSES FOR SALE!

Students worked on writing a descriptive paragraph about haunted houses! This was done by writing for sale ads for haunted homes. I read aloud to the students, I'm Not Afraid of this Haunted House by Laurie Friedman. This was to help get some creative juices flowing for the  kiddos as to what they would see or hear in a  haunted house.


As a group we brainstormed a ton of ideas! They had lots of creepy ideas to add to their writing, and I am so impressed with how hard they worked.

We also talked about the type of rooms a haunted house might have, as we are trying to sell the house! Our purpose is to have the reader want to buy our house, even if it is a little haunted.

This was to accompany our beautiful haunted house art we also made this week. Students slowly tinted white paint with a colour of their choice to create a creepy backdrop for their houses.

 

Next, they used black construction paper to create their house shapes! Using yellow paper they added their very own windows and doors.

This is one of my absolute favourite art pieces we do, and every year its a little bit different! The background colours are stunning! Their haunted houses ads can be found in the hallway by the Music room.

MATH

We have started a new unit in math: PLACE VALUE!

A main understanding in this unit is that numbers can be expressed in various ways. This can be in numerals, numbers words, expanded form and with base ten material. 

To introduce this unit, we jumped right into it! Using bean bags and hoola hoops, we made a model for place value, creating numbers up to 10 000! As we threw bean bags in hoops, students counted up how many they had, recorded it on a board, and then as a group we would say the number aloud. 

 

This week students worked with base ten materials to represent numbers up to 10 000 in various ways. 

SOCIAL

In Social we have began to talk about Alberta and the climate. Students learned that climate is the general weather in an area or region over a long period of time. Using Alberta government's weather website they recorded the temperature of different cities across Alberta. Looking at the locations of the cities, we discussed how different landforms, lattitude and elevatin can affect a regions climate. 

 

Students also worked with Quizlet, an interactive vocabulary site, to learn and record new terms we will be covering over the unit. 

Oct 15-18

A Few Reminders:

• October 22-24th - Book Fair!
• October 23rd - Parent Teacher interviews. Use this link if you still need to book a time. 
• October 23rd - Earth Rangers Visit @ 2:00pm.
• October 31st - HALLOWEEN

A note from Mrs. K about Halloween

All Robina Families are invited to join us for our annual costume parade at 9:00 am on Wednesday, October 31. Please feel free to dress up as we end our parade with all our other guests doing a lap of the gym to share their costumes. Please keep costume choices preschool friendly. Many of our younger children get frightened by overly gory or scary costumes. Some costume guidelines are listed below. If you are unsure of your costume choice, please email the classroom teacher to do a check in. If costumes that include weapons are brought to school, they will be taken away and returned at the end of the day. Thank you in advance for helping to keep our Halloween day fun and safe!

Please see her blog update for more information regarding appropriate costumes. 

ELA

Reading

Visualizing is our new reading strategy introduced this week! Visualizing; I can make images in my mind to make sense of what I am reading. This is an important skill for students to learn while reading, as it has them focus on the details in what they are reading. It can also help them be more accurate readers, taking their time to read every word and ensure they are building an accurate image in their mind that the author is creating. 

To introduce this strategy, I read aloud to the students having them create an image of what I was reading in their minds, and drawing it out! I used a picture book, Go Away Big Green Monster by Ed Emberley.  In the book the author slowly describes the monster piece by pieces, and the students listen to the detail and create their monsters! I love to see how similar each students monster is, AS WELL AS, different - as each student processes the details with their own imagination. I also pick this book as the description of the monster is very vague, which opens up a great discussion on how we can write to create visuals for our readers.

Next, to extend on this, we read a passage about an old house. As I read the passage the first time I had students close their eyes and visualize, listening to the specific details. Then I read it again, allowing them to start drawing the picture in their mind. As a group we brainstormed some of the other things we might experience from the reading, through our senses. What would we smell? Hear? See? Taste? Feel? This has the reader, and student, putting themselves into what their reading.

No one had lived in the house for years. The blue paint was peeling and the yard was overgrown with weeds. The windows on the lower floor were boarded up, and some of the windows on the second floor had been broken, probably by kids throwing rocks at them.

Book Clubs
Based on their top 3 choices from the Book Tasting, I have sorted students into mini book clubs! Some clubs are reading the same book, or books from the same series, or reading together through a picture book. During Read to Self time, they read for 15-20 minutes, and then they get together as a club and retell their chapters/stories, make predictions and share some questions about their own books.

Writing
We mixed some Science and writing this week to introduce students to students to Procedural Writing. This is How To Writing, and students wrote: How To Create a Compost!


First, we watched a few videos about compost and how it is made. There were many steps we had to pay attention to.
Next, we re-watched the video, making jot notes about each step on the board. I recorded answers given to me from the students.

Then, we groups the steps together to write our instructions. Procedural writing will use cue words: first, next, then and finally to describe each step.
Finally, students recorded the steps, so that we could carry out the process the next day!

MATH

We wrapped up our patterns unit this week! Monday was a day for students to work on corrections from the unit and complete some practice questions. They also spent some times in pairs playing patterns games.


We had our quiz on Tuesday and then once I had them marked, I worked with students in small groups to work through their corrections. These marks are in Powerschool. 

A common trend on the quiz for students having incorrect answers was from misreading instructions. Another trend was minor miscalculations when adding or subtracting.  

SCIENCE

We are all about COMPOST! As mentioned earlier, we watched videos and researched the steps to creating our own classroom compost! Once we had the steps down we needed to collect our materials! Students collected brown waste from outside (grass clippings, leaves) and brought it in. 

Together we worked through each step building our compost! 

First, Pick a dark container and drill holes in the top and bottom. 

Next, we need to add about 2 inches of soil. Students came up one by one adding soil until we had enough. Also, each student had a sheet of newspaper to shred and we added that to our soil mixture. 

Then, we needed to add some food! Worms love coffee grinds, banana peels and apple cores. DO NOT ADD fatty foods like meat. 

After, we need to squirt some water on our compost to make it moist - NOT WET. We might have had to test the spray bottle on some kids to make sure it worked. 

FINALLY, WE CAN ADD OUR WORMS!

AND THAT'S HOW WE MADE A COMPOST BIN!

Stay tuned for more updates on our bin throughout the unit. 

SOCIAL

We have wrapped up our unit on Mapping! Students had a quiz on Wednesday. They had a chance to work on corrections in class, through independent open book work. Using their mapping booklets they went through their quiz fixing spelling and answers. 

Oct 9 - 12

A Few Reminders:

• October 16th - Photo Retakes.
• October 18th - Fruit Order Forms Due.
• October 19th - No School, PD Day.
• October 22-24th - Book Fair!
• October 23rd - Parent Teacher interviews. 
• October 23rd - Earth Rangers Visit @ 2:00pm.
• October 31st - HALLOWEEN
  

ELA

Reading

This week we had our very first Book Tasting! I wish I could say I came up with this idea on my own, but I was searching for an engaging and interesting way to introduce new books and genres to students and the internet helped out! 

In Grade 4, we work to try and introduce students to various genres so they can expand their reading and try out new types of books. This month students were invited to Cafe Potter, in the heart of Paris. They were greeted by the Maitre'D-elbridge and directed to the table as per their reservation.

Students were at their own table with a tray full of books in front of them waiting to be tasted! These books all belong to a specific genre, they are soon to discover.

 This month our genre focus is Mystery. Mystery is a genre spread across all books; picture books, easy readers, and novels. Theses books will usually have common character roles, such as detectives, villains, or police, and will follow the similar plot of "something missing". 

When students came into the room, they looked at the books in front of them from various mystery series: A-Z Mysteries, Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, Nate the Great, Jigsaw Jones, Jack Russell Detective, Baileey School Kids and even Scooby Doo! We looked at the covers and titles of the books to create the web above.

Next was time for the tasting! When tasting a book it is important that you look at the cover, read the back and perhaps a page or two. We're not buckling in and reading a whole book. Students were given 5 minutes to taste a book, and then 2 minutes to write in their menu what they think! Everyone did so well and really explored the different books. Each student was hoped to work through 5 books, however some only got through 3.

After the tasting, students had to list their top 3 choices. Based on these choices, I put the students into book clubs this week. Some students are reading the same book, some are in the same series (as they expressed interest in so) and some are reading various books from different series. Throughout the month, during our read to self time students will have book club meetings. On these days they will read their books and then have a designated time to meet with their club and discuss their books. This will include discussion on plot and predictions, sharing questions they may have and comparing characters. Some clubs even got started!

Writing
During KidBlog this week, students worked on perfecting their reflection piece. This is a chance for us to review our learning for the week, have students dig into their brains and try to remember what happened at school today, and express what they liked about their own learning and lessons.

This activity is a called Week in Review and we write in a 3-2-1 format. 3 things we learned, 2 things we liked and 1 question they have going forward. This writing activity has a dual purpose - it is important for students to reflect and express their preferences, but they are also working on formatting various writing forms. Our 3-2-1 is writing in list format, having students using titles, numbered lists and bolding important information.

3 Things I Learned: 

1. In math we learned Algebra 
2. In Blue Flame we made salsa and fruit salad
3.  In art we are studying  Vincent Van Gogh 

2 Things I Liked

1. I liked writing Turkey letters
2. I liked the picnic

1 Question  

1. What are we doing in tech block

- PP

3 Things I Learned:

1. I learned about Vincent Van Gogh. 
2. In science I learned about decomposers, producers and consumers.
3. In math I learned about algebra.

2 Things I liked:

1. I liked Blue Flame and making salsa.
2. I liked writing the turkey letters. 

1 Question I have: 

1. What will the next idom of the week wil be?

- AMD

We also started a new project, that we will return to weekly - IDIOM OF THE WEEK. An idiom is a figure of speech that people use, and it is not mean literally. It is usually used to mean something else. 

This is a chance for students to work with figurative language and access its meaning. Each week we will look at a new idiom, and decipher its meaning and practice using it.

This week our idiom was - Hold Your Horses! Students had a great time working with this idiom, as I think many of them have heard it before!

Math

We are all about balancing equations this week as students are introduced to algebra. This is a very very light version of algebra, which is close to missing number equations students have completed in the past. 

It is important that students understand that both sides of an equal sign in an equation need to have the same value. 

ie. 4 + 5 = 9 

Both sides of this equation total up to 9. 

Students are working to solve equations, using addition and subtraction, to find the value of a missing number or symbol. We have been practicing with equations as well as word problems. 

Science 

With our exploration of waste in nature, students have been working on a research project this week around decomposers, producers and consumers. 

Using a graphic organizer, in pairs, students scanned QR Codes to find links to sites. On each site was a bit of information on all three areas. Students had to read through information to determine importance, and then record it in the organizer where it belonged. 

Understanding the roles of decomposers, producers and consumers helps students to recognize and understand how recycling occurs in nature. 

Social

We are almost done mapping! The last thing on our list to learn was longitude and latitude! These are the imaginary lines that run vertically and horizontally around our globe that make things like GPS possible.

The middle line of longitude is called the Prime Meridian, and splits our globe into Eastern and Western Hemispheres. The middle line of latitude is called the Equator. This line separates our globe into the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. 

We will be having our mapping skills quiz next week.

Blue Flame Kitchen

Thanks to our nutrition budget, the Grade 4's had an awesome day of cooking on Wednesday with Atco Blue Flame. They absolutely loved it!! They got to make fresh salsa and fruit salad. The program focuses on teaching them healthy eating recipes and kitchen safety skills. 

Blue Flame will be hosting a parent night on Oct. 23rd during interviews. 

Art

Over the past few weeks, students have been learning about Vincent Van Gogh! He spent many years painting landscapes and using various techniques to add texture to his work. 

Our skills focus was to create a vanishing point and to use various mediums to create texture within our work. 

Here is the finished product: a recreation of 

Avenue of Poplars, 1884