Happy Holidays!

We have had another full week this week as we prepare for the Holiday Break!

We had a quick review/study of time and calendar in math this week and we will have a brief test tomorrow. After the break we will get into 2 digit x 2 digit multiplication! I will be sending home a multiplication game for extra facts practice over break!

In Writing Workshop we are drafted and have begun revising our Memoirs on the computers. Our fingers have been working swiftly and we have some great stories to share about things we have done that are generous or things that have made us a better person! We will be completing our Memoirs after break.

Our study in Reading Workshop with Questioning continued and we are now pretty good at finding answers to questions asked about a piece of text. Answer them in complete sentences seems to remain a struggle and we will work on that after break as well.

Floating and Sinking will begin on Wednesday 1/5 and will continue until Friday 1/14 in the afternoons. Thank you to parents who have volunteered to help us! It is fun, but a bit overwhelming at times.

I hope you have a safe and happy holiday break!!

Memoir, Questioning, Multiplicaion, and Explorers

Phew... we have been busy.

In Reading Workshop we have been working hard at learning the four types of questions we are asked about passages. 1. Right There 2. Think and Search 3. On My Own and 4. Author and Me. Determining the type of questions helps us to correctly answer any questions asked.

In Writing Workshop we have been focusing our time on reading memoirs. We are becoming experts and will begin drafting our Memoir on being generous or something we have done that has made us a better person tomorrow.

Math returned to multiplication as we work on 2 digit x 1 digit and 3 digit x 1 digit. Tomorrow we will focus on money and multiplying by 0's. Time is our next unit.

We have completed our study of the explorers. There will be a test on Thursday. All of the information your student needs to know is on their chart.

I can't believe the holiday season is upon us... I hope your homes warm and happy.

Memoir

In Writing Workshop today we talked about things we have done in our lives that have made us a better person or times we were generous. Some examples that came up were:
• Donating hair to locks of love
• Food Drive for boy scouts
• Donating toys you have outgrown to Goodwill
• Working at a food pantry
• Donate money to Red Cross
• Giving blood
• Giving clothes to Salvation Army
• Christmas box for kids who are in need and don’t have presents
• Giving Tree
• Tour to Cure for kids with cancer

Students memoir this year has to focus on you being generous or doing something that made you a better person. They should talk to family if they get stuck coming up with a good idea.

What, Mrs. Jones did a cartwheel in class?

We have had another exciting week in fourth grade!! I have really enjoyed the 16 parent conferences I have had an look forward to my final 7 on Wednesday.

This week we have been studying Graphing in Math. Bar Graphs, Line Graphs, Pictographs, Coordinate Graphing! Next week we will take a look at Mode, Median, Range, and Mean. We will complete our unit with a review on Wednesday and a test on Thursday.

Our How To's are DONE. They came out wonderfully and we are just having a blast presenting them today! We have magic tricks, baseball games, football throwing, volleyballs, cooking, bracelet making, drawing, etc. going on in our class today. The kids are thrilled and working hard. Next week we will begin our study of Memoir. I am sure my writers will need a little help with their memories and I will be sending them your way!

In Social Studies we are taking a close look at the first explorers to touch NYS. They were all searching for a water route to Asia and didn't make it! Ask your historian who we have been talking about!

In Reading Workshop we are focusing on Questioning. Readers ask questions all of the time... we are asked to answer questions as well... this unit focuses on the 4 different types of questions and the best way to answer them.

The book letters came out very well last week. Don't forget they are due again the week of 12/13.

Have a great weekend!

GRAPHING IS FUN!!!

Want a cool and easy way to make Graphs?
Visit:

http://nces.ed.gov/nceskids/createagraph/default.aspx?ID=083da359286c473886528615a4200cea

Report Cards, Conferences, Car Wash Tickets, and Holiday Auction

There is a lot going on today!

1. Report Cards have been loaded to BC@Home and can be picked up at your convenience.

2. Conferences are Tuesday, Thursday, and next Wednesday. I look forward to having a great conversation with you about your fantastic student.

3. Car Wash Tickets are in and will be coming home with your seller today! Thank you again for your WONDERFUL effort!

4. Don't forget the holiday auction TONIGHT from 6:30-8:30!! I'll be there (hoping to win an iPad!).

We have started back from our little break with great momentum... I couldn't be more pleased!

How Much Does Thanksgiving Dinner Cost???

Ask your mathematician! We are working on a project this week to calculate the cost of a Thanksgiving dinner for 8 people based on the Price Chopper website. We have created our menu and begun to determine the amount of food we need. Thanks to the Butterball website, we know how big of a turkey to buy!

Microsoft Excel is our savior for this project as we have created a table that does the math for us!

Happy Thanksgiving!

New to eBlogger!!

I now have the ability to link our Team Jones Tweets to our BLOG!!! That means, you only have to check 1 place to get up to the minute updates on our great work! Please make sure to check it out at least weekly!!!

We also created our first TEAM JONES PODCAST! What is a podcast you ask? A digital recording produced in Garage Band. You can locate our work on the class Wiki!

Have a great day!

Hoffmans Car Wash

Way to go Team Jones!!!! You outsold EVERYONE!!! We sold 84 tickets... the next best class was 24 tickets! YAHOO, I am so proud of you!!!

Marking Period End

I will be ending the marking period grades after tomorrow's math test. We will be starting with Term #2 on Wednesday.

Thanks!

Week and a half??

I can't believe that it is a week and a half until Thanksgiving Break! We have so much to do and so much to be grateful for.

Our assembly on Wednesday for Ms. McDonald was wonderful. Each grade got to share their great words about Dorothy and it was very powerful.

This week we were able to conclude our unit on Multiplication and Division. Monday your mathematicians will be reviewing and Tuesday there will be a test. Its format is a mad minute followed by multiplication and division fill in the blanks and word problems. If you are working on your facts, it should be no problem!

In Reading Workshop we took our retake on the Non-Fiction Text Features open book today. The results were much better with an average of 91%. Following directions seems to be our biggest obstacle. Today we went over the directions on the ELMO as a class and I gave them a second chance at the final question. We moved onto expository text features as well focusing on description and definition texts. Next week we will cover: Process, Classification, Comparison, Analysis, and Persuasion. Each of these are different forms of NF writing.

Our How To's are coming right along in writing workshop. Being clear and concise is our focus. We will be peer revising and editing next week and I hope to present our How To's either the week of Thanksgiving break or the week we get back.

We have spent a good deal of time on the Native American's of NYS for the last few weeks. We are becoming experts on the Iroquois and Algonquin tribes and know a lot of information about their homes, lives, responsibilities, and traditions. We will be concluding our study of the Native American's before Thanksgiving and moving into Explorers with our first Jeff Bennett presentation the Monday after break.

Monday I will not be in class as I am on the interview committee for Mrs. Browne's third grade replacement. I am hoping for great behavior from my Team and I hope to give you a good report on Tuesday.

Have a great weekend!!!

Non-Fiction Text Elements Quiz

Change of plans today... I decided to take the opportunity to go over test taking strategies today during Reading Workshop. We will be re-taking the test with our notebooks on FRIDAY.

Ask your child about ways to prepare and take tests at home! I think they learned a lot.

Thanks!

New Background - ready for Fall

It is now officially fall, so it was time to make a change to our blog background!

We had a nice week this week focusing on our studies of How To, Non-Fiction, Native American's, and Division.

We were able to complete our study of Non-Fiction Text Features. We will review these Monday and have a quiz on Tuesday. All of the information your student needs to study is located in their Reader's Notebook. Next week we will begin to look at Text Structures.

We practiced writing How To's this week and realized how specific and clear the writing has to be. On Monday writers will make topic choices and begin drafting their own How To. We should be through revision by Friday.

Next week we will finish up our review of division. Mathematicians should be practicing their facts each night!!! I promise, it will make life easier.

Thursday we had a great visit from George Steele. We were going to go out in the pouring rain, but made a quick change and learned about plants and animals that can be found in our backyard in our classroom. It was fantastic! I even touched a skunk skin!

On Wednesday we have our first Character Assembly on Gratitude. We will be celebrating Ms. McDonald. As a fourth grade we are writing a Where I'm From poem about Ms. McDonald. It should be nice celebration.

Please don't forget that Wednesday is early release and all students must be getting on a bus (with the exception of School's Out Students). A specific PINK letter is coming home today!

I hope everyone has a nice weekend!

Conferences and Pictures

I was able to schedule everyone who sent the green conference form back on Wednesday with their 1st or 2nd conference choice! Thank you for your speedy return. If you were unable return the sheet today, I am sending home a second version with the available conference times today. Please let me know as soon as possible which times will work for you.

I updated our Team Jones photos... so sorry for our delay! Please check them out at your convenience!

Happy Wednesday!

No Candy Mrs. Jones???

No, I am very sorry to say that candy is not an acceptable snack in school. Please be sure to send in something more appropriate!!!


Thank you!!

Paper Newsletter this Week

I thought I would send home a paper newsletter to make sure that all of you are up to date on the great things we have been accomplishing in our class this year. It has come to my attention that when you open the classroom blog, it may not open to the most recent update. I am updating it at least once a week, so please make sure you are in October and that you have had a chance to read all of our updates.

We have had a great first week back to normal after Rocks and Minerals. Our Reading and Writing Workshops have been very productive as we work on our study of Non-Fiction. We have taken a close look at 9 text features of a Non-Fiction piece of writing and will do 11 more next week. It is important for all great readers to understand why authors use the different features when writing in Non-Fiction.

Our first pieces of writing are all drafted and typed as a draft. I am taking the time to read and edit all of the pieces. We will be working hard to finish these on Wednesday of next week.

In the meantime we will be starting our next writing unit of How To. Your writer will be asking for your help in coming up with an idea for something they can teach us how to do in class. More info to come on Wednesday!

Our math unit for this week and next is multiplication and division. PLEASE make sure your mathematician is practicing their facts. It is very important that they learn them now. It will make math easier going forward.

In Social Studies, we have begun our study of Native Americans. We will b e making comparisons between the Iroquois and the Algonquin tribes. We will be reading picture books and selections from SS text books to fill in comparison charts.

HELP!
It has come to my attention that there are some inappropriate games being played at recess and during snack. There are very clear rules in school that we keep our hands to ourselves. We will begin having snacks at our desks to help us remember how to remain clam.

I would also like to ask that all trading cards, toys, etc. remain at home. I some students are feeling excluded when they do not have cards, etc to trade.

Thank You
Thank you to all families that are sending in goodies and paper products for our Harvest Party.

I also appreciate all of the books that were bought for our classroom from the PTA Book Fair!!

I can’t wait for a fantastic November with your students!!!

Back to a Normal Schedule

With the conclusion of a fantastic work of science, we are getting back to our regular schedule. A special thanks to Mr. Cohen who did some fantastic scientific study with our classes (and their buddies) on Friday afternoon!

In Reading Workshop we will be starting our unit on Non-Fiction. We will begin by looking at where we find it and what we use it for. We will also take a look at some of the characteristics included in NF such as Title, Bold Words, Italics, Labels, Graphs, Captions, Table of Contents, Headings, and Subheadings.

For Writing Workshop we are a little behind and will finish publishing and conferencing about our first published work. It is going well but takes a bit longer for me to meet with everyone that I had anticipated!

We will begin our study of multiplication in math. PRACTICE FACTS PLEASE! They need to be mastered in order for the rest of our year to go smoothly! Each night they will have different fact families to be working on! Please help your mathematician by investing some time!

On Monday we are going to have a quiz on our Rocks and Minerals Unit and then we will begin our second Social Studies unit of the year - Native American's. We will take a close look and make comparisons between the Iroquois and Algonquin Tribes in NYS.

The book fair is next week. Wednesday is our preview day and Thursday is our buying day.

We will have a small celebration of Halloween on Friday as well. Thank you to the parents who signed up to send in snacks!

George Steele will also meet with our class on Thursday so we need to be dressed appropriately for spending the afternoon outside!

Have a great weekend! I am so proud of your learners!

Stop Light

Please take a minute tonight to discuss our new behavior plan with your student. We are starting a stoplight to help monitor our class rule of respect. There is a sheet that is going home today with explanations.

In addition, coming home today is a Midterm Update. This will have all averages for your student thus far in fourth grade. Please sign and return it to me Friday.

We are loving ROCKS and MINERALS and I will post another update tomorrow!!

Rocks and Minerals!!!

Next week is Rocks and Minerals Week! All science all the time!!! We will be partnering with Mrs. Kourt's class for a week of science discovery.

We will be taking a break from Math, Social Studies, Reading Workshop, and Writing Workshop Lessons. Don't worry, we will still be reading and writing!


I love science Academy and can't wait to see your scientists at work!

CHANGE: Our SS test has been postponed until TUESDAY! Your student will have their study guide sent home on Friday for ample time for review.

Short Week

This week may only be a short one but we have LOTS to get done! Next week is our 1st Science Week - Rocks and Minerals - all week long! In order to get ready for that we must finish up all of our other units.

We will conclude Literary Life with a look at a few more good reading strategies: Wonderings, Authors Purpose, and Lessons Learned.

In Math we will be concluding our review of addition and subtraction strategies by subtracting across 0's, making change, word problems, and a test.

For Social Studies will wrap up with geography. Our NYS maps are almost done and we will be doing some reading on the topography of the state. We will have a SS test on Friday as well.

Writing Workshop will consist of revision and editing of our first piece. This will not be finished but we will continue to conference and publish over Rocks and Minerals week.

I hope everyone rested up this weekend!

Cyberbullying Presentation

I attended last nights panel discussion on Cyberbullying. I was disappointed by the parent turnout to discuss this as I think it can be a big problem in our students lives. It easily goes undetected and from what the Student Body President said, many students may not even know they are bullying with the things that they text, write online, or post to sites.

I am going to do everything I can to teach internet safety to Team Jones but I am going to need to partner with you to continue to reinforce the ideas at home and for years to come!

I took away a fantastic idea that I want to share with you...recently a parent at a sleepover party took away all of the cell phones when the guests entered the house. This immediately got rid of the cameras and potential for children to do things (send texts, make phone calls, etc) due to peer pressure. I thought it was a fantastic idea!

Thank you for working with me on all of the important skills that I am teaching in 4th grade!!!

Word Problems

Please note that today your mathematician will have ONE word problem for homework. There is also a yellow paper coming home for parent instructions on how to help your student with word problems without giving them the answer or leading their thinking. Please review it and keep it handy for more assignments that will come home!!

Thank You

Thank you for all of the kind words this week as we had a terrible loss to the Clarksville Community.

As there is no school tomorrow, reading calendars will be due on Monday (don't forget a parent signature). We will also have our second spelling test on Monday. We will review the different genre's on Monday and have our Genre Quiz on Tuesday (originally planned for Friday).

This week we attempted to continue having a great day of learning as Ms. McDonald would have wanted us to. We wrote a variety of different Writer's Notebook topics and reviewed even more genre's of reading. We began our unit on addition and subtraction in math and continued to work on our NYS maps in Social Studies.

I hope that your teammate shared our lesson on Internet Safety with you. I feel strongly that our children need to have lessons on appropriate, safe, and effective ways to use the internet. Each week I will be highlighting a different topic. Yesterdays lesson had a focus on Private Information and not giving it out! Next week we will discuss Passwords.

Next week we will also have our first assembly's. The Show of Love on Thursday and Fire Safety on Friday.

Thank you again for your support of your children. We are a great team!

Test

What a fantastic first Math Test on Place Value we had today. The class average was 90%. Fantastic!

We are continuing to have issues with our chatty behavior! We had a hall walking conversation today and I hope to see great improvement tomorrow. Thank you again for your support with this.

Don't forget picture day is Thursday!

I hope you are surviving this weather!!!

Hard Work

We were hard workers this week! I am proud of all of their accomplishments and it was a pleasure to meet all of you.

We are having a little problem in class with chatting. The noise level is quick to rise and although we are discussing it all day in class, I could use a little support at home. Please have a chat with your student about transition times and making good choices. I am going to begin having consequences of missing minutes at recess (a class decided consequence) starting on Monday. I am hoping this issue can be nipped quickly.

Next week our Reading Workshop time will focus on four more genre's: Historical Fiction, Non-Fiction, Classic/Traditional Literature, and Science Fiction. In addition, we will have a quick quiz on the genre's on Friday.

In Writing Workshop we will continue to focus on different types of entries for our Writer's Notebooks. By the end of next week we will have practices 10-12 different types of entries so that when writing is assigned, your writer shouldn't have much writers block!

Monday will be a review of Place Value with our first math test on Tuesday. The test will be fair and the review sheet will be written off of the test. I encourage your mathematician to study on Monday night!!

Spelling tests will start next week. Your student will have 5 words assigned on Monday with their first test on Wednesday. They should study each night.

In addition to their spelling, I encourage your student to study their math facts. We will be taking 2 mad minutes per week!! Addition and Subtraction will be our first focus.

Picture day is Thursday!!!

Have a fantastic weekend!!

Fantastic Start

We are off to a fantastic start. I am so happy with the homework and classwork that are coming in. It is clear to me that many parents are checking these assignments and I appreciate your time and effort.

We will be continuing our study of Place Value in math next week with comparing and ordering, rounding, and problem solving. This is sometimes a hard unit for fourth graders. We will continue working on it throughout the year.

In Reading Workshop we will be starting a genre study. We will be looking at the different types of writing for their characteristics and purpose. This will be a two week study.

Our focus in Writing Workshop will be on entries - different types, how to come up with ideas, and stamina. Your writer will be writing entries at home for homework next week as well as in class.

Our Social Studies work will continue to focus on geography but turn to New York State specifics. We will be looking at rivers, lakes, and making large NYS maps.

I am very much looking forward to meeting you on TUESDAY night at Open House!!

Have a wonderful weekend!

Full Week... Here we come!

We had a fantastic Friday last week. We got to know each other, met with Mrs. Kourt's class to make a book for Ms. McDonald, and went over many routines.

This week we are going to jump right in. In Reading Workshop we are going to work on using our classroom library, choosing just right books, discuss the kids of reading we like to do, and plan for our reading in class this year. In Writing Workshop we are going to being with what good writer's do, how we use our writer's notebook, and creating a heart map. Math will start with place value and a quick inventory on where we are as math students. For Social Studies, we will begin our geography unit with the 7 continents review and key NYS landforms.

It is going to be fantastic I am sure! Thank you for supporting your 4th grade student!

1st Day!!!

What a quick day we had! It was great to see 22 smiling faces (we had one absentee). Everyone was very well behaved while we organized all of our supplies. You will be amazed at how ready we are to start right up on Friday. Thank you for sending in almost all of the necessary supplies for the year. We are fully stocked and ready to go!

I hope your student enjoyed their first day, I can't wait to get to know them better in the coming weeks!

Welcome to Team Jones

Welcome to Team Jones and our classroom blog. I hope that you are all having a great summer vacation. I have been enjoying my summer with Abby and Matthew (you will hear a lot about them soon!). I am very excited to begin a new school year and get to know you all.

I will be using our blog and BC@Home to communicate with you and your parents this year. The blog will take the place of a weekly newsletter. Here you will find what is happening in our classroom, important announcements and links to websites.

Please come to school on the first day with all of your supplies. We will be labeling and sorting!

I am looking forward to meeting you on September 8th and your parents at our Open House. Enjoy the rest of your summer!