EDITOR’S NOTE

We had two disaster drills and two fire drills this week. All fourth grade students were checked for hearing and vision if they wear glasses. Our assembly is today at 2:20. Attention Center Helpers: We will start centers on Monday, September 27^th from 9:40-10:10 daily.

LITERACY

Strategy: recognizing text features in fiction and nonfiction

Next Week: recognizing text features in nonfiction

Genre: realistic fiction

Next Week: realistic fiction

Text Elements/Structure: character traits, point of view, plot, summary, theme

Next week: character traits, point of view, plot, summary, theme

Writing Trait/Craft: organization

Next week: organization

Writing Mode/Unit of Study: launching the writer’s workshop, writing notebooks, identify of a writer, the writing life, writing process

Next week: launching the writer’s workshop, writing notebooks, identify of a writer, the writing life, writing process

Grammar/Conventions: nouns, adjectives, pronouns

Next week: complete sentences, subject pronouns, synonyms

Spelling: prefix (bi-), suffix (ance)

Next week: prefixes (non-, port-), suffix

(-ish)

Vocabulary: rowdy, rowdier, impressive, analyze, trend, boost

Next week: hardship, seek, limit, turbulent, industrious, thrive

MATH

I sent home small cards for each child this week that had their Everyday Math login and passwords on them. Please keep these somewhere safe so students can use the cards at home. Students reviewed equivalent names for whole numbers and name-collection boxes; practiced identifying values of digits in numbers up to one billion; practiced reading and writing numbers up to one billion; practiced with place-value skills using a calculator routine; and reviewed reading and writing large numbers.

Next week: Students will practice organizing and displaying data with a tally chart and determine the maximum, minimum, range, and mode of a set of data; display a set of data with a line plot; find the median of a set of data; review the partial-sums algorithm used to solve multi-digit addition problems; and start learning how to use a column-addition method similar to the traditional addition algorithm.

SCIENCE

Students answered the following questions:

· How can you classify living things by what they eat?

· How were saber-toothed cats similar to African lions?

· What is the difference between a food chain and a food web?

· How did cane toads change the food chains and food webs in Australia?

· What caused the brown pelican to become endangered?

· How do adaptations help living things get food?

· How is a chameleon adapted to its environment?

Next week: Students will answer the following questions:

· What are some adaptations that help plants and animals protect themselves?

· How is nature like a drugstore?

· How do beavers change the environment and how do the changes affect other living things?

· How can changes people make to the wetlands be helpful and harmful?

· What caused buffaloes to nearly disappear, and why have their numbers increased?

· How are different plants and animals adapted to desert environments?

· What adaptations do some plants and animals have to survive cold winters?

IMPORTANT DATES

9/27 Centers Start

10/5 Churchill Park Fieldtrip 9:00-12:00

jnicolai@d41.org

(630) 534-7330