Red River Water Festival

Today was our very first field trip as 4th graders. Every student did great! We learned a ton about several water-related topics, so without further ado...here is what happened straight from the horse's mouth (we also learned what metaphors are this morning...)!!!

Prior to leaving...Mrs. Clarey needed to figure out how to use her new selfie stick (purchased specifically for field trips...). Wouldn't you love to be on a bus full of 64 excited fourth graders?

Station #1: Let the Cattail Out of the Bag

Written by --- Eric, Jake #2, Chuck, & Ava

At this station we learned about wetlands. Then we pulled animals out of a bag, and we figured out what they had to do with wetlands. Then she handed out things for us. We got in groups and then figured out what the things had to do with wetlands. And we wrote in our journals.

Station 2: The Life Box

Written by --- Katie, Petunia (aka: Zoe), Jaden, & Addie

The first thing we did was to decide if Boris (the plant), Petunia (aka: Zoe), and Fred (the rock) were alive or not. Then we learned about the 4 necessities of life. They are H2O, organic matter, air, and sunlight. We got to open a life box and study the things inside, and we got soybeans seeds. 

Station 3: One River, Many Voices

Written by --- Joey, David, Jake #1, & Ella

First a lady read us a poem about the Red River written by a girl who lived in Grand Forks. Then we learned about watersheds, floods, and droughts. Last we learned about using our natural resources. 

Station 4: Would You Drink This Water?

Written by --- Anya, Sofie, Jonathan, & Henry #1

We were at the station called Would you drink this water? We tried six different kinds of water. The first one was just tap water, the second was onion powder, then green food coloring, the fourth was mint flavoring, the fifth one was coffee creamer, and the sixth one was salt water. We learned about how important it is that we don't waste water.

Last stop...Mr. History himself!!!

Written by --- Jonah, Henry #2, & Fatima

12,000 years ago a glacier moved through the valley, which formed the river. Many years later a group of people that called themselves the Ojibwa move in somewhere in Minnesota. Then a group of men moved from France and married the women in Minnesota. They trapped beavers and sent them on riverboats, then onto ox carts to Saint Paul where they would be made into hats. The Dakota tribe came to our state and named it North Dakota. The railroad built a bridge over the Red River for the trains to go across, and the cities built up. 

And back in the classroom...the soybean seeds we received in The Life Box station have been "planted" using the 4 essential elements of life. Energy (sunlight), organic matter (present inside the seed), water (in the wet cotton ball), and air (entering the bags through a punched hole). Can't wait to watch what happens in those little bags!!!

We've been busy!!!

We have been busy beavers this week!!! Not only have we been continuing to work hard on our learning, but we also squeezed in 5 keyboarding lessons, a guidance lesson, and a lesson on school beliefs with Mr. Carlson. Whew! Each week our learning, of course, will continue to build and challenge us. To be successful on a daily basis we will not only need to focus on the topics of our lessons, but also on behaviors that will help us to focus, discuss, and internalize our learning goals. One topic that we will be emphasizing is self-monitoring. Am I paying attention and focusing in class? If not, what are some strategies that I can use to get my brain and/or my body back on track?

SNAPSHOTS OF THE WEEK...

Unit 1 in math seems to be kind of all over the place, but the underlying emphasis is on understanding numbers with multiple digits, the value of each digit, and then applying our understanding of those numbers in situations like rounding, estimating, adding, subtracting, and measuring, etc. In the picture below you see students working on adding large numbers. In this activity I had place 8 different problems around the classroom. Students were asked to circulate and choose at least 4 to answer. 

Over the past week we've been working our way way through a book called Porpoises in Peril. Below the students are searching for evidence to explain how the Science Squad discovered the identify of Drake Darkly...a villain who is illegally mining for opals on the ocean floor and disrupting the fish and porpoise populations. As students found evidence in the book they recorded it on their post-it notes.

Keyboarding class...a super duper critically important life skill that we need to learn NOW with proper technique. :)

MRS. CLAREY RECOMMENDS...

New to our class blog this year will be a weekly book feature...books we are reading in class, books I've read and would recommend to my students and their families, etc. Without further ado, here they are!!!

• Book #1: James and the Giant Peach, by Roald Dahl --- One of my all time favorites and one I used to read aloud as a third grade teacher. Ronald Dahl has many fabulous books, such as The BFG, Matilda, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory... Here is his website http://www.roalddahl.com/home/kids
• Book #2...ANYTHING by Seymour Simon. Oh my word I can't tell you how fabulous he is, especially if you like animals. He also has a fabulous website for kids... http://www.seymoursimon.com
• Book #3: The Land of Stories. I read this over the summer and am now reading it to my son, who is a first grader. It was recommended to me by several of my students last year. GREAT read and totally fine to have younger siblings listen in if you read as a family. Best part...it's a series!!! 4 books as of now!!! http://thelandofstories.com

Getting your child to LOVE reading!

Photo credit: Hope King of Elementary Shenanigans 

Reading. One of my favorite topics!!! Why? Reading is the single greatest determining factor in your child's success in school...and in life. Reading is what opens doors to new opportunities, allows us to communicate, escape into another "world," and learn about the world around us. Reading is used in EVERY subject in school as well as in almost every activity in life (try driving around or eating at a restaurant without reading anything). I promise you that this year I will do everything in my power to support your child in not only learning reading strategies, but also to help them LOVE reading. 

So, what are my beliefs about reading?

• To get kids to love reading, you need to let them pick what they read!!!
• Kids need to build reading habits:
• Know how to find books and how/where to find ideas for picking books
• Choose books that are a good fits, both for interest and readability
• Build stamina for reading
• Read THROUGH the books we pick
• Repeat this process over and over in order to build qualities of being a reader that will last beyond 4th grade
• Reading needs to be modeled and supported at school and at home
• Reading needs to be enjoyable, without strings attached. No logging minutes or petty projects. (Do you know any adults who keep track of the number of minutes they read for pleasure?)

What I expect:

• This year I'm challenging my students to read 40 books. Why 40? Because I want them to build reading habits, read often, and read widely...I want them to catch the reading bug!!!
• I will encourage students to read a variety of genres (I have "challenge lines" on the Genre Graph in their Page Turners book). Why? Let me explain using one of my favorite foods. I love  pizza and could totally eat it all the time. Pizza, however, is not great as an exclusive meal choice. It needs to be supplemented with fruit, veggies, milk...you get the idea. As readers we do naturally gravitate to our favorites, but we still need to be able to read for other purposes. When my son was little it was my job to introduce new, unfamiliar foods, and now as a teacher it's my job to introduce new kinds of reading material. 
• Students need to be able to talk about what they are reading. Once we have built our reading stamina and reading habits we will begin writing about our reading in our Page Turners notebooks and discussing together at Book Club Meetings. These were the highlight of our year last year!!! 

Below is a picture of two anchor charts that we're currently using and referring to often as we build stamina for reading and our ability to stay tuned in to what we're reading.

First weeks of school...round 2!

Now that I have full permission for photos on the blog...here are a few more from our first few weeks! Here are a few more pics of the class helping me sticker all our books. I LOVED hearing over and over..."Ooooh! This looks good! Can I read this one, Mrs. Clarey?"

One of our on-going projects is our Interactive Reading & Language Notebook. Throughout the year we will add pages with information about the different skills and topics we learn that are related to reading and language. I love that these give students an opportunity to be creative while recording notes and information about our learning.

First attempt at a class selfie. :)

On Friday we took a few minutes to touch on the events of September 11 in memory and honor of those our country lost. We then read a story called The Man Who Walked Between the Towers. The book is based on a real event that occurred toward the end of the construction of the Twin Towers many years before, when a street performer from France walked on a tightrope between the towers. 

Back to School 2015!

Welcome to 4th grade and the 2015-2016 school year! What a great group of kids we have in our class!!! After spending our first few days getting to know one another, settling into new routines, and slowing diving into subjects one at at time, our class is finally in full swing. Here are a few peeks back...

Morning Meeting...

Working hard on cursive...

Helping their teacher place a genre label on every book in our classroom library (there were more bins than students...yes, I have a LOT of books)...

Playing Number Top-it...working on creating, reading, and comparing large numbers...

In the coming days of school you can expect to hear how we are...

• Developing ideas and storylines for realistic fiction stories in Writing Workshop.
• Analyzing stories for evidence to talk about characters, point of view, etc.
• Rounding.
• Map reading skills.

Over the next few weeks I will continue completing fall reading and math assessments so that we can begin small groups in October!