Verbs in the present tense

Helping verbs and main verbs

Subject-Verb Agreement Video

January 23, 2013

The students had lots of fun at the Field Museum last week! They also did a great job on their social studies tests. We'd recently talked about different ways to study, and I hope that some of these methods are working for the students.

In science, the students had a blast today participating in the "Metric Olympics." They needed to predict the volume of water in a cup, the mass of a marble, and how far Gabriel could jump, among other things! It was a great way to practice different types of measurements and using the metric system. We will have a test next week on Thursday, January 31, about the properties of matter. Next week on Friday, February 1, the Whipping Boy projects are also due. I'm looking forward to seeing all of them! Please let me know if you have any questions about them.

Catholic Schools Week begins next week as well, which is a time to celebrate all the things that make our school great! I'm sure you've seen the schedule in the Tuesday folder, but here are just a few reminders:

Monday is pajama day, and students can wear pajamas to school. They should have a book with them that they'd like to read, and they can bring a pillow or blanket, but the students cannot share anything that their head will rest against.

The Catholic Schools Week posters are due on Tuesday. Everyone needs to complete one, and the theme is "How have Catholic schools changed me?" Students can wear a shirt from their favorite team.

Thursday is the awards ceremony, which will take place in the downstairs gym right after Mass (probably around 9:30). Everyone is invited to this, then welcome to come back up to the classroom to observe a lesson. We are wearing the same color as our buddies that day, which is red.

Finally, on Friday, we'll be having our school Olympics.

January 14, 2013

Happy New Year! Above, you can see pictures our of our completed Jesse Tree and Mr. Lindo, who came in to teach a lesson on weather.

The students did a fantastic job of setting New Year's resolutions and wrote well-organized paragraphs describing their goals, with resolutions ranging from eating more fruits and vegetables to not jumping on the couch. We're working right now on verbs, and then we will be writing persuasive paragraphs.

We have a field trip coming up to the Field Museum this Friday, and a social studies test on Thursday. We are still reading The Whipping Boy, and discussing plot maps, character changes, and setting. Right now, it looks like we'll be done reading the book the week of January 28, which means the castle, rat, or simile project will be due then.

Our weather forecasts are online! Ms. Perkins is uploading them as the students complete them. To hear, go to this link, and click on the tab that says "minicasts." This month, the students are learning about matter. We did some activities last week looking at the different states of matter and how they are defined, including investigating oobleck, which sometimes acts as a liquid and sometimes like a solid! This week, we'll measure length, mass, and volume, using tools like a balance and graduated cylinder.

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December 21, 2012

Merry Christmas everyone! The students have worked really hard this year, and I hope they all enjoy their well-deserved break. Above, you can see pictures from when visitors from the Nature Museum taught a lesson about air, and the students performing How To Eat Fried Worms. (They did a great job and read with a lot of emotion!)

I passed out the project sheets for our next book, The Whipping Boy, yesterday. We'll actually begin reading this book after break, but I wanted to share the projects with the students now so they could get started on them over break. If they are doing the castle project, here are some helpful websites:
Castles for Kids
Medieval Castles

December 14, 2012

I hope everyone had a great time at the Christmas concert! The students performed beautifully, and they had one of the toughest songs to sing, too.

We are finishing up our unit on weather. We have some special guests from the Nature Museum today, who are coming to teach a lesson about cold and warm fronts and high and low pressure areas. Next week, students will need to take their weather measurements on their own, and then create a weather report that they'll turn into a podcast to share with the school. The test will be on Friday. Yesterday, we discussed different ways to study for tests, and all of the students created a study plan.

Next week, students are going to begin taking their state quizzes. About two weeks of every month, they'll be given five-six states whose location they need to memorize. The study guide will be passed out on Monday, and the quiz will be on Friday. I've linked a game on the blog that can be a fun way to learn these. We're also going to begin reading The Whipping Boy next week, and I'll send home some information about the castle project that goes with it.  This won't be due until the middle/end of January (depending on how long it takes us to read the book), but it can be a good thing to work on over Christmas break.

December 6, 2012

Happy Advent! We are celebrating in the classroom by learning the stories of the Jesse Tree. So far, we've heard about the creation, Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, with many more still to come. We are also going to weekly prayer services with the whole school. We've been practicing for our Christmas concert as well, which will be this Sunday at 4:00. Please have your child there by 3:45 so we are all ready when it begins.



Last week in science, students conducted balloon races to learn about variables, data, and making predictions in science. This is one of the lesson ideas I learned from my classes with the Museum of Science and Industry. As you can tell from the pictures, they had a lot of fun!

In science, we are learning about the weather and taking measurements using instruments we made, such as a barometer, anemometer, and wind vane. We will have a test on this on December 20. We're finishing up reading How to Eat Fried Worms, and will be completing some projects for this book next week, such as creating new book covers and performing plays. Their sequence worms for the books will be due on Tuesday. I told the students that if they're really lucky, they'll get to eat some fried worms, too!

Before Thanksgiving, we were able to get together with our buddies to color some turkeys. Those pictures are below.

November 15, 2012

The students have been hard at work in science class lately! We've been learning about the forces that shape Earth's surface, such as plate movement, earthquakes, erosion, and weathering. This has led to lots of hands on activities, from trying to crack rocks through freezing water (weathering) to looking at how glaciers cause erosion. You can see pictures of the students completing experiments above. We are going to look at some fossils today and tomorrow, and their test on this unit will be next week on Tuesday.

We're also wrapping up our units in English on nouns and in social studies on maps. Both of these tests will be the second week after Thanksgiving, the week of December 3rd. We begin many of our English units by writing poems, and the students have been having fun imagining the creative things they would find in a messy locker!

Students received their Bibles on Tuesday during the Bible ceremony. These Bibles are their own to keep, but we will be using them in religion class in school starting after Thanksgiving. They will also need to use them in middle school. I encourage the students to take their Bibles home to read, but they will need to remember to bring them back to school. We complete one of my favorite projects of the year, making a Jesse Tree, during Advent, and the students will need to use their Bibles to complete this. They will receive more details about this project after the break, but each student's assignment will be due on a different day, so please watch their assignment notebooks for this.

I hope everyone has a safe, happy, and healthy Thanksgiving break!

November 4, 2012

Thank you everyone who came to conferences! I really enjoy getting to sit down and speak with each family about their child's progress and goals for the rest of the year. If you think of anything you forgot to ask, or would like to speak more about something from their report cards, please don't hesitate to contact me.

The students did a beautiful job writing their paragraphs for the Day of the Dead, and they were really excited to share them, too! Below are pictures from sharing their projects, creating the ofrendas on Halloween, and learning CPR.



We have a social studies test on Wednesday. After the test, we're going to begin studying maps. In science, we've begun learning about Earth science and geology, and in writing, we're going to begin a unit on nouns.

I know I've been gone a few days this year, and I wanted to explain why. I am taking a class with Ms. Garber, who teaches science for the middle school, at the Museum of Science and Industry. These are wonderful classes that give me more background in science, as well as tons of ideas for experiments and the materials to complete them. I've already taken classes on Earth science and environmental science through the museum, and we've already done experiments and investigations from these classes, such as creating a food web about Lake Michigan animals, testing soil pollution, using seismographs to discover where earthquakes happened, and trying to figure out how many pennies were in a closed opaque container. The classes I'm taking now are on physical science and energy, and though it is unfortunate that I need to miss school, I know that the material I am able to bring back will be extremely beneficial to the students.

October 18, 2012

I'm sorry I have not been able to publish the students' Ecuador video yet. There's been some technical issues with uploading it to the internet, but Ms. Perkins and I are working on it and will have it up as soon as we are able. The students worked really hard on it, and I'm anxious to share it with everyone! In the meantime, here are some pictures of the artwork we've done:

The class is going on a field trip on Monday, October 29 to see The Magic Flute, which Lyric Opera of Chicago will be performing at a local high school. The Lyric Opera has been generous enough to donate books for all the students with information about operas, Mozart, and The Magic Flute. I encourage you to look at these with your students, since I think the students will get more out of the experience if they see the opera with some prior knowledge!

We've started drafting our Day of the Dead paragraphs, honoring loved ones who have passed away. These should be finished by October 31. We'll have time in class on the 26th and 31st to create our ofrendas for those we honor. Please make sure to send in a shoebox and any other pictures or mementos you and your child would like to include.

We have a few tests coming up: the religion test on the first three commandments is on Wednesday, October 24, and the science test on ecosystems and food chains is on Monday, October 29. We will also have an English test and social studies test in about 2-3 weeks. The end of the quarter is Friday, October 26, and conferences will be on Sunday, November 4.

October 1, 2012

We're in the midst of two exciting projects right now: Hispanic Heritage and Day of the Dead! Students have finished researching our country for Hispanic Heritage month, Ecuador, and are busy creating posters of famous people and writing their scripts. We'll begin filming our movie this week, and hopefully, I'll be able to post it soon.

I also passed out letters today about our Day of the Dead project. Students need to choose one relative who has passed away to honor, and they need to interview two people about the person they are honoring. The first interview is due next week on Tuesday, and the second interview the Monday after that. We'll then begin working on our paragraphs about these people. Students also need to bring in a shoebox so we can create an ofrenda, or altar, for that person, along with photographs and mementos to place in the box. We will have time in school to work on these, and I can provide the students with construction paper, feathers, and glitter, but anything else they'll need to bring from home. We'll create the altars on the 26th and 31st of October. If you'd like to see examples of projects from previous years, feel free to look at last year's blog entries!

We began to talk about the economy today in social studies. One aspect of this unit is to talk with the students about their own financial decisions. We discussed today the difference between needs and wants, and how some things we need to save to buy and some things we can buy now. We'll work in the next few weeks with tracking spending and creating savings plans. I encouraged the students to discuss with you at home something they wanted that they could save for, and it would be great if this could become something they do at home and actually save for and buy, instead of just something we discuss in class!

September 14, 2012

We had a great time today meeting our buddies and helping them with their Hispanic Heritage month project: making Mayan masks. We are going to be studying Ecuador for our country, and will begin working on our research projects and artwork next week. If you have any experiences that you'd like to share with the class, please let me know!

Our science test will be next week on Thursday, September 20. On Monday, September 24 we will have our social studies test. The students already received their science study guide, and should be filling it out and studying from it. They will get their social studies study guide on Monday.

Below, you can see pictures of the students working with their buddies and in their science centers. I was able to borrow materials from the Nature Museum so students could investigate reptile and amphibian skeletons, and look at real turtle shells and snake skin!

September 7, 2012

The students have been doing lots of fun, hands-on science activities! Last week, we looked at shark teeth and practiced our classifying skills by putting them into groups. This week, we began to talk about how to classify animals, and students were very excited to observe our earthworms yesterday to determine what makes them an animal and if they're a vertebrate or invertebrate.

Students also received their first project of the year, an ABC book in social studies. They will be working in groups with each student having several letters they are responsible for. This will be due the week we take our test, which should be around the week of the 24th. We will also be having a science test the week of the 17th. I'll post the exact dates as we get closer, and I know exactly when we'll have finished covering all the material.

In reading, we are almost done learning the routines we'll use throughout the year. Every day will consist of reading to yourself, reading to someone, writing, or working on words with the iPads. We've gone through all the procedures necessary for reading to yourself and reading to someone, and will work next week on the last two activities. After that, students will choose which two they'd like to work on each day as I meet with the students either one-on-one or in small groups.

We've begun to draft our first writing pieces of the year, and I'm hoping to complete them by the end of next week. Students will have time in writing class to work on these, but may need to work at home, too, if they are unable to finish in the time we have in class.

August 27, 2012

Welcome to a new school year! I'm very excited to be back and teaching fourth grade, and we have a lot of fun activities planned for the beginning of the year. Right now, I am working with the students on organization and setting up routines and procedures. This will help the rest of the year run smoothly, especially as students have more independence in reading and writing and the ability to make more choices. In the beginning of the year, we focus on learning about the writing process (exploring, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing) in English and classification and animals in science. We'll begin discussing the Ten Commandments and learn comprehension strategies in reading.

We will begin spelling this week, which will mean weekly spelling tests. These will alternate between testing the definitions from the vocabulary in the book and testing on the spelling of words from their own lists. Starting today, students will also have regular reading and math homework.

Don't forget that our Back to School Night is this Thursday, from 6-8. We also have a three day weekend, with no school on September 3 for Labor Day.

Fantasy Book Summer Reading

Welcome to our new fourth graders! This year for our summer reading, instead of doing a written report, you have the option of participating in a discussion online. I hope this will let us all see and respond to each other's thoughts about the book.

As a reminder, you need to begin each comment with the book you read, and should write your first name only under "Comment As." You should then write down the number of the questions you are answering, followed by your answer. Later on, you should check back and respond to another student's comment.

For your fantasy book, you need to answer two of the following questions:

1. Who is the main character and how would you describe them? Are they like you at all-why or why not?

2. What do you think are the three most important things that happen in this book? Why are these the most important?

3. What in this book happens that makes it a fantasy? List at least two things, and be specific.

4. Is the "world" that the author created one that you would like to live in? Why or why not?

June 6, 2012

We made it to the end of the year! It has truly been a joy to teach this class, and there were many moments throughout the year I felt blessed to witness the intelligence, generosity, and compassion of the students.

The students are meeting their reading teachers in middle school today and will receive their summer reading and math packets. These need to be completed over the summer and turned in on the first day of school. The students should continue to bring pencils, art supplies, and paper to write on to school these last few days, as we have assignments left to complete.

Thank you for all of your support throughout the year, and I hope you have a fantastic summer!

Realistic Fiction Summer Reading

Welcome to our new fourth graders! This year for our summer reading, instead of doing a written report, you have the option of participating in a discussion online. I hope this will let us all see and respond to each other's thoughts about the book.

As a reminder, you need to begin each comment with the book you read, and should write your first name only under "Comment As." You should then write down the number of the questions you are answering, followed by your answer. Later on, you should check back and respond to another student's comment.

For your realistic fiction book by Beverly Cleary or Judy Blume, you need to answer two of the following questions:

1. Who is the main character and how would you describe them? Are they like you at all-why or why not?

2. What do you think are the three most important things that happen in this book? Why are these the most important?

3. Do you think that this book could really happen in your school, family, or neighborhood? Why or why not?

4. If you could change something about the book, what would you change? (Do not write down "nothing" as your answer!)

May 25, 2012

The year is winding down, and we saw the eighth grade graduate today! Don't forget that students will receive their summer reading and math packets the last week of school and will get a chance to meet their reading teacher for next year then. Please also keep a lookout for any books that belong to the school and start sending them back.

The science fair was a great success! We had many excellent projects, and I was very impressed with their quality. Congratulations to Isaiah and Joshua for winning first place, Destiny and Elysa for second, and David and Max for third.

I also recently received information from the Museum of Science and Industry. They are doing a free program this summer where you can sign up to receive weekly emails of fun science experiments to do at home. If you register soon, you'll also receive a free ticket to visit MSI. The link and more information can be found here.

Our last field trip will be to the Lincoln Park Zoo on Tuesday, June 5 with our preschool buddies. Students also should be finishing up their research projects next week. The rough draft is due Tuesday, and the final published copy is due Friday.

May 16, 2012

It's getting closer to the end of the year, and the fourth graders are doing excellent work! We're doing an ABC countdown with the first-third grade, with a different letter for each day, ending in "Z" for our last day of school. Yesterday was hat for H, Monday was grapes for G, and today we're getting ice cream!

The students did a fantastic job on their science fair projects. We'll be showing them to the school tomorrow during the day, and families are welcome to come that evening from 5:30-7:30 to view our projects and the rest of the school's. We've also been learning about heat, sound, and light in science class. Students made their own instruments and demonstrated how pitch changes, created insulated "ice keepers" to keep ice cubes from melting, and looked at how prisms separate the colors of light. They'll get a study guide at the end of the week, and the test will be on Thursday, May 24.

We've just finished reading The Bad Beginning, and many of the students have been reading the next books in the series. It's great to see them so enthusiastic about reading! Their scrapbook projects will be due on Monday. In English, we're writing research papers. I have lots of books on animals, and the students were told if they'd like to research another subject, they need to find three books about that topic. So far, we have students doing research on things from the Aztecs to Michael Jordan. They'll research and take notes this week and next, and we'll also begin drafting our papers next week. Their recent four paragraph papers were great, and I was very impressed with students' word choice.

We had tons of fun at the White Sox game yesterday! Thank you to Mr. Jim for donating those tickets. We also have a field trip coming up on Tuesday, June 5 to go to Lincoln Park Zoo with our buddies.

Finally, congratulations to Anayah! She won a state wide competition to design a rain barrel, which we'll be able to see at our school next year.