Hope you are enjoying your holiday! A few reminders....

Happy Holidays! I hope that you are enjoying time with family and friends and are having a safe and relaxing break.

We will be back in school on Tuesday, January 3, 2012! I am enjoying my break but miss the kids and are anxious to get back to learning with them.

Reading logs will be due on Tuesday, January 3. Your child is required to read 200 minutes over the break however students who read more than 200 minutes will be receiving a prize. The students who have read the most, get to choose their prize first. I've received a few emails from students who have already read over 400 minutes! Wow!!!!! Great job and keep up the hard work.

Don't forget to practice math facts and some problem solving over the break as well. Firstinmath.com is a great way to practice. The kids need to keep challenging themselves!

Students also need to begin planning their science projects. They will be graded on checkpoints to help keep us all on track to complete the project and make some amazing scientific discoveries. Checkpoint #1 is due on Thursday, January 5. Here are some sites that could be helpful: http://school.discoveryeducation.com/sciencefaircentral/
http://www.all-science-fair-projects.com/index.php


Have a wonderful week! I will see all of you soon. Keep safe and keep your kids using their brains. Be sure to stay up late and enjoy this time off. Now that the first half of 4th grade is over, we will be starting 2012 in full swing. Expectations will be higher and they are ready to meet them. They need to be ready to focus and put forth their best effort everyday! I am so excited to see their progress as the year continues!

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Happy Holidays!

Hi,

Happy Holidays! We had a wonderful holiday party! Thank you Mrs. Geyer, and all the other parents who helped and/or donated items. We also had fun making gingerbread houses with our first grade buddies. Thank you to all the parents who donated items for that as well! Thank you for all of the presents! I can't wait to go shopping with my Visa gift cards! You are all awesome!

We have been busy! We enjoyed a great visit with the author, Jeff Crosby, last Friday as well as a fantastic concert by the Ridgeview band, orchestra, and choir. Our pen pals had fun also last Friday sharing holiday stories, and playing games. Our next visit with our pen pals will be on January 10. We will be making clay bowls with Mrs. Arnold. The bowls will be donated to the Empty Bowl Project in April. The bowls will be sold and the proceeds will go to the Round Rock Serving Center. Feel free to join us at 1:00 for our visit on January 10. You can make a bowl also!

Science Projects are coming up! The packet went home in Thursday folders and is also available on the FCE school website. The first checkpoint is due on Thursday, January 5. I have attached it. Doing a science project is required for fourth graders. The project is required but entering the fair is optional, however, if your child is making the project, he/she might as well enter it in the fair. The FCE website also has tons of helpful links for science fair projects. Go to FCE, students, then Science Project Resources. Have fun and enjoy being very scientific.

Don't forget that Holiday Reading Logs are due on Tuesday, January 3. The students are required to read 200 minutes over the 17 days. We are making it a contest and there will be prizes for anyone reading over 200 minutes. The children will choose a prize based on the amount of time read. (Readers with the most time read get to choose first)

Have a wonderful holiday! Be safe and enjoy time with family.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Great Day Today!

Hi,

We had a great day today! Everyone worked hard and had some fun. I was impressed with the way people thought before speaking and acting and helped each other. Thank you for talking to your child at home and reminding them of the importance of respectful, hard working behavior.

Our Pen Pals are coming to school on Friday for a visit. We will also have a visit from the author and illustrator, David Crosby. Friday will also include a concert from the Ridgeview band, choir, and orchestra. It will be a fun and busy day!

Service Club! Members from the FCE Service Club had a busy weekend. We went to the Round Rock Serving Center on Saturday and volunteered. We took some book donations (keep those book donations coming), organized food in the pantry, made holiday crafts with kids in the waiting area, sorted and hung up clothes in the Thrift Shop, and helped in the compost garden. On Sunday, we took fleece blankets made by the Service Club to the Emergency Shelter in Starry. We played with the children there, ate snacks, did crafts, and played a crocodile video game. We had a lot of fun helping members of our community this weekend. The Service Club is meeting on Tuesday afternoon (12/6) from 2:45-4:00. We will be going to Mrs. Arnold's room and making clay bowls for Round Rock's Empty Bowl project which raises money for the Round Rock Serving Center. We will make the bowls on Tuesday then Mrs. Arnold will fire them. We will then glaze them at another meeting. The Empty Bowl Project will be in April. All 4th and 5th graders are welcome to come and join the Service Club. Helping others is a great way to spend our time! Thanks to all the parents and kids for their work this weekend and throughout the year in Service Club.

Here's what we did this week:


Reading/Social Studies-We integrated some more social studies into our reading by reading about missions and empresarios. A mission simulation was very fun during which the children pretended to be Native Americans at a mission. They had to silently pick beans, sleep on the floor, learn some Spanish words, draw tools that were made, and go to the chapel to listen to chants. It helped them realize that although the missions protected the Native Americans from attacks from other tribes and helped provide food, that the Native Americans lost their language, their religion, and their freedom. We also pretended to be Empresarios like Stephen F. Austin. Reading from the translated version of the laws about the settlers (had to be Catholic, had to speak Spanish, had to be hard-working, and of good moral conduct). We then read letters from prospective settlers and decided whether we would let them into our new colonies. Then we made posters to advertise for settlers to come to Texas. Reading book club books and writing reading responses were also a part of our week.

Reading Logs-Many children did not turn in a completed reading log today. Be sure that your child is reading and writing down their reading. The logs do count as a grade. We will be having a Holiday Reading Contest. Who can read the most minutes over the winter holiday? Everyone is still required to read during the break. For the holidays, the class is required to read a total of 200 minutes. The readers with the highest numbers will be receiving prizes. Have fun over the break but keep reading and keep working on Firstinmath.com.

Writing-Essays are continuing to be our focus. We learned about outlining an essay by determining a central idea (box) and supporting details or examples. (bullets) We made several plans using boxes and bullets and then are deciding on which idea we have enough information about to expand into an essay. We started writing rough drafts then will revise our leads and conclusions, work on word choice, voice, and sentence fluency. Then we will edit for spelling, punctuation, grammar, complete sentences, paragraphing, and capitalization. Copying and/or typing our essays will be part of our publishing and then we will share! Our plan is to finish writing these essays before the holidays.

Math-We will continue to work on multiplication facts and problem solving but have begun working on division. We are doing a lot with fact families and what to do with remainders in a division problem. We are using lots of manipulatives and drawing to help us all understand the concept of division. Fractions are coming next.

Science-Electricity and forms of energy was fun and now we are working on forces (gravity, friction, etc...) We did a demonstration using a pendulum made from yarn, a paper clip, a washer, and a pencil taped and hanging off the edge of the table. We worked on the web surfing for forces today and will be continuing this concept this week. Information about Science Projects will be coming soon.

Holiday Party-look for information from Michelle Geyer about our holiday party. It will be on Friday, December 16 from 1:45-2:45. We will also be decorating gingerbread houses with our first grade reading buddies in the morning on Dec. 16. We will need lots of donations for the party and the gingerbread houses. You will be getting an email soon. Supplies for the gingerbread houses need to be in school by Tuesday, December 13.

Dates to Remember:

Tuesday, December 6-Choir Tour 8:30-2:00, Service Club 2:45-4:00pm
Wednesday, December 7-Early Release-12:45 (lunch choices are-tray one=cheese pizza strips, tray three=spicy chicken wrap, tray four=hummus bowl, no tray two)
Friday, December 9-Ridgeview concerts, Pen Pal Visit, Author Visit
Monday, December 12-Running Club
Tuesday, December 13-Math Club
Thursday, December 15-Writing Club
Friday, December 16-Gingerbread Houses with 1st graders, Holiday Party at 1:45
Saturday, December 17-Monday, January 2-Winter Break

Thanks for sharing your child with me. Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope you are enjoying yourself and enjoying time with your family. Just wanted to remind you and your child that they should spend some of their time off from school reading. I love losing myself in my book and am looking forward to having some extra time to read this holiday. Be sure to record reading on your reading log.

We are working hard to gain more points as we play math games on www.firstinmath! Your child will have fun exploring this site and discovering math strategy games, and problem solving, as well as fact practice. If your child forgets his/her user name or password, email me and I will email the info to you.

A review packet for social studies came home on Monday. Please review this information with your child. We will be having a benchmark on this information on Wednesday, November 30. We will also have a science benchmark on Tuesday, November 29.

Here are some fun Thanksgiving websites to explore, if your child gets bored.

http://www.scholastic.com/scholastic_thanksgiving/daily_life/index.htm

http://www.scholastic.com/scholastic_thanksgiving/webcast.htm#


Have a fun and safe holiday! I am very thankful that I get to spend time with your child each day!

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter-Awesome Visit with Pen Pals

Hi,

Your children did an amazing job interacting with our pen pals this afternoon! They interviewed them about their Thanksgiving tradtions and performed two Thanksgiving Reader's Theaters (using a microphone! Very exciting!) They also played games and worked on some fun Thanksgiving puzzles. In the morning we decorated framed photos of ourselves as a gift for our pen pals and revised and edtited our Thanksgiving poems. We wrote them on pretty fall paper and gave them to our pen pals also. It was a great afternoon. Our next visit will be on Friday, December 9 at 9:00 am. We would love to have you join us and meet our wonderful pen pals.

Our published class books are in! We were going to share them today but ran out of time. We will read them together on Monday and if you purchased a copy, it will come home. Today your child should have brought home a stapled packet that included an online order form if you would like to purchase a class book.

Your child also brought home a letter explaining the website www.firstinmath.com. Our school is using this fun site as a way to help us practice math facts and concepts in a game format. As you play, you receive points and stickers for yourself and for our class. It gets harder as you progress through the games and there are many, many games. I was experimenting with it at home and it is very addicting! Each student has their own username and password. If they lost the little piece of paper, email me and I will get it to you. I encourage you to go on this site with your child, bookmark it, and have them play for a little while each day. I think that we will see huge improvements quickly!


Here's what we did this week:

Reading: We read some expository text in magazines and wrote on post-its as we read. On the post-its we wrote facts that we found interesting and/or important that we wanted to teach our partner. We then met with our partner and shared articles. It helped us realize that the main ideas in the article (most important parts) and that helps the us teach our partner what the article is about but the details (the interesting parts) support the main idea and helps us to make connections and encourages us to keep reading. We will continue to read non-fiction or expository text throughout the year. Book Clubs are overall going well. Most of your children have finished at least one novel and some are on their third or fourth novel! I am so glad that they are reading and finishing books but am mostly glad that they can talk about the characters and how they have changed, they can make predictions and support those predictions with evidence from the book, they are asking thoughtful questions, and discussing the novels together in deeper ways.

Writing: We used our science writing topic of forms of energy to model essay writing. Then started planning and drafting an essay about a role model. We will continue revising and editing that essay. We also took our first benchmark on essay or expository writing. They are off to a great start! We read a fun book called Turkey Bowl by Phil Bildner and noticed all the great adjectives and nouns that he used then tried to incorporate strong word choice into our Thanksgiving poems.

Math: Multiplication strategies were fun this week. We played games and looked for patterns for 9's and 6's. (5X10)-5=45 9x5=45, (7x10)-7=63 9x7=63, (9x10)-9=81 9x9=81, (5x5)+5=30 6x5=30, (7x5)+7=42 6x7=42, (4x5)+4=24 6x4=24 We also worked hard on strategies for elapsed time and multistep problems using multiplication. We will be starting some division work next week.

Science: Electricity was cool! We experimented with circuits and electromagnets. Some of them worked fine, others were a little more challenging. We also worked on a web quest activity and took a science vocabulary test. A study guide for our test on Energy came home today in that stapled packet. We will be having that test on Tuesday, November 29.

Social Studies: We will be learning about missions and early colonies next.

Dates to Remember:
Tuesday, November 22-Red Dragon Pillow Drive, Service Club 2:45pm-4:00pm
Wednesday, November 23-Friday, November 25-Thanksgiving Holiday
Monday, November 28-Running Club
Tuesday, November 29-Science test, Math Club 2:45-3:45pm
Thursday, December 1-Writing Club 2:45-4:00pm
Saturday, December 3-Volunteer at RR Serving Center from 10am-11am
Sunday, December 4-Drop off fleece blankets& holiday party at Emergency Shelter 2:00-3:00 pm
Monday, December 5-TAG referral packets due to office, Running Club
Tuesday, December 6-Senior Coyote Choir Tour, Service Club 2:45-4:00pm
Wednesday, December 7-Early Release Day

Have a great weekend! Please contact me with any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter-Awesome visit with Pen Pals

Newsletter-Pen Pals Visit on Friday at 1:45 in the library. Yeah!!!!

Hi,

I had family in town last week (8 family members including our niece's one year old little girl!) so stayed home on Thursday and Friday to spend time with them. I had a great time but am happy to be back with your children.

This Friday, November 18, our pen pals are coming to visit! We will be meeting in the library at 1:45 (right after our specials) and stay there until dismissal. We will be performing some Thanksgiving Reader's Theaters (scripts will some home tomorrow), interviewing our pen pals about their Thanksgiving traditions, and writing poems about things for which we are thankful. We will play some games, if we have time. We are excited about seeing them again. Feel free to join us for our visit!

Last Friday, the kids enjoyed a concert from the Austin Jazz Workshop. I heard that it was a great show.

This Tuesday will be the second meeting of the FCE Math Club! The children (kdg-5th grade) explore math problem solving games. At their last meeting, they were using strategies and building things like the game, Mouse Trap. Most of your children love a challenge and love to solve puzzles. Come and check out math club! They meet from 2:45-3:45 in Mrs. Washburn's portable. Hope to see lots of our fabulous mathematicians there!

This Thursday will be the second meeting of our Writing Club! Encourage your child to stay and write with us. The writing club is a place to write and share writing. Mrs.Peterson and I conference with the children about their writing and help to revise and publish some pieces. The children (2nd grade-5th grade) are encouraged to experiment with writing in different forms and write for the love of writing! We will be meeting in the library from 2:45-4:00 every other Thursday. Pick up in the front of the school. Hope to see lots of our awesome writers there!

Reading and Social Studies-We have been working on projects about our Texas explorers and integrating some reading lessons as well. We also are reading and talking about the characters and how they change in our book club books.

Writing-We are writing essays and expository writing. We planned a piece using a graphic organizer on one of the explorers. We also wrote about sound energy, mechanical energy, and heat energy are all created when playing a musical instrument like a guitar. Role Models are the topic for our current essays. We planned these essays and began our first drafts. We will be revising and editing these pieces and then writing our final copies. We will continue working on essays as well as some more personal narratives.

Math-Multiplication is very fun! We are discovering and sharing new strategies, playing games to practice facts, and multiplying larger numbers. We are also problem solving and sharing strategies using multiplication.

Science-We examined several everyday objects and decided which form or forms of energy were used. We will be experimenting some more with these items this week and taking a vocabulary test on Thursday. Don't forget to go to Stemscopes for extra practice. (go to our school website, for teachers, Stemscopes, user name-Bartholomew, password-bats) Do the activities in the buckets for Forms of Energy and Conductors, Insulators, and Electricity.

Dates to remember:
Red Dragon Pillow Drive continues
Tuesday-Math Club-Mrs. Washburn's portable 2:45-3:45
6:00 pm-Reflections Gallery Night
TAG referral packets available for print-out from District Website-TAG department
Wednesday-Picture Retakes
Thursday-Writing Club-Library-2:45-3:45
Thanksgiving Meal at regular lunchtimes
Friday-PTA Movie Night Under the Stars-7:00pm
Wednesday, November 23-Friday, November 25-No school, Thanksgiving Holiday

Have a great week! Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter

Hi,

We had a great Halloween week! We tried to incorporate some Halloween fun into our math and reading activities on Monday. We read Big Pumpkin and made a story mountain to review the elements of fiction. We solved a logic problem based on costumes and trick or treating. We dramatically read aloud a poem called In a Dark Dark Wood. We had a fun day!

Saturday morning the Service Club (and any FCE families who want to join us) will be volunteering at the Round Rock Serving Center from 10 am - 11 am. We will be stocking shelves, organizing donations, etc... We will be there every first Saturday of the month. Be sure to come and help!

Our class book is in the mail ready for publication! We worked hard to complete our class poetry book with illustrations. I think that it turned out great and I can't wait to see the final product. Thank you for returning your order forms. We will have a celebration when the books arrive!

Reading/Social Studies-We are integrating some SS work with explorers into our reading. We practice making inferencing by using our background knowledge and clues from the text. We did that by reading an amazing book called Encounter by Jane Yolen. It is about Columbus landing in San Salvador but told from a native boy's point of view. I read the book to them without letting them see the illustrations so that they could make inferences based on the words and their own background knowledge. We practiced reading from the textbook and using text features. We took notes as we read then used those notes and some short biographies to match explorers in Texas with where they explored and some facts about them. We also made a human timeline using events about the explorers. We will be working on projects with explorers next week and using magazines to read expository text.

Writing-Essays are our genre at this time. They are doing a great job noticing and observing and then writing about their big ideas. (This makes me realize... this makes me think...., this makes me wonder.....) We compared narrative writing and essays to help us be able to organize text when we write and to know what to expect when we read. Next week we will be using big ideas or central ideas and writing examples to support those big ideas to create essays.

Math-Elapsed time can be tricky. We have been practicing it a lot this week using small clocks as well as time number lines. (make a horizontal line, write the starting time, make jumps counting by hours or minutes until you reach your ending time) We will continue to work on this. Problem solving with patterns, input/output charts, and algebraic equations continues to be fun and challenging. We also have been working with number tricks and practicing math vocabulary like-sum, difference, product, and quotient. We are starting to work on multiplication with larger numbers and today used partial products to help solve multiplication facts. We drew arrays and then broke the arrays into smaller arrays. After multiplying the smaller arrays we added those products together to get the answer for the large array. It sounds confusing but is quite useful and efficient once they get the hang of it! More of that is coming next week.

We will be working with energy next week in science.

Don't forget to bring in pillows for the Pillow Drive for soldiers returning to Fort Hood.

Dates to Remember:
Monday, November 7-Running Club
Tuesday, November 8-Service Club 2:45-4:00 pm, TAG Informational Meeting at 5:00 pm,
PTA Meeting and Senior Coyote Choir Concert at 6:30pm
Wednesday, November 9-Senior Choir Concert at 8:30am
Friday, November 11-Veteran's Day-Come eat breakfast with your child
Monday, November 14-Running Club
Tuesday, November 15-Math Club-2:45-3:45pm
Thursday, November 17-Thanksgiving Meal at lunch 11:55, Writing Club-2:45-4:00pm
Wednesday, November 23-Friday, November 25-Thanksgiving Holiday

Have a wonderful weekend! Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Abraham Lincoln Visited on Friday!

Hi,

We had a very fun week and a very exciting day! We had a visit from Abraham Lincoln. He came and spoke to the 4th graders about his life and answered their questions. It was very cool to speak with Honest Abe!

Red Ribbon Week was fun! We had two winners in the essay/poster contest. Rylee won first place for her poster and Savanna won 2nd place for her essay. Congratulations to them and to all our students who wrote great essays! We loved wearing our pajamas on Thursday, our hats on Wednesday, our sunglasses on Tuesday, and our sports jerseys on Monday. We also talked about making good choices, heard a speaker talk about alcohol use, and watched a drug free video. Our theme on Friday was Coyotes "can" be drug free. We are collecting canned goods. Students will receive a ticket for each can that they bring to school next week. (I think it goes through the week but may only be for the beginning of the week) Then there will be drawings for Cinemark passes. Bring more cans, have more chances to win. The cans will be donated to the Round Rock Serving Center.

The Service Club will be accepting donations for the Round Rock Serving Center for the entire year. Bring in canned food, toiletries, clothing, toys, books, etc... and we will be taking the donated items to the Serving Center once a month. The club members (and anyone else who likes helping others) will be stocking shelves, organizing donations, etc... from 10:00-11:00am on the first Saturday of every month. Our first trip will be on Saturday, November 5. We would love to have you meet us there and help. Let me know if you are able to come so that we can give an estimate to the manager there so that they can have jobs ready for us. All are welcome!!!!!

Passport to Adventure: Literacy Night was a huge success! We had hundreds of people attend on Thursday evening. They enjoyed hearing books and stories from all around the world. The Ballet Folklorico dancers were amazing! Thank you to all those who were able to attend.

Writing Club is beginning this Thursday in the library from 2:45pm -4:00pm. Pick up in the front of the school. We will be learning about the craft of writing, writing pieces of our choice, conferencing with teachers about our writing, and sharing our writing with others. It is so much fun and I am so excited to be a part of our Writing Club. I love to share writing with our wonderful FCE students. Writing Club is great for writers at all levels. If you have any questions, contact me or Jenny Peterson.

Read about our week:

Reading: We read about Native Americans in Texas and worked on main idea, details, and summarizing. In book club groups, we have been working on describing characters and changes that characters go through in a story. Today we finished our read aloud, Out of my Mind. We talked about how we are a bit sad when we finish great books because the characters become like our friends and we miss them. We will talk about a new novel to begin reading next week.

Writing: We read more poetry and discussed the importance of word choice. We wrote down interesting words, phrases, and sentences and tried to incorporate more descriptive words into some of our poems. We worked on (and almost finished) our class book project. The book will be mailed on Thursday. Please return the order form signed whether you'd like to purchase a book or not. If I prove to the printing company that I gave you an opportunity to buy a book by returning your forms with yes or no and a signature, then our class gets a free book. Please return the forms by Wednesday. In the spring, each child will create a hard cover anthology of their writing throughout the year. You will receive a free copy of this book and may purchase more copies as well. If you have any questions about our class book, let me know.

Math: Patterns, algebraic equations, input/output charts, and elapsed time have been practiced this week. We will continue to work on problem solving and more multiplication strategies next week.

Science: We finished up learning about mixtures and solutions and had an assessment on Thursday. Our next unit will be Force, Motion, and Energy.

Social Studies: We are finishing up our studies of Native Americans in Texas and will begin learning about explorers next week.

Have a wonderful weekend! Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Red Ribbon Week is Here!

Hi,

We worked very hard this week. We presented our Native American presentations and performed some exciting poetry readings. We also solved some challenging math problems. It was an awesome week!

This week is Red Ribbon Week! Here are the themes for each day:
Monday-Winners Don't Do Drugs-wear sports team jersey
Tuesday-Too Cool to do Drugs-wear your sunglasses
Wednesday-Hats Off to a Drug-Free Life-Hat Day
Thursday-Follow your Dreams-Pajama Day
Friday-Coyotes CAN be Drug Free-Wear your Forest Creek Shirt and bring in a canned good to donate

Our class is participating in the October Essay contest. Each student has written a rough draft on bullying. We have been revising and editing and will be completing the final copies on Monday to turn in. Your child can create a poster based on bullying prevention or one of the themes for Red Ribbon Week for the poster contest. Your child may also want to write another essay for Red Ribbon Week. The essays and posters are due on Monday, October 24.

Forest Creek is also having their book fair in the library this week. Come and do some Christmas shopping and raise money for our school. The book fair will be open late on Thursday evening.

Thursday evening is our Passport to Adventure Literacy Night beginning at 5:00 pm. Admission fee is a book to donate (new or gently used). When you donate a book, you receive your passport. Visit each continent, listen to books, and see cultural presentations. Ballet Folklorico will be performing at 6:30 in the cafeteria. Promise Pizza will be selling yummy pizza slices for $1 and the FCE Relay for Life Team will be selling sweet treats to raise money for cancer research. Feel free to donate more than just one book. The children will get to choose a book to take home and any extra books will be taken to the Round Rock Serving Center for their Thrift Store. The FCE Book Fair will be open during Literacy Night. Join us for a wonderful night of cultural awareness and literacy!

Read about our week:

Reading: We continued to read poems and used the poem Dreams by Langston Hughes to make inferences and determine a possible theme. We wrote autobiographical poems and read poetry aloud with expression and actions. This week we will be reading about Explorers and integrating subjects by using reading skills to understand social studies content.

Writing: Poems were written and shared. We also worked on our bullying essays. We will be rereading our poems and choosing one to add to our published class poetry book. The book will be filled with poems written and illustrated by our class! The books will be hardbound and available for purchase. Order forms will be coming home this week. Please return the order form with your signature whether you'd like a book or not so that we can receive a free class book. We will also be writing individual books in the spring. These will also be hardbound and each child will get one book for free and may purchase more copies.

Math: Patterns and algebraic equations were challenging and fun this week. Many of the children are getting this and some are still working on mastering this concept. We will continue with patterns, input/output charts, and equations this week and throughout the year. We will also be working on elapsed time this week.

Science: We started learning about mixtures and solutions this week. Ask your child about our popcorn and water mixture. We also separated a beach mixture using tools. We took out pebbles and shells using our fingers and/or a spoon. We used a colander to separate the small pebbles from the salt water and sand. A coffee filter in the colander was necessary to separate the sand from the salt water. A hot plate was used to heat the water so that it would evaporate and the salt crystals would be left behind. We will be learning more about this topic this week. A study guide came home on Friday and we will be having a test on this material on Thursday.

Dates to remember:
Sunday,October 23-Texas Book Festival at the Capitol downtown
Tuesday, October 25-Service Club meeting after school
Wednesday, October 26-Early Release Day at 12:45 pm
Thursday, October 27-Science test on Mixtures and Solutions
Passport to Adventure: Literacy Night 5pm
November 3-PTA Reflections projects are due to Mrs. Arnold
November 4-Walk for Diabetes-envelopes are due as well

Have a wonderful weekend! Enjoy the beautiful weather and all the festivals! Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Wonderful 1st Visit with our Pen Pals!

Hi,

We had a great first meeting with our Pen Pals. The kids were very flexible because there were some last minute changes and they were VERY polite, kind, and completely engaged with our new friends from The Court Assisted Living Facility. The pen pals had huge smiles and were excited to meet and talk with your kids. There were lots of stories being told, games being played (bingo, dominoes, memory, checkers, etc..) and some creating with play dough. The kids also shared their personal narratives with their pen pals. It was a wonderful visit for all of us. Thank you to the parents who came and helped. We will be writing more letters soon and discussing our interview answers. The pen pals will be visiting again in November.

Reading: This week in reading we began learning about poetry. We read a lyrical and free verse poem and discussed their similarities and differences. We discussed how poetry can be interpreted in different ways and watched two videos of the same poem with completely different interpretations. Watch and compare. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x587PpF-J1Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1I4uaRt6bMThe kids were very surprised by the second one! We also read a poem about the Moon and learned about personification and how readers ask lots of questions, make predictions, make connections, and have thoughts and feelings as they read poetry just like when they read fiction and nonfiction. We will continue to read poems next week and even write some poetry.

Writing: We completed our first published piece this week and had a fun Author's Celebration. Thank you to all the parents who could attend our celebration. Many of the children were nervous about reading but we heard lots of examples of great leads, small moment stories, good sequencing, and good details. A lot of students slowed down their most important part of the story to build suspense and make the reader feel like they were right there and many of our endings really pulled the story together and gave some closure. Great job for our first personal narratives of the year! We will be writing some poetry and working on some essays about bullying and our Native American Tribes.

Math: We are practicing input/output tables and looking for mathematical patterns. We are beginning to create algebraic equations as well. We are using multiple strategies for problem solving and sharing those strategies with each other. Continue to practice using strategies to solve problems using multiplication, addition, and subtraction.

Social Studies: Native American research and projects are going well. We are trying hard to finish by Monday or Tuesday of next week then we will work on mixtures and solutions in science.

I enjoyed talking with all of you at conferences. Be sure to let me know if you have any concerns or questions. Email is always the best way to reach me.

Dates to remember:
Monday, October 17-2:45-3:15 Running Club-Email me to let me know if your child is staying.Pick up by the playground
Wednesday, October 19-Water Experiment Paper is due
October 24-28-Red Ribbon Week & Book Fair in the library
Thursday, October 27-Passport to Adventure Literacy Night 5-8pm
November 1-11=Annual Food Drive for the Round Rock Serving Center
Thursday, November 3-Reflections due to Mrs. Arnold

Have an amazing weekend! Thank you for sharing your children with me.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter

Hi,

Wow! We started working on our projects for our Native American research. Your children worked together and solved disagreements together and decided on interesting projects then got to work. I was impressed with their creativity and how engaged they were in their work. Some of the groups are making power points, some making dioramas, and some are creating plays and songs. We are going to try to finish them by next Friday. I will take photos to share and video of the plays. I can't wait to see these projects!

Pen Pals are coming next Friday!
We are very excited to meet our pen pals and will be planning our activities this week. Our pen pals are residents at The Court in Round Rock Assisted Living Facility and we will be interviewing them about their childhoods, learning from each other, and playing games. They will be arriving at about 9:30 am in the library and will be staying for about an hour. Feel free to come and enjoy our pen pals with us!

Conferences
Just about all of us have a conference time set up next week. This conference is a goal setting conference so your child should be present. We will be sharing some work that your child has completed so far and talk about areas for improvement and goals for this year. I look forward to meeting with you all!

Reading
This week in reading we read The Story of Ruby Bridges together and worked on asking questions to gain information. We applied this to Native Americans in Texas research that we are doing. Everyone also has a novel that they are reading in school as well. We have begun meeting in book club groups to share our questions, inferences, thoughts, and feelings about our book. Before each meeting, we read and write responses in our book club section of our reader's response books. Then we share our thinking in our meetings. It is wonderful to hear such excitement and enjoyment over sharing our thoughts about our books. Next week we will be looking at poetry.

Writing
In writing we are working hard to finish writing a second story in our draftbooks. Then the children examine both of their personal narratives and decide which one they want to publish at this time. Then we rewrite the draft and begin more revising. We add some show, not tell. (Use lots of descriptions and details to make the reader feel that they are there with the writer, instead of just telling the reader.) We are still planning to have our Author's Celebration on Wednesday, October 12. Some of us may not have our completely done and pretty final copy ready but will have a great personal narrative to share with you. We hope that you can come!

Math
We are continuing to work on strategies for multiplication. We practiced the double, double strategy in computation and in problem solving situations. We played games using multiples of 10 in multiplication and sang Three is a Magic Number with the Schoolhouse Rock video. We share lots of strategies for our problem solving using the document camera so your child is experiencing many different strategies to use when solving problems and hopefully finding some that work best for him/her. Continue to talk about math situations at home. Use time, money, fact practice, skip counting etc... in games and in the car to practice. Next week we will do some patterns and algebraic reasoning.

Science
Changes from Heat was our topic. We experimented with evaporation by painting with water on the blacktop. We learned about melting by melting some crayon pieces in the sun. (Thank you Madi for sharing your melted crayon experiment that you did at home! Very cool!) We also experimented with freezing by putting a water balloon in the freezer and seeing what would happen. We studied using games, songs, and websites on Stemscopes and did well on our assessment. Next we will be learning about mixtures and solutions.

Social Studies
The children are in cooperative groups and each group is researching a Texas Tribe. We thought about questions that we wanted to answer in our research and are looking in books and on two websites to find information. We are writing down our sources to use in a bibliography and are going to present our information in a creative way. Each child will also write a Native American essay to practice our expository writing.

Dates to remember:
Monday, October 10=No school for students, Parent/Child/Teacher Conferences
Tuesday, October 11=Service Club Meeting
Wednesday, October 12=Individual Picture Day at 10:40
Author's Celebration at 2:00pm in our classroom
Thursday, October 13-Conferences
Friday, October 14=Pen Pal Visit at 9:30 am in FCE library

Have a wonderful weekend! Don't miss the Chalk Walk on Main Street in Round Rock on Saturday!

Let me know if you have any questions or concerns. Thank you for sharing your child with me.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter-September 30, 2011

Hi,

Be sure that your child washes his/her hands and uses hand sanitizer. We seem to have a little stomach virus going around. Hopefully, everyone can get healthy and stay healthy this week.

We had a great week!

I am so excited that our fourth grade has started forming groups for enrichment and interventions. We have one twenty minute group time from 8:00-8:20 and another from 10:00-10:20. Many children are leaving their homeroom and going to another teacher for a more focused group in reading and math. We can group them by specific objectives that are needed to reteach and/or extend. Some of the groups meet daily and some meet two or three times a week. Ask your child about this. Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Thank you so much to the all the Dads who came to school on Wednesday. I am sorry that I missed you. I had a doctor's appointment that had been scheduled quite a long time prior. I hope you enjoyed your time in our classroom and feel free to come again anytime! (Moms can come, also :) )

Thank you for sending in your conference time requests. I will make a schedule and send it to you by Monday afternoon.

Read about our activities and our learning.

Reading: We read an online book about matter and answered some review questions to get ready for our science test. We are beginning some research on Native Americans in Texas and will continue that next week. We read an article about the first moon landing and learned about reading to gain information and answer new questions. We will be praciting this in our Native American research. We are beginning book clubs and each child has a new novel to read for their book club group. Many of the children brought their books home to read chapter 1 over the weekend. We will be reading in class and they are welcome to bring their book club book home also but NEED to have it in class. They will be reading independently, summarizing what they've read, then writing about their questions, connections, predictions, character descriptions and changes, as well as their thoughts and feelings about their book. They will be meeting in groups with me to talk about what they've read. Book clubs are so much fun and it is always wonderful to experience the children getting lost in their books! I can't wait!

Writing: We finished a draft of our first personal narratives in our draft books. We will each choose another personal narrative entry from our writer's notebook to write a draft of in another draft book. Then each child will read both of their draftbooks and decide which one they would like to publish. We will have an Author's Celebration on October 12 at 2:00 in our classroom. The children will be sharing their published work. You are invited to come and help us celebrate their wonderful progress in writing!

Math: Multiplication strategies have been our focus. We practiced multiplying by 10's and 100's a bunch this week and applied that skill to problem solving situations. We also made multiple towers using adding tape and calculators. In partners, we had a starting number and found multiples of that number by repeated adding or multiplication to create our towers. We will be examining them more on Monday and continue with input/output tables and mathematical patterns.

Science: We are learning about changes in matter from adding or taking away heat. We will finish our web surfing activity from today, review vocabulary, and read about changes from heat. We will be having a test on this topic on Wednesday, October 5. The children are welcome to explore the activities and games on this topic on Stemscopes. Go to the Forest Creek Elementary Website, then for teachers, then Stemscopes. Login-Username= bartholomew, password=bats. Click on Bartholomew Bats Fall 2011. Then click on any or all of the activities in the Changes from Heat section. Have fun! Feel free to explore with changes from heat at home. Put an ice cube in the sun (with and without an insulator), put crayons on some foil in the sun and see what happens, put a cup of water in the freezer then put it in a pan on the stove (with parent help) and watch it change. Talk about the changes that happen. Feel different parts of the inside of the car when you enter it after being parked in the sun and talk about them. Notice matter changing around you.

Social Studies: Native Americans in Texas is our topic. We just started and will be continuing researching this week and next.

Dates to remember:

Monday, October 3-Reading logs due
Wednesday, October 5-Science Test-Changes from Heat
Thursday, October 6=Writing Benchmark
Monday, October 10-Student Holiday-Parent/Teacher/Student Conferences
Tuesday, October 11-PTA meeting 11 am
Service Club Meeting-2:45-4:00pm
Wednesday, October 12-Author's Celebration-2:00 pm in our classroom
Individual Photos taken
Monday, October 17-Running Club 2:45
Thursday, October 20-Writing Club (tentative date) 2:45-4:00 in library
Monday, October 24-October 28=Book Fair, Red Ribbon Week
Tuesday, October 25-Service Club Meeting 2:45-4:00pm
Thursday, October 27=Passport to Literacy Night 5:00pm

Have a fabulous weekend! Stay safe and healthy! Hopefully it will rain.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter

Hi,

We had a great week! We were very busy and had fun.

Wednesday was our first fire drill of the school year and our class did extremely well. On Friday we had a Mad Science Assembly which was very cool. Ask your child about their favorite parts.

Here's what we did:

Reading: We learned that readers ask lots of questions as they read. Some of them are answered as we continue reading but others are not. We read a very interesting book called The Mary Celeste: A Mystery from History by Jane Yolen. This book raised lots of questions and many were answered but some left us wondering. Asking questions is one skill that readers use to help monitor their comprehension and help with understanding. We also read some biographies and continued reading our read aloud book, Out of my Mind.

Writing: We wrote, edited, and revised letters to our pen pals introducing ourselves. We did some free writing while I had conferences with individual students to work on writing leads for the personal narratives that we are writing.

Math: Multiplication strategies! We practiced the "Using Tens" strategy. If you know the product of a number multiplied by ten then you can find out the answer to that number multiplied by five. Since five is half of ten, by halving the product of a x 10, you will get the product of a x 5. For example: 8 x 10 =80, 8x5= (half of 80 which is forty) 3x10=30 so 3x5= 15 (or half of 30). Practicing using place value to multiply by 10s and 100s was easier than we thought. We also practiced the doubling and halving strategy. If you have a difficult problem like 45 x 18, you can double one of the factors and half the other factor to make an easier problem. For example, 45 x 18 (double 45=90, half 18=9) new equation is 90 x 9. 9x9=81 so 90x9=810. We will continue practicing these and many more strategies for multiplication.

Science: We are working on Classifying Matter. We've been exploring ways to identify and classify matter and did an experiment using different items and magnets. We did another exploration using balloons filled with three different substances then tested to see which balloons were more dense by determining if the balloons would sink or float. The balloon filled with air was least dense and floated. The balloon filled with dish washing soap was most dense and sunk. The one filled with baby oil was in-between. It was suspended in the water. We also tested liquids for density using straws and dyed salt water. The water with the greatest concentration of salt was the densest and went to the bottom of the straw. The plain water was on the top layer and the one with some salt was in the middle. We explored some websites also to help us learn more about states of matter. There are some sites on our class website under science links that could be reviewed over the weekend to get ready for our test on Monday.

Social Studies: We worked on reading maps this week. We interpreted an elevation map of Texas and some natural resources and products maps.

Education Go Get it Week:
Don't forget to print out a pennant from the school website to decorate with your favorite college. We will have special guests in broadcast during the week and have a task for each day.

Monday-wear college t-shirts
Tuesday-wear sunglasses
Wednesday-wear tennis shoes and bring Dad to school (FYI-I will not be in class in the morning on Wednesday because I have a doctor's appointment, I will be back in the PM)
Thursday-wear an outfit to represent your future profession
Friday-wear a FCE shirt, purple shirt, or green shirt

Be sure to remember:
Monday, September 26-Science test on Classifying Matter
Tuesday,September 27-Service Club Meeting after school from 2:45-4:00
Monday, October 10-Student Holiday
Friday, October 14-Pen Pal Visit at FCE

Have a wonderful and safe holiday weekend!

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter-Celebrate Freedom Week

Hi,

This was Celebrate Freedom Week! We learned a little about the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson, The Constitution-Preamble, Articles, Bill of Rights, and Amendments. The book, America: A Patriotic Primer, was read and discussed. We compared the Pledge of Allegiance to the Pledge to the Texas Flag. The Schoolhouse Rock Preamble song was sung several times this week as well as state song, Texas, Our Texas. We watched Brainpop videos about the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and Thomas Jefferson. To celebrate Constitution Day (September 17) we read a book called Bartholomew Cubbins and the 500 Hats to show why the Constitution and the Bill of Rights is important and what could happen if they didn't exist. We also listened to an interview on the Scholastic Site of two children interviewing President Obama about the importance of the Constitution. Drawing pictures of "Freedom" was fun as well.

Thank you to all the students who came to our first official FCE Service Club meeting. Our new project is collecting HEB and Walmart gift cards for fire victims in Smithville. We will continue to collect them through next Wednesday. Thank you to those who have already donated. Our next Service Club meeting is on Tuesday, September 28. All 4th and 5th graders are welcome.

Reading: We read books by Patricia Polacco and will be reading her autobiography on Monday to show how she used stories from her life as topics in her picture books. Next week, we will practice more reading strategies and will be examining some biographies.

Writing: We are getting ready to begin revising and editing our first personal narratives. We worked on drafting some leads and will be working on endings next week as well. We will write our drafts into draft books which will help us to organize our stories into paragraphs. We will be conferencing and revising a lot next week. It will be wonderful!

Math: Going to the computer lab to use population numbers to graph was very cool. We also began looking at arrays and practicing multiplication concepts this week. We will continue to review addition and subtraction with regrouping in problem solving as well as more strategies for multiplication.

Social Studies: We completed a huge project this week. We made poster sized maps of Texas and used jewels to mark cities, yarn to mark rivers, and pom poms to represent resources and products in Texas. We did these projects in cooperative groups which was a bit challenging for some but the maps look magnificent. Come and see them in our hallway! Next week we will be learning about matter in science.

Education Go Get it Week!-The week of September 26-30 is week Education Go Get it Week. Be sure to go to the Efolder on the FCE website to print out a banner for your child to decorate with their favorite college. We will be hanging these up.

Dates to Remember:
Wednesday, September 21-Last day to send in Walmart and HEB gift cards for fire victims
Tuesday, September 27-Service Club Meeting-2:45-4:00pm
Monday, October 10=Student Holiday
Tuesday, October 11=PTA Meeting 6:30pm
Wednesday, October 12=Fall Individual photos
Monday October 24-Friday, October 28=Red Ribbon Week

Have a wonderful weekend! Thank you for all your support. Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter

Hi,

We had a busy but fun week! Your kids have been earning individual classroom tickets for showing good behavior (self-control, following directions, working extra hard, etc...) and many have been choosing to use their tickets by bringing in a pet to share. We have seen Sophie's dog, Cayge's dog, Madi's hamster, Morgan's kitten, and Ethan's puppy. We also have a new addition to our classroom. Albert, the hermit crab is now living with us. Madi brought in three other hermit crabs for us as well. It has been quite exciting!

It was so wonderful to see so many grandparents here today. Thanks so much for sharing in your grandchild's education!

Here was our week:

Reading: We read some nonfiction books and magazines and practiced using comprehension strategies. We asked questions and recorded them, we discussed different visual and text features in nonfiction (photos, captions, glossary, table of contents, maps, diagrams, etc...) and how they helped us learn and we noticed words that we said in our head when we learned something new. Some of these words were wow..., I never knew..., yikes..., It's interesting that... then we wrote down the fact or new information that followed. We read some magazine articles independently to practice. Next week we will be studying some picture books by Patricia Polacco and her autobiography to see how she uses stories from her life in her books. We will also look at some other biographies.

Writing: We are working on gathering entries for personal narratives. We wrote about special people, important places, and significant objects. We are continuing to write with details, sensory words, and strong word choice to help the reader get a picture in their head while we read. We will be choosing an entry soon to publish. Lots of interesting writing is going on!

Math: In math we continued to work with place value and some word problems with addition and subtraction. We will always work on problem solving and next week we will focus on some multiplication.

Social Studies: We continued to learn about places in Texas and the four regions of Texas. We are finishing up a postcard project about our favorite regions. Next week we will be making a giant Texas poster and decorating it to identify the regions, cities, rivers, mountains, and resources. It will be a lot of fun and very educational!

Our Service Club organized the donations for the wildfire victims this afternoon. Our school collected 975 items! Wow! Thank you for being so generous!

We will talk on Monday again about 9/11. Share your stories of what you were doing with your child.

Dates to Remember:

Tuesday, September 13-Service Club Meeting from 2:45-4:00pm
Wednesday, September 14- Early Release Day-12:45
Friday, September 16-Robotics Applications are due to Mrs. Ginapp
Monday, September 26-Friday, September 30-Education Go Get It Week
Monday, October 10-Student Holiday
Tuesday, October 11-PTA meeting at 6:30 pm

Have a great weekend! Thank you for sharing your children with me. Please let me know if you have any concerns or questions.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter-Hard Working Week

Hi,

Our class worked hard this week!

Thank you to all families who were able to come to Back to School Night. Thank you for helping your child with the decoration of their writer's notebooks. All of the books look fantastic and the children did a great job telling stories about their decorations. Thank you to Grace for sharing her wonderful cello playing with us and to Cayge for sharing his adorable dog, Bruno, with us. Thank you also for sending your child to school each day ready to learn, ready to work, and happy!

Don't forget that we have PE on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays so be sure that your child has the appropriate shoes.

Reading-In reading we began working on some comprehension strategies. We read a book called How Many Days to America? by Eve Bunting. It is a book about a family who arrived in America by boat from an island in the Carribean. As we read aloud we listened to our inner conversation. We wrote about questions, wonderings, tricky words, connections, and feelings about content and characters. We wrote our thinking on tons of post-it notes and discussed the theme of the book. We practiced writing about our inner conversations by using magazine articles from National Geography for Kids and shared what we learned and noticed. We also read part of an article about Asian artifacts being stolen and sold. As I read some of the article aloud, I modeled how my comprehension broke down at times and what fix-up strategies I used to help get back on track. We will be practicing this more next week. We will also be using some articles and children's literature on 9/11. This year is the 10th anniversary of that tragedy. We will be thinking through the texts and again leaving tracks of our thinking to help monitor our comprehension. We will also be looking at text features in expository (non-fiction) text and how these features help us to learn.

Writing: We read a poem by Maya Angelou and discussed the figurative language used and the images it created for us. Then we read more poems and books with similes and metaphors and discussed how the writer used these comparisons to describe and help the reader get a picture in his/her head as they read. We then read the book, The Important Book by Margaret Wise Brown and used the format of that book to write important poems about ourselves. We took our poems through the writing process-drafting, conferencing with teacher, revising, editing, and publishing. The kids did a wonderful job and our descriptive poems are on display outside our classroom. Be sure to stop by and enjoy them!

Math: We continued to work on place value. In fourth grade, the students need to be able to read, write, and use numbers up to 999,999,999. We used our 1,000 books to practice skip counting strategies and practiced adding and subtracting multiples of 10 and 100. Then we found those numbers in our 1,000 book. We used a number line strategy to figure out numbers to 1,000 starting with a number in the hundreds. This strategy allows for getter understanding of number concepts and for less mistakes subtracting a number from 1,000 and regrouping so many zeros. We also added to check our answers. We played some games to practice using and manipulating numbers to 1,000. Next week we will continue to work with large numbers. We will compare them (greater than, less than, and equal), add and subtract them, order them from greatest to least or least to greatest, and estimate using these larger numbers. We will do an activity involving population sizes of states and solve some challenging problems.

Social Studies: We are using a powerpoint with photos of the regions of Texas to go on a virtual bus trip. We are learning about the geography of the region and some cities in each region. We will be doing some activities about each region and work on a post card project. Each student will create a post card about one of the regions and write about it. Some map skills will also be practiced during this time. We are using the photos that you sent in of places in Texas to see examples of some of these regions as well. Thank you for sending them in. Check out our map in the hallway and see all the cool places that we have been.

Thank you for sending a healthy snack each day and a water bottle.

Dates to remember:
Monday, September 5-No School
Tuesday, September 6-PTA meeting/WATCH DOG kick off-6:00pm
Friday, September 9-Grandparent Day during lunch time 11:55-12:25
Wednesday, September 14-Early Release Day


Have a safe and relaxing holiday weekend! Thank you for sharing your child with me! Please contact me with any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Back to School Night-Thursday, Sept. 1 at 6:00 pm

Hi,

This is a reminder that Back to School Night is tomorrow night. (Thursday, Sept. 1 at 6:00 pm in the cafeteria) We will all meet there and Mrs. Lehnick will be talking to you about school wide items. Then Kari Maurer, our 4th grade team facilitator, will talk to all of you about some general fourth grade things. We will then come back to the classroom and you can ask some more specific 4th grade questions at this time. You will also be able to see some of your child's work and try to figure out which "bioglyph" is his/her drawing.

A bioglyph is a symbolic representation of a face. The symbols represent observable things like gender, eye color, hair color, and hair length. There are also symbols that require an interview. We interviewed each other and collected data. Tomorrow we will use the data that we collected through our observations and our interviews to help determine which bioglyph belongs to which child. Interview information included favorite color, number of brothers and sisters, birthday month and day, how they get to school, number of pets, and attitude about science. We will see if you can use our key and figure out which bioglyph represents your child.

You will also have the opportunity to write a note to your child and leave it on his/her desk for the morning. (Don't tell. Let them be surprised!)

I look forward to seeing you all tomorrow and I am having a great time in class with your children!

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Awesome First Week!

Hi,

We had a wonderful first week of 4th grade. The children are doing a great job reviewing and following the school and classroom expectations. We worked on a bunch of academic things as well!

Thank you for returning the forms in the large envelope. A few children still need to send in a photo of themselves taken somewhere in Texas. We will be using these to locate and discuss different places in our state and to remember stories about that place for writing. Please send in the photo by Monday so that we can use them to help our learning and display them. The photo does not need to be from this year. It could be an old photo and it could also be taken at your home. A place that has stories that your child can tell and write about is best.

Reading: We set up expectations for our reading workshop. We have been reading silently each day and began writing reading responses in today. We will write tons of reading responses this year. A reading response is basically writing about the thinking done while reading. At first the children need to include connections, predictions, questions, and thoughts and feelings about what they read. Sometimes they will write a response about the entire book and sometimes their response will be about the chapter or pages that were read. Beginning after Labor Day, your child will need to write a reading response for homework on Mondays, and Tuesdays. I will be modeling more of these and giving the children feedback next week so that they will be ready!

Writing: We set up expectations for our writing workshop also and discuss the uses of our writer's notebooks. We read some books and poems that included great figurative language and lots of details. We read the books like a writer and noticed what the author did so that we can work on that in our own writing. Observations were done on the playground, in the cafeteria, and in the hallway using our senses as well as thinking about a place that is special to us and describing it using details and sensory words. We also wrote a free writing entry today. Some wrote poetry, some started new stories, some added to or extended the writing done earlier this week. Beginning after Labor Day, your child will need to write a writing entry for homework on Wednesdays, and Thursdays. We will talk more about this.

Your child should have brought home their writer's notebook and a blue half-size sheet of paper. Their assignment is to cover the notebook with paper and decorate the cover so that the book represents them. Photos, stickers, drawings, etc... can be used. The rubric has detailed information. They all need to return their writer's notebook on Monday. They can take it home again if they didn't get it decorated yet. Decorated writer's notebooks are due by Thursday, September 2 at the latest. The blue form had the wrong date. Wednesday would be ideal but Thursday is for sure when they have to be done. Thank you for your help with this and email me if you have any questions.

Math: In math we reviewed place value and began working with number patterns and larger numbers. We also solved a challenging problem about cows and chickens. Ask your child about it. Thank you for encouraging your child to work hard in math, turn homework in on time, and to practice facts at home. (addition, subtraction, multiplication) Each night (Monday-Thursday)your child will have a math paper or game to do for homework. It is due the next day.

Science: We are reviewing science safety and safety tools. We are also collecting data for a bioglyph. You will see these on Back to School Night next week. Next week we will begin geography in social studies.

We will go to the library on alternating Mondays starting with Monday, August 27.
Mon. and Wed.-Art/Music
Tues and Thurs-PE days-wear sneakers
Fri-PE and Art/Music-wear sneakers

Send a healthy snack each day and a water bottle.

Dates to remember:
Thursday, September 1-Back to School Parent Information Night at 6:00
Thursday, September 1-Decorated Writer's Notebooks are due
Monday, September 5-No School
Tuesday, September 6-PTA-6:00pm
Friday, September 9-Grandparent Day during lunch time 11:55-12:25
Wednesday, September 14-Early Release Day

Thank you for sharing your child with me. Feel free to contact me with any concerns or questions.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Welcome to the 2011-2012 School Year!

I can't wait to see you all on Friday, August 19 for our Supply Drop-off Night. Come to our classroom (512) and check it all out!

How are you feeling about fourth grade? Are you nervous, excited, worried, thrilled, etc....? What are you looking forward to this year? What is the best thing about school? What was your favorite thing about this summer?

Write about these questions or share any thoughts you have so far about fourth grade. Post any questions you may have also. Be sure to come back and write appropriate comments to the other comments or ask new questions. (Please use complete sentences with capitals, punctuation, and accurate spelling when writing on our blog. This isn't the time to write like you are writing a text message.)

Don't forget to bring a photo of you somewhere in Texas and a book to read on Tuesday!

Can't wait to start a new and fantastic school year. 4th Grade Rocks!!!!!!!

Have a Wonderful Summer!

Hi,

Be sure to read everyday, solve math problems, practice math facts, and write letters to me, stories, essays, etc.... Don't forget to play outside, spend fun time with your family, go swimming, run, sing, dance, etc....

Have a safe and happy summer. Keep learning everyday.

Thank you for a wonderful year in 4th grade. I look forward to watching you grow and change as you return to Forest Creek for 5th grade!

Feel free to post comments on our blog throughout the summer.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Happy Summer! Read, practice math, and write stories and letters!

Hi,

Our class created some amazing bullying projects and the children have been going to other classes to teach them about bullying. They have been presenting their slide shows and performing their skits. Mrs. Rollans, our tech teacher, made movies of the skits using the green screen technology and movie maker. They are wonderful and I will show them during the party tomorrow.

If you would like to have a copy of your child's movie and/or slide show, send in a thumbdrive tomorrow and I will copy it for you.

Thank you again for sharing your child with me this year. I have enjoyed them all and they have made amazing progress. Be sure to practice facts (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division) to make those facts automatic so that using larger numbers in 5th grade will be even easier. I am sending home a packet of math problem solving for your child to enjoy this summer, also. Keep reading this summer to prevent the "summer slide". (loss of reading level)

Did you know that according to Scholastic.com, students who read almost two million words per year outside of school score in the 90th percentile on standardized tests? Reading two million words means about 50 chapter books per year for a fifth grader or about four books a day for a first grader. That may sound like a lot but if your child reads about 20-30 minutes everyday, that goal will be easy to achieve.

Reading with your child (family book clubs are fun!) can strengthen the connection between you and your child. Have fun enjoying literature with your family this summer!

I am attaching a form with some reading programs in the area. These were also included in the children's Thursday folders today. There are some math links that would be helpful to use, also. Visit our class website as well as other FCE teacher websites to find other fun math and language arts games for practice.

I will also be sending home a stamped and addressed envelope for your child. If your child writes and mails me a letter, I would LOVE to write them back!

The report cards and some awards will be coming home as well.

Have a wonderful summer! I will see you around Round Rock (I'm sure!) this summer. Stay safe, keep learning, and enjoy your family!

Feel free to email me during the summer if you have any questions or concerns. I will miss each of the children. I know they will do well in 5th grade!

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter-Field Day was great! Pen Pal trip on Monday.

Hi,

We had fun this afternoon at Field Day. The kids were tired by the end. We had some rain but they were already wet so it didn't really matter. They played volleyball with beach balls, had races on the trikes, did a jump rope relay, got tattoes and popsicles, slid and climbed on the inflatables, and had a tug of war. It was great!

On Monday, we are going to visit our pen pals for our last trip of the year. If you didn't sign a permission slip, please do so and send it in on Monday or email me and let me know that your child is allowed to attend. Feel free to join us. We will be having a little talent show.

This week we have been researching bullying and are completing projects to show what we've learned. Many of the children are making slide shows, some have written and will be performing skits, a few posters were also made, and a song. We will be videotaping these performances (hopefully using the green screen) and we will also try to use our projects to teach other classes about bullying.

We created a survey this week and Mrs. Rollans, our technology teacher, came in and taught us how to use excel. It was very fun and we created some amazing graphs.

Next week we will be creating some brochures after researching some places in Texas. We will also be doing lots of problem solving and logic problems and doing a reader's theater. We started writing some fantasy stories and we will be working on those. We will do lots to stay busy and still learn some things in these last days of fourth grade.

Our end of the year party is on Friday, May 27 at about 1:50/2:00 until the end of the day.

I have had a wonderful year with your child. I am happy to have more time this summer to spend with my family but I am sad that the school year is ending. I will miss them a lot and look forward to seeing them in fifth grade!

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter-Author's Celebration- Thursday, May 12

Hi,

Our Pen Pal visit on Monday was so much fun! We did another service project within our service project. We made No-Sew Fleece Blankets for children with the Starry Organization. The blankets will go to Starry's Emergency Cottage. Many of the kids and the pen pals measured and cut the strips. Then they tied knots to make the fringe. We finished two blankets at The Court and two more at our Service Club meeting.

We also interviewed our pen pals to get more information to make a Pen Pal Cereal Box! We will be creating a cereal box biography featuring our pen pals! Your child will need to bring in a covered or painted cereal box by Monday, May 9. We will be writing the sections and putting the boxes together at school. If your child needs a cereal box, let me know.

At our pen pal visit we also played board games like Scrabble, HeadBanz,and checkers. We also played with play-dough, completed jigsaw puzzles, and word search puzzles. Best of all, we got to play Bowling on the Wii!!!! We had a great visit and will be going back to see them for the last time this year on Monday, May 23. We would love to have you join us!

At Published Books are in! You will see them at our conferences on Monday, May 9 and then we will have an Author's Celebration on Thursday, May 12 at 2:00 in our classroom. We hope that you can come and celebrate writing with our class!

We have new pets in our classroom! Each student received a meal worm today! We did some tests to observe and record our meal worm's reactions. We also named them and will watch them grow and change.

Reading: We have been reading book club books and filling out pamphlets about certain chapters. We have used these and our response to help guide our book club talks. We also worked on finding important information using our social studies books. This week we will be reading and researching about life cycles and meal worms during our reading time. We will also be completing our District Reading Assessments this week.

Writing: We will be keeping diaries for our meal worms. We will be writing in the meal worms point of view. We will also be starting to write some fantasy stories and continuing to write poetry.

Math: Problem solving can be challenging and we learn a lot by sharing our strategies with each other. We will also continue to practice our facts. Be sure to continue to practice facts this summer. (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division) I will also send some problem solving activities for your child to work on over the summer.

Social Studies: We will have a social studies test on Urbanization in Texas on Monday, May 9. The study guides came home yesterday.

Science: We are learning about Life Cycles, Food Chains, and Inherited and Learned Traits.

Dates to Remember:
Wednesday, May 4-Early Release Day
Friday, May 6-Science Day
Monday, May 9-Reading Logs due, Student/Parent Group Conferences
Tuesday, May 10-Rising Star Night at 6:30-All are invited
Thursday, May 12-Author's Celebration at 2:00 in our classroom
Friday, May 20-Field Day
Monday, May 23-Pen Pal Visit to The Court
Friday, May 27-Last Day of Fourth Grade :(

Have a wonderful week! Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter

Hi,

We had a fun-filled day today. We planted vegetables, herbs, and flowers in our garden box by the parking lot. We shared our extremely creative Earth Day creations. We played a math review game using plastic eggs. We did another fun reading activity in our Amazing Race! Then we also did a few practice things for math and reading. It was a great day.

Reading: This week we reviewed reading skills using our Amazing Race activities. We have one more activity on Monday. Then we will continue to read and discuss our book club books.

Writing: We have been working on persuasive letters and finishing up our poems.

Math: We have been reviewing using practice problems as well as games.

Social Studies: We learned about the effects of cattle, railroads, and oil on Texas.

Next week: We will be taking the TAKS math test on Tuesday and the TAKS reading test on Wednesday. Be sure that your child gets enough sleep and eats a good breakfast. Breakfast at school is free next week!

Our will be doing Broadcast for the next few weeks and recycling until the end of the school year.

Look for progress reports in Thursday folders today. We will be continuing to work hard and have many opportunities for grades to improve. Thank you for encouraging your child to do his/her best each day.

We will be having group conferences this spring. More information will be coming soon. This will be a time for your child to show off all the wonderful work that he/she did this year.

Thank you for sharing your children with me. Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

No school tomorrow. Be safe and enjoy time with your family.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Great Day at the Museum!!!!

Hi,

We had a wonderful time at the Bob Bullock Museum today. Thank you to all the parents who came and chaperoned groups. The children seemed to have a lot of fun and hopefully learned some things as well. They were very well behaved! Ask them about the movie in the Star of Destiny theater. Ask them also about the primary sources that they saw. They should have A LOT to talk about.

Reading: Next week in reading we will be practicing skills by doing an AMAZING RACE! They will have activities to complete and then earn "money" based on how they did. At the end the person with the most money wins! They will be practicing using context clues, inferencing, determining important information from interesting details, writing summaries, and determining point of view. It will be fun! We will do an activity a day this week and next Monday. We also will be reading and responding to some books about natural disasters. We are beginning some new book club groups as well.

Writing: We are continuing to work on our persuasive letters.

Math: We will be continuing to review and do problem solving.

Social Studies: We will be learning about Texas heroes and settling in the west.



Monday, April 18-Service Club Meeting after school
Monday, April 18-Thursday, April 21-Earth Week!!!!
Thursday, April 21-Writing Club after school
Friday, April 22-No School
Pen Pal Field Trip on May 2.
Science Day on May 6.
Rising Star Night on May 10

Earth Week Activities

· MONDAY 4/18- No Trash Lunch Day. On average, during one day of lunch for all grades, our students fill 15-16 large gray trash containers! That’s 75 trash bags in just 1 week! That’s a lot of trash….let’s see which classroom can create the least amount of lunchtime trash today! The top 2 classrooms in each grade will win Go Green prizes!

· TUESDAY 4/19- 3R’s (REDUSE, REUSE, RECYCLE) Day -Bring an item to school that Forest Creek currently recycles, place into appropriate bin, and keep it out of the earth’s landfills! (juice pouch, plastic water bottle, ink cartridge, cell phone, alkaline battery, aluminum can). Look for earth friendly Forest Creek reusable water bottles for sale this week!

· WEDNESDAY 4/20- Go Green…Got Plants? – Plant Sale today… .50cents per plant, receive small informative flyer on importance of plants/trees in our world. And, be sure to check out the gardens outside of Forest Creek!

· THURSDAY 4/21 Make that change day. Wear Green! How will YOU be better to the EARTH? Pass it on to a friend. (Fill out the small Green card located in envelope on the Go Green bulletin board and post it onto the bulletin board! -HOW WILL I HELP THE EARTH?)

· FRIDAY 4/22 (Holiday) EARTH DAY Turn It Off day –Try conserving electricity, water, and reducing carbon emissions around your house (turn off water while brushing your teeth, turn off your computer, room lights, fans, walk don’t drive!)

Have a great week! Let me know if you have any questions or concerns!

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter-Field trip on Friday

Hi,

We had another wonderful but busy week. Our pen pal visit on Friday was fun. We took them to our computer lab and wrote posts on our blog. Check them out! We also worked on a webquest about Antarctica. We read some books about Antarctica in reading class this week and learned even more using this cool site. Best of all, on Friday, we were able to explore with Proscopes which are very powerful microscopes that plug into a computer. We tried to look at ladybugs (they were very quick and active). We looked at our hair, skin, clothing, tissues, freckles, etc... up close! Very, very cool!!!!

We are going to visit our pen pals on Monday, May 2. We always look forward to seeing them again.

Friday was also an assembly during which we were entertained by a wonderful Jazz Band. Ask your child about it!

Reading: We read at least two books on the same topic, talked about them, and compared them. We used a lot of higher level thinking skills as we read and responded and worked on building up our reading stamina while reading non-fiction. We read about Antarctica and about the Depression. We will be continuing with this format this coming week and reading about zoos and about social situations. (getting along with others, new friends, etc...)

Writing: We finished our published books and they are being mailed on Tuesday. We also wrote interesting poems modeled after poems that we read. This week we will be learning about persuasive writing and will be writing a persuasive letter. I wonder if they will be able to convince YOU to do something after you read their letter!

Math: We have been reviewing lots of concepts like measurement, time, temperature, decimals, and place value. We had math words as vocabulary words last week and will continue to discuss math vocabulary. We will continue to play math games this week and review more with temperature, geometry, multiplication, and division.

Science and SS-We finished up learning about the moon, sun, and Earth's patterns and began some social studies. We will continue social studies this week and will have our field trip on Friday!

Rising Star- Everyone submitted either a poem or a story or both to be considered for publication in Rising Star. I was impressed that we had three of our pieces chosen for fourth grade! Congratulations to Mallory (wind poem), Jody (solo story), and Aaliyah (Mom's Closet story)! Our class is filled with awesome writers and poets. I'm so glad that three of them will be recognized in Rising Star!!!!!!

Field Trip on Friday, April 15-Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum-We are looking forward to a great day at the museum on Friday. Your child should try to wear a Forest Creek shirt or a purple or green shirt. (if possible) They will need to bring a lunch with a drink unless they ordered a sack lunch from the cafeteria. We will not be going to the gift shop so no money should be brought on the trip. We are going to see the movie The Star of Destiny and will be exploring the three floors of the museum. Each floor has a different theme-1st floor=Encounters on the Land shows the people native to Texas through European explorers, early missions, and early settlers. 2nd floor-Building the Lone Star Identity deals with the fight for independence, becoming part of the United States, then seceding to join the confederacy during the civil war. This floor continues with Juneteenth and the ways in which Texas presented itself and its identity during the 1936 World's Fair; only 100 years since its independence. 3rd floor-Creating Opportunity deals with how Texas oil impacted the state and also how Texas-led explorations in space, medicine, and technology have impacted the entire world. It is going to be a great day!

Dates to Remember:
Tuesday, April 12-PTA meeting 6:30 in library
Thursday, April 14-Poem in Your Pocket Day
Friday, April 15-Field trip to Bob Bullock Museum
Monday, April 18-Service Club Meeting after school
Monday, April 18-Thursday, April 21-Earth Week!!!!

· MONDAY 4/18- No Trash Lunch Day. On average, during one day of lunch for all grades, our students fill 15-16 large gray trash containers! That’s 75 trash bags in just 1 week! That’s a lot of trash….let’s see which classroom can create the least amount of lunchtime trash today! The top 2 classrooms in each grade will win Go Green prizes!

· TUESDAY 4/19- 3R’s (REDUSE, REUSE, RECYCLE) Day -Bring an item to school that Forest Creek currently recycles, place into appropriate bin, and keep it out of the earth’s landfills! (juice pouch, plastic water bottle, ink cartridge, cell phone, alkaline battery, aluminum can). Look for earth friendly Forest Creek reusable water bottles for sale this week!

· WEDNESDAY 4/20- Go Green…Got Plants? – Plant Sale today… .50cents per plant, receive small informative flyer on importance of plants/trees in our world. And, be sure to check out the gardens outside of Forest Creek!

· THURSDAY 4/21 Make that change day. Wear Green! How will YOU be better to the EARTH? Pass it on to a friend. (Fill out the small Green card located in envelope on the Go Green bulletin board and post it onto the bulletin board! -HOW WILL I HELP THE EARTH?)

· FRIDAY 4/22 (Holiday) EARTH DAY Turn It Off day –Try conserving electricity, water, and reducing carbon emissions around your house (turn off water while brushing your teeth, turn off your computer, room lights, fans, walk don’t drive!)

Have a great week! Let me know if you have any questions or concerns!

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Pen Pal Visit

Write about our pen pal visits. What do you like best about having pen pals? What things have we done together that you liked best? Why do you think having pen pals is important?

Write about our pen pals and comment on posts written by others.

Newsletter

Hi,

We had a great week. We worked hard on our released reading and math TAKS and the children did well. Now I know what skills we need to target and in what areas we can do some extension activities.

We have some awesome mathematicians in our classroom. I got an email about a Trimathlon Competition in Round Rock on May 14. It is free and sounds fun. I think A LOT of students in our class would do great in this competition. Let me know if you are interested and/or visit this site for more information. http://www.mathnasiumtrimathlon.com/

Reading: We used a non-fiction book called How do Animals Adapt? to practice taking notes using expository text, using text features(subtitles, glossary, index, table of context, photos, captions, etc...) We also practice writing summaries. Summaries are one of those tricky things. A summary needs to tell about the beginning, middle, and end of the passage and use summary statements. It shouldn't include a bunch of details but the most important parts to get the gist or main idea of the passage. We also chose non-fiction books to use as book club books. We read and took notes. Then wrote summaries and responses to the book. We met with others who read the same book and talked about some facts from the book, what the author's purpose may have been to write the book and how the author organized the book. We created posters and shared this information with the class. They did very well. Next week each child will read at least two books on the same basic topic and compare and contrast the books and the information learned with their book groups. We will be reading about Anarctica (two different books) and then later in the week, we will read about The Depression/The Dust Bowl (two different books). We will share what we've learned with the whole class.

Writing: We are writing poems about weather (If I were a thunderstorm...., If I were a snowflake...,etc...) We are also helping each other finish our published books. We are all almost done. Next week we will be writing more poetry.

Math: We are continuing to work on different types of measurement. We will be working with time and temperature this week. We will also be solving lots of problems and reviewing some geometry.

Science: We will continue learning about the moon, the sun, and patterns of the Earth and will have a test on Tuesday. We will be finishing up an activity on phases of the moon and do a demonstration of the phases on Monday. We will also review a little for the test on Tuesday.

Social Studies: We will be working on Frontier, Urbanization, and Citizenship for the next couple of weeks.

Pen Pal Visit on Friday, April 8-Our pen pals will be coming to visit us on Friday, April 8. We are planning on using technology with them in the computer lab. Come visit with us!

Attached is a flyer for writing camp at UT this summer. It sounds wonderful!!!!! Check it out.


Dates to Remember:

Monday, April 4 and Tuesday, April 5-Fifth Grade TAKS test-no visitors allowed on campus
Monday, April 4-Service Learning Club in PTA portable
Tuesday, April 5-Science test
Thursday, April 7-Writing Club afterschool until 4:00
Friday, April 8-Pen Pal Visit at FCE from 10:00-11:00
Jazz Band Concert-1:45
Friday, April 15-Field Trip to Bob Bullock Museum
Friday, April 22-No school
Tuesday, April 26-Math TAKS test 3rd and 4th grade
Wednesday, April 27-Reading TAKS test 3rd and 4th grade

Have a great weekend! Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Thanks,
Pam

Science test on Tuesday, April 5

Hi,

I attached the study guide for next Tuesday's science test. We haven't covered all of the topics yet but I wanted you to have enough time to go over the material with your child. I pasted some websites on the study guide so eventhough your child will receive a hard copy tomorrow, you may want to use this attached version so that you can get to the websites easily.

We are finishing up our published books! Every child will receive a free hard cover copy of their book. If you would like to order another copy, you need to fill out the form and send it in by Friday. If you didn't turn in a form yet (you need to check that you don't want another copy and sign it) then please do so by Friday.

I also attached a flyer about a service project that one of our staff's high schooler is doing. She is collected gently used coloring books, etc... for children at Dell's Children's Hospital. These items are due on Friday.

Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Have a great day!!!!


Thanks,
Pam Bartholomew

Newsletter March 25, 2011

Hi,

We had a talkative but productive week. Spring fever may have hit a few kids a little early. We have a wonderful class but many like to socialize A LOT. We will be having fun in the weeks to come but do still have a lot of work to do for the end of fourth grade. I will give them time to chat but we need to keep working and learning as well.

Our pen pal visit went very well today! We were able to glaze bowls together for the Empty Bowl Project. Reminder-The Empty Bowl project will be on Saturday, April 2 from 11-3 at the First United Methodist Church on Mays St. The Empty Bowl Project will benefit the Round Rock Area Serving Center. We will be having another pen pal visit at our school on Friday, April 8. We will be doing something in the computer lab with them. Many of our pen pals commented to me today about how much they love meeting with your children. They look forward to our visits very much and love interacting with them. You are welcome to join us.

We also visited with our 1st grade reading buddies today and helped them research frogs. Then we read together. Mrs. Garcia told me that her students told their Junior Achievement Teacher who much our class helps them with their reading and how much they appreciate us.

We talked a little today about how much of a positive impact they are having on others (young and old) by working together, being kind and helpful, and basically being themselves. It was nice to hear such positive comments about our class today! You should be proud of your child!

Reading-We discussed media literacy this week and played lots of games to see how producers and advertisers try to persuade us. We also learned that even when reading non-fiction we have to be aware of the author's point of view because the author decides what facts to put in or leave out based on what he/she thinks is important. Someone who loved sharks would write an article with a different feeling and possibly different information than someone who was terrifed of sharks.

Writing-We worked on our published books. A few of us are finished with the writing and illustrating of their books! They go to the publisher soon, so we will be finishing them up this week. We will also do some poetry.

Math-Measurement is still our topic. We will continue to think about appropriate units to use when measuring and solve some problems dealing with measurement. We will also continue to work on area, perimeter, and volume. Transformations (reflections, rotations, and translations) will be coming our way this week as well.

Science-We learned about weather this week and took our test today. (They did well) We will be talking about the sun and moon next week.

We are taking a released math TAKS test on Tuesday and a released reading TAKS test on Wednesday. This will give us information about specific skills that our students are mastering and which ones still need some review.

Thank you for sharing your child with me.

Let me know if you have any questions or concerns. Have a great weekend!

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

Great Day!

Hi,

We had a wonderful first day of the fourth marking period in fourth grade! We played a game using a balloon, teamwork, and focus to remind us that we need to continue to work hard, work together, and pay attention to our goals so that we can continue to learn everyday from now until the end of the school year and for the rest of our lives.

Everyone was excited to see each other and we talked a lot but worked hard as well.

We are working on measurement in math. Talk to your child about measuring at home whenever possible. Practicing measuring in real-life situations helps in many ways. We have created this chart and refer to it to help us as we measure in class.

Units Tools Types
Inches, feet, miles, Ruler, yard stick, meter stick LENGTH
yards, meters, centimeters, odometer, tape measure, pedometer
kilometers, millimeters


Pounds, ton, ounces, gram, Triple beam balance, scale, WEIGHT or MASS
kilogram, metric ton pan balance



Liter, milliliter, pint, Eye dropper/pipette, CAPACITY/VOLUME
fluid ounces, gallon, quart, graduated cylinder,cup
measuring cups


months, days, weeks, Stop watch, clocks, calendar TIME

minutes, hour, seconds,
years

Fahrenheit, Celsius Thermometer TEMPERATURE


We will be having a science test on Friday. It will be on weather and study guides came home before spring break. Try to watch weather reports on the news this week and discuss some of the terms used.

The students brought home a TV Diary today. They need to record at least one show that they watch and rate it. They also should be describing some commercials. A peper with questions about commercials will be coming home tomorrow. We will be using a PBS website to discuss media literacy and reading information critically.

Our pen pals are coming to school on Friday to glaze their bowls for the Empty Bowl project on April 2. Feel free to come and visit with our wonderful pen pals.

Rising Star Entries are due on April 1. Artwork, poetry, and narratives can be submitted. Three pieces from each category will be selected by each grade level. We will be having a Rising Star Night in May. Encourage your student to submit some of their great pieces.

Writing Club-on Thursday afterschool in the library!

Have a great week and I'm glad that everyone had a nice spring break.

Sincerely,
Pam