Hi,
We had a busy and great week! We had to say goodbye to our friend, the tarantula. We enjoyed observing and learning about him/her.
Thank you for meeting with me during conferences. I enjoyed seeing all of you and discussing your child’s goals. Thank you for all your support and, as always, let me know if you have any questions or concerns.
Most of us wore orange on Wednesday to celebrate National Bully-Free Day! We talked about treating others with respect and watched a bullying Brain-pop!
The FCE Service Club is leading a Diaper Drive for the Round Rock Serving Center. When we volunteered at the center in September, we noticed a few clients asking for diapers and that shelf was empty! If you would like to donate diapers (any size) ask your child to drop them off in the box outside of the office. Thank you!
Our pen pals are coming on Tuesday! We are excited to see them and wrote letters to them today. We will be planning some activities for our visit on Monday.
On Monday, we will have our entire fourth grade will have a visit with the author, Phil Bildner! We are so excited about meeting him and learning about writing from him.
Read about our week:
Reading-We read a book called, The Other Side, which is a realistic fiction book. The book was about an African American girl and a white girl who live next door with a fence separating their yards. They watch each other from their respective sides of the fence and finally become friends. They hope that someday that fence will be knocked down. We talked about what that meant, metaphorically, and discussed a bit about civil rights. We did lots of independent reading then practiced leaving tracks of our thinking. We also read some books about matter.
Writing-Most of us finished our final copy of our personal narrative as well as our essays on No Hate Schools. We wrote these essays for a contest sponsored by Austin Family Magazine. We learned the basic format for an essay and that a personal narrative tells a story but an essay teaches something. We wrote about ways that we could make our school a safe place for everyone regardless of their differences. We will continue writing essays using topics of our choice next week.
Math-We had a great time working with patterns and algebra. Input/output charts, repeating patterns, and growing patterns have all been fun! We look for a pattern and then work to discover a formula with an unknown that can be used to work with that pattern. We also continued with multiplication and division within problem solving situations. We will be working more with algebra and patterns next week and beginning work with time and temperature.
Science-Changes in matter experiments have been fun! We put ice and salt in an aluminum can and stirred. It was cool to see the frost form on the outside of the can. We also put blue food coloring and ice in a plastic cup of water. Water droplets formed on the outside of the cup and when we wiped the droplets with a white paper towel the towel wasn’t blue. These two explorations helped us realize that the water and frost did not come through the cup or can but were the result of the cool container cooling the warm air around it and the condensation came from the air, not from the inside out of the container! We also discussed insulation and tested some materials by wrapping ice in Styrofoam, bubble wrap, flannel, sand, and towels. The sand and the flannel was the least effective insulation. The others were all about the same. Reminder: We are having a test on matter on Thursday, October 18. Be sure to go to Stemscopes (FCE site, for students, Stemscopes, username: Bartholomew, password: bats) to study.
Social Studies: We began researching early Texans. Each group will research a tribe and present the information to the class. We will be focusing on the following facts: in which region did they live, what natural resources did they use, what type of food did they eat and how did they get it, what was the appearance of the homes, were the people nomadic (moved in search of food) or non-nomadic (permanent houses).
Each group will be presenting their information to the class soon. If your child would like to do some extra credit work: he/she can create something extra about their tribe (poster, diorama, play, movie, power point, etc….)
Dates to remember:
Monday, October 15-Phil Bildner visit!
Tuesday, October 16-Pen Pal Visit in library, 9:30-11:00
Thursday, October 18-Matter Test, Writing Club begins in library-2:45-3:45
Friday, October 19-Spirit Day!
Saturday, October 20-Service Club Volunteers at Round Rock Serving Center 9-10
Tuesday, October 23-Individual Photo Day
Have a great weekend!
Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew
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