Bartholomew Bats!


Our school is located in Round Rock, Texas which is near Austin. Austin and Round Rock both have huge populations of Mexican Free Tailed Bats that live under our bridges. A colony of bats lives beneath the Ann Richards/Congress Avenue Bridge in Austin and in Round Rock, another colony resides under the Interstate 35 bridge over McNeil Road. Each evening from March to about October, the bats fly out from beneath the bridge and search for insects to eat. The emergence of the bats is a wonder to watch. We are also thankful that all these millions of bats eat the bugs by our homes.

Our class mascot is the Bat to honor the mammals that live so close to us and help us. (also because Bat and Bartholomew both start with the letter B!) The bats in Central Texas live together in a group and help take care of the young. Then they migrate together as a team. Our class will also live together in our classroom, work together as a team, and help each other out. We are the Bartholomew Bats!





Friday, January 4, 2013

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!

I look forward to seeing all of you on Monday at school and hopefully will see some of you at the Round Rock Serving Center tomorrow from 9-10 am.

I know that you have enjoyed reading over the holidays so remember to have your completed reading log (at least 300 min.) to turn in on Monday. Everyone is required to read 300 minutes, however, those students who read more than 300 min. will receive a prize. Those who didn't meet the 300 minutes expectation will need to go to study hall. :( If you didn't quite make it, read a lot this weekend and you will get there! We will be starting a different at home reading log that will need a parent signature for the new year.

Be sure to continue to practice multiplication, division, addition, and subtraction facts as well as problem solving and other math concepts. You can go to sites on our math links section of our class webpage or many other downloadable games and activities. Check with your parents first before downloading anything.

Science Project checkpoint #3 will be due on Thursday, January 10. You will need to think about uncommon words that you discovered or used so far in your project and list the word and the definition. Remember that a word may be easy for you but tricky for others so any words that could be tricky would need a definition. You also will need to include background information. What research are you doing or did you do to help you with your project? Write to explain it and be sure to remember the source for your bibliography.

Be sure to go to our Moodle page and have fun completing some activities as well as connecting with friends. Be sure to comment on other people's posts as well.

Enjoy this weekend and I can't wait to see you ready to go on Monday! Be thinking about your goals. We will revisit the goals set at conference time and adjust or modify for the new semester and the second half of fourth grade.

Sincerely,
Pam Bartholomew

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